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For decades, trading gold meant a commodities broker, trading Tesla meant a stock broker, and both meant paperwork, market hours and a middleman holding your money. In 2026 that's optional: gold, silver, oil and US equities now trade as perpetual contracts on decentralized exchanges — around the clock, from a crypto wallet, with no account application whatsoever.
You're not buying tokenized shares or vaulted metal. These are perpetual futures: synthetic contracts whose price is pinned to the real-world asset by oracle feeds and funding payments. You post USDC margin, choose long or short, and your PnL tracks the underlying — XAU, WTI, a stock, an index — exactly as crypto perps track BTC.
That design brings three things brokers can't offer:
| Asset | Aster | Hyperliquid | Lighter |
|---|---|---|---|
| Gold (XAU) | Yes | Yes (HIP-3) | Yes — 0% fees, 15x |
| Silver (XAG) | Yes | Yes (HIP-3) | Yes — 0% fees, 10x |
| Oil (WTI) | Selected contracts | Yes (HIP-3) | Yes |
| US stocks (single names) | Yes — widest range | Selected via builder markets | 30+ names |
| S&P 500 / ETF exposure | Index products | Yes (HIP-3) | SPY, QQQ |
| Forex | Yes | — | Yes |
Aster is the broadest TradFi venue — US equity perps, forex and metals are core products, not experiments. For a dedicated FX map, see our trade forex on DEX guide. Hyperliquid added commodities and index exposure through HIP-3 builder-deployed markets, backed by the deepest liquidity engine in DeFi (note: HIP-3 markets carry roughly double base fees, set by the market deployer). Lighter quietly built wide RWA coverage too — gold, silver, oil, forex, US stocks and ETFs — all at its trademark 0% retail fees. For a ticker-by-ticker map, see our stock perpetual contracts list.
Gold, silver, stocks and forex — no broker, no paperwork, no market hours. Aster has the widest range; Hyperliquid the deepest books.
Trade TradFi Perps on Aster →