A brief introduction to the GMTrade protocol: it has become the third-largest perpetual DEX on the Solana chain

Author | Wood

This content is provided by a third party and does not represent Wu Shuo’s views.

1. Project Overview

GMTrade (formerly GMXSOL) officially launched on the Solana mainnet on March 12, 2025. The protocol is based on a liquidity pool architecture, approved by GMX DAO voting, and deployed and iteratively developed by an independent team on Solana. It aims to build a decentralized perpetual contract system, extending the mature Perp trading mechanism from EVM networks like Arbitrum to Solana, and exploring more efficient liquidity management solutions.

As the project enters a new development phase, the team completed a rebranding on November 26, 2025, changing from GMXSOL to GMTrade to strengthen its independent brand identity. It was also announced that GT points will be used as participation credentials during the upcoming TGE phase.

2. Market Performance and Growth Momentum

As of the latest data at the end of February, GMTrade’s core operational metrics have seen significant growth:

● 24-hour trading volume exceeds $200 million

● Open interest (OI) surpasses $30 million

● Total value locked (TVL) approaches $15 million

Currently, GMTrade has become the third-largest Perp DEX on Solana and continues to grow.

This performance validates the adaptability of its liquidity pool architecture on Solana and demonstrates market recognition of the TLP model and RWA expansion pathways.

3. Core Architecture Design

GMTrade’s core architecture includes:

● Market-isolated GM Pools

● Dynamic Funding Fee adjustment mechanism

● Global Liquidity Vault (GLV) for cross-market liquidity scheduling

This design leverages Solana’s high-performance parallel environment to achieve higher capital efficiency and risk isolation.

4. Perpetual Contract Models: Orderbook vs Trader-to-LP

The main types of decentralized perpetual contract platforms on Solana are:

1. Orderbook Model

Drift Protocol uses a hybrid matching architecture combining on-chain limit order books (CLOB), virtual AMM (vAMM), and JIT liquidity mechanisms, supporting limit trading and active market-making strategies, more suitable for proactive traders.

2. Trader-to-LP (TLP) Model

Both GMTrade and Jupiter Perp adopt the TLP architecture. Users interact directly with liquidity pools, with prices determined by oracles and pricing functions.

Jupiter Perp employs a unified large liquidity pool model, which is simple but has limited risk isolation.

In contrast, GMTrade uses a multi-pool architecture with GM Pool risk isolation and GLV unified scheduling, offering better scalability and risk control.

5. Architectural Evolution: From Single Large Pool to Multi-Pool Model

Using a single liquidity pool can lead to risk concentration and position imbalance.

The multi-pool reconstruction includes:

● Independent Market GM Pools

● Dynamic Funding Fee balancing mechanism

● GLV cross-pool coordination system

With the introduction of GLV, risk isolation is maintained while further improving capital efficiency.

Currently, GMTrade supports markets for indices, stocks, commodities, and forex outside of crypto assets. Future plans include introducing permissionless GM Pool creation mechanisms to gradually realize the long-term goal of “Trade Everything.”

6. Cross-Chain Expansion Logic

GMX has long been a leading decentralized derivatives protocol on Arbitrum.

However, Arbitrum faces single-thread performance bottlenecks and gas congestion during extreme market conditions.

Deploying on Solana benefits from its parallel processing architecture and lower latency.

With over $200 million in daily trading volume and continuously growing OI and TVL, Solana’s performance advantages are gradually translating into actual trading depth.

7. LP Revenue Mechanisms and Security System

LP risks are isolated via GM Pools.

Revenue sources include:

● Trading fee sharing

● GT point incentives

On the security front:

● Multiple audits by Sherlock

● Zenith audits

● Chainlink Data Streams oracle support

8. GT Points and TGE Credential System

GT refers to the on-chain points system of GMTrade (GT Points).

In the upcoming TGE, GT Points will serve as a record of historical contributions, used to determine participation eligibility and allocation weights.

1. Allocation Targets

GT is distributed to:

● Trading users

● Liquidity providers

● Referral contributors

2. Initial Generation Cost

The initial cost is approximately $0.01 per unit.

For example:

If a user pays $5 in fees, they receive 500 GT Points.

3. Exponential Increment Mechanism

Every time 210,000 GT are generated, the cost increases by 2.1%.

This mechanism controls the pace of point distribution and encourages early participation.

4. Bitcoin-Inspired Structure

Bitcoin uses a halving mechanism to control supply.

GT adopts:

● Smaller incremental steps

● Higher frequency

● Smoother exponential growth

This analogy is for supply control ideas only and does not imply GT is a crypto asset.

5. Adaptive Incentive System

VIP levels and referral mechanisms enhance point earning efficiency.

Different users have varying point efficiencies based on their contributions to the ecosystem.

9. Summary

Building on GMX V2’s multi-pool architecture advantages and leveraging Solana’s high performance, GMTrade creates a scalable and risk-isolated decentralized perpetual contract platform. It focuses on the highly watched RWA markets, including stocks, forex, commodities, and indices, greatly expanding the strategic scope for crypto-native traders.

As of the end of February:

● Daily trading volume exceeds $200 million

● OI surpasses $30 million

● TVL approaches $15 million

● It has become the third-largest Perp DEX on Solana

Through architecture optimization, capital efficiency, and the GT incentive system, GMTrade is entering an accelerated growth phase.

GT Points, as an ecosystem incentive tool and future TGE credential, will play a vital role in the protocol’s long-term development.

With continuous improvements in product capabilities, liquidity depth, and user base, GMTrade’s market position and growth potential within the Solana ecosystem are worth long-term attention.