dYdX: security, fees and reviews
Decentralized exchange
In short
- Legal entity
- dYdX International Ltd, Cayman Islands (runs dydx.xyz)
- Fees
- Futures taker: 0.050% (5.0 bps) at tier 1, under $1M 30-day volume (as of 31 October 2026)
- Risks and caveats
- Not a regulated exchange: no licence is held for the protocol, and it is closed to US, Canadian and UK persons for perpetuals.
- Checked
- 31 October 2026
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Key facts
- Type
- Decentralized exchange
- Exchange launched
- 2017
- Operator
- No single operator: dYdX Chain (v4) is run by validators and governed by DYDX holders; software by dYdX Trading Inc. (dYdX Labs); dydx.trade front end by dYdX Operations Services Ltd.
- Official site
- dydx.xyz
Key facts checked on 31 October 2026 against official sources.
What is dYdX
dYdX is a decentralised exchange for perpetual futures (and some spot trading) that runs on its own blockchain, dYdX Chain (v4), released in 2023. Users keep custody of their funds; the order book is run by validators and fees are set by governance. The software developer, dYdX Trading Inc., has worked on perpetual markets since 2017.
Good to know
- dYdX Trading Inc. and dYdX International Ltd state that they do not run or control the public dYdX Chain; front ends are run by independent deployers. ↗
- The dydx.trade front end is operated by dYdX Operations Services Ltd., described as independent from dYdX. ↗
- Perpetuals trading is prohibited for persons in the United States, Canada and the United Kingdom; VPN use to get around this is prohibited. ↗
- The old v3 exchange on Ethereum halted trading on 28 October 2024; dYdX Chain (v4) was unaffected. ↗
- On 30 June 2026 dYdX Labs launched Arcus, a separate DEX with Robinhood Chain; dYdX v4 stays supported and funds remain accessible. ↗
- Fees are set by dYdX governance and can change; staking DYDX can give fee discounts. ↗
Services
| Parameter | Details |
|---|---|
| Derivatives | Perpetual futures on 200+ markets with instant market listings. |
| Spot trading | Solana spot trading through the front end and Telegram. |
| Own blockchain | dYdX Chain (v4), an open-source chain where validators run the order book. |
| Own token | DYDX, used for governance and staking (staking gives fee discounts). |
| Custody / wallet | Self-custody: users keep control of funds. |
Security and audits
- Trading is self-custodial; the developer states it never holds user funds.
- The protocol has an insurance fund for liquidation losses.
- On 10-11 October 2025 dYdX Chain halted after a liquidation-ordering error; the developer published a post-mortem and a compensation proposal for affected traders.
Security incidents
| Date | What happened | Source |
|---|---|---|
| 18 November 2023 | Oracle incident: On dYdX v3, an attacker built 5x leveraged long positions in YFI-USD while YFI's spot price rose; when YFI's price fell nearly 30% in an hour on 18 November 2023, the positions could not be liquidated in time and the insurance fund covered the losses, a drain of more than $9 million. dYdX described it as what appears to be an oracle manipulation attack and said no user funds were compromised. | dydx.exchange |
| 23 July 2024 | Domain hijack: The dydx.exchange domain (dYdX v3 front end) was taken over at the registrar Squarespace through a social-engineering account recovery; the attacker hosted a malicious site asking connected wallets to transfer ETH and ERC-20 tokens. dYdX stated 2 users were affected with about $31,000 in lost funds, and that no smart contract, backend or dYdX Chain issues were found. An earlier nameserver change on 9 July 2024 was blocked by DNSSEC. | dydx.xyz |
| 10 October 2025 | Network halt: dYdX Chain halted after a misordered process in collateral pool transfers during liquidations in isolated markets triggered a protocol-level failsafe; after the restart, trades and liquidations were processed at incorrect prices due to stale oracle data until oracles were fixed on 11 October 2025. Funds returned: The developer proposed that governance compensate affected users from the protocol insurance fund: about 2.85% of the fund, roughly $462,000 of $16 million, if approved by governance. | dydx.xyz |
Further incidents are reported by third parties (press, incident databases) but are not confirmed in the company’s own channels, so they are not listed here.
Fees
| Parameter | Details |
|---|---|
| Futures taker | 0.050% (5.0 bps) at tier 1, under $1M 30-day volume (as of 31 October 2026) |
| Futures maker | 0.010% (1.0 bps) at tier 1; rebates at the top tiers (as of 31 October 2026) |
| Deposits | Deposits of $100 or more are free, per the dYdX website (as of 31 October 2026) |
Who can use it
- Verification: No account-level identity verification in the protocol; users connect a self-custody wallet. Users must confirm they are not restricted persons.
- Perpetuals software may not be used by persons in the United States, Canada or the United Kingdom; no dYdX software for persons in sanctioned territories such as Iran, Cuba and North Korea.
History
| Date | Event |
|---|---|
| 2017 | dYdX Trading Inc. starts building perpetual markets trading. |
| 2021 | dYdX (v3) becomes the largest decentralised exchange by trading volume, per dYdX. |
| 2023 | dYdX Chain (v4) is released as a fully open-source chain. |
| 28 October 2024 | Trading on the v3 exchange halts; users withdraw USDC from the Ethereum contract. |
| 10 October 2025 | dYdX Chain outage during liquidations; compensation proposed for affected traders. |
| 30 June 2026 | dYdX Labs launches Arcus with Robinhood Chain; dYdX v4 continues. |
Risks and caveats
- Not a regulated exchange: no licence is held for the protocol, and it is closed to US, Canadian and UK persons for perpetuals.
- Leveraged perpetuals carry a high risk of loss; the chain halted in October 2025 and trades at stale oracle prices were later reviewed for compensation.
- Fees and parameters can be changed by governance votes.
- dYdX Labs' new focus is Arcus; dYdX v4 continues to be supported.
About the company
- Legal entity
- dYdX International Ltd, Cayman Islands (runs dydx.xyz)
- Legal entity
- dYdX Trading Inc., doing business as dYdX Labs (software developer)
- Founders
- Antonio Juliano
- Founded
- 2017 (GitHub organisation created 5 January 2018)
- Own token
- DYDX
Official links
- Website: www.dydx.xyz
- Fees: docs.dydx.xyz/concepts/trading/rewards
- Terms of use: dydx.exchange/v4-terms
- Status: status.dydx.trade
- Blog: www.dydx.xyz/blog
Questions and answers
Is dYdX regulated?
No. dYdX is a decentralised protocol without a financial licence; its software terms bar perpetuals use from the US, Canada and the UK.
What are dYdX's fees?
At tier 1 (under $1M 30-day volume) taker fees are 0.050% and maker fees 0.010% (as of 31 October 2026); governance can change them.
Who runs dYdX?
Validators run dYdX Chain; dYdX Trading Inc. (dYdX Labs) writes the software, and dYdX Operations Services Ltd. runs the dydx.trade front end.
Is dYdX v3 still available?
No. v3 trading halted on 28 October 2024; dYdX Chain (v4) is the current version.
Does dYdX hold user funds?
No. Trading is self-custodial, and the developer states it never custodies user funds.
Sources
- dYdX - Home
- dYdX - Terms of Use (dydx.xyz)
- dYdX - Software Terms of Use (v4)
- dYdX - Chain Front End Options
- dYdX Documentation - Rewards, Fees and Parameters
- dYdX - Annual Report 2025
- dYdX Blog - v3 Product Sunset
- dYdX Blog - v4 full decentralization
- dYdX Blog - October 2025 Incident
- dYdX Blog - A New Arc (30 June 2026)
- GitHub - dydxprotocol organisation
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