Kaiko: On-chain trades may have front-run Robinhood listings

Analytics firm Kaiko reported on-chain trading and perpetual futures data that show some traders opened positions on tokens such as LIT, SNX and ZEC shortly before Robinhood announced listings. Kaiko highlighted patterns in funding rates, trading volume and open interest that appeared in the hours before public notices.

Kaiko identified a wallet labeled 0xa1E that opened a long on Lighter (LIT) on the decentralized exchange Hyperliquid at 11:05 UTC on Jan. 15. Robinhood announced the listing at 12:12 UTC that day. The wallet closed the long at about 13:00 UTC, shortly after the public announcement.

The same wallet opened a short on a HOOD-linked perpetual contract on April 28, hours before Robinhood reported Q1 revenue that missed analyst expectations. That short position was closed later the same day as HOOD’s price declined.

Kaiko flagged similar activity for other tokens that Robinhood listed, including Zcash (ZEC), Synthetix (SNX) and Near Protocol (NEAR). The firm documented surges in open interest and funding rates in the hours leading up to the public listing notices and recorded average abnormal returns for those coins in the periods just before and after announcements. Kaiko used minute-by-minute trading and on-chain records from Hyperliquid to trace the sequences of trades.

Laurens Fraussen, a researcher at Kaiko, wrote that the patterns could reflect traders reacting to observable derivatives metrics or access to non-public information. He noted:

Traders that know how microstructure works could have noticed the funding spikes, increase in volumes and open interest spikes, and position based on that.

Fraussen also pointed to clustering of activity across multiple wallets prior to announcements.

Perpetual futures contracts do not have a fixed expiry and use periodic funding payments between long and short holders to keep contract prices aligned with spot prices. Funding rate spikes, rising open interest and sudden volume growth can be observed on-chain and in derivatives feeds and may show positions being established ahead of anticipated events.

Kaiko’s report states it did not find direct evidence of insider leaks and did not allege legal wrongdoing. The firm presented the observed patterns and the data sources used, including exchange records, perpetual contract metrics and wallet-level transaction histories, as the basis for its timeline and analysis.

Robinhood has added multiple crypto listings in recent years, and its public announcements have affected token prices. Kaiko’s findings outline on-chain and derivatives activity that coincided with several listing notices and provide trade-level timelines for further review.