The acquisition brings almost a decade of decentralized change infrastructure to Katana, delivering exponential progress in perpetual buying and selling volumes and an always-on market that redefines value discovery.
March 23, 2026 at 9:00 a.m. ET– Katana, the DeFi-first blockchain developed by Polygon Labs and GSR, at the moment introduced the acquisition of IDEX, one of many earliest decentralized exchanges, and the launch of Katana Perps, a perpetual futures platform designed to unify spot and derivatives buying and selling inside a single on-chain atmosphere.
The acquisition marks the primary main transfer beneath new CEO Matthew Fisher. Mr. Fisher has been driving Katana’s strategic enlargement since becoming a member of the corporate, reflecting his imaginative and prescient to personal extra of the buying and selling stack and seize the income that comes with it.
The transfer comes as U.S. regulators sign a path towards permitting crypto perpetual futures, marking a possible inflection level for on-chain derivatives. On the similar time, buying and selling exercise continues to shift to always-on markets, and value discovery more and more happens in real-time slightly than inside mounted buying and selling hours.
As world markets adapt to new realities, macro dangers not bide their time, reinforcing the significance of a steady, always-on buying and selling atmosphere. That shift was evident this month, amid the Iran disaster, when oil futures buying and selling on HyperLiquid elevated to $7.3 billion by March 13, highlighting the growing use of 24/7 exchanges for real-time value discovery when conventional markets are closed.
Katana’s enlargement into Perpetual is designed to seize that change. By integrating spot liquidity, routing, and derivatives right into a single stack, the decentralized Katana platform is designed to help steady markets and extra environment friendly capital deployment for each crypto-native and institutional traders.
Perpetuals have turn into some of the essential battlegrounds in on-chain transactions. In January 2026 alone, PERP DEX buying and selling quantity reached $739.48 billion, with the decentralized change accounting for 10.2% of all crypto perpetual buying and selling, a big improve from 2.0% two years in the past. Katana’s acquisition of IDEX and the launch of Katana Perps will allow the corporate to satisfy that demand with a extra built-in on-chain buying and selling atmosphere. At launch, Katana Perps is supported by market makers similar to GSR, Selini Capital, and Auros. These corporations consider buying and selling infrastructure from numerous points, together with counterparty and custody danger, reliability and uptime, and execution high quality.
The transfer additionally displays broader modifications in Katana’s technique beneath Matthew Fisher, who has been named Katana’s chief government officer, a task that formalizes the strategic possession he has exercised since becoming a member of the corporate. Fisher designed Katana’s enlargement technique, together with securing partnerships with OKX and Binance (making Katana the primary DeFi venture to concurrently run acquisition campaigns on each platforms) and pursuing acquisitions that may enable Katana to personal extra of the on-chain buying and selling stack.
Previous to his management function at Katana, he held positions in digital asset coverage, ecosystem progress, and DeFi market infrastructure at Diem Affiliation (previously Libra) and Polygon Labs, and beforehand served as Head of Enterprise Growth at Buttonwood, the place he helped launch DeFi lending and yield merchandise.
“After I turned CEO, we determined that Katana wanted to personal extra of that stack and the income that comes with it. IDEX and Katana Perps are the primary strikes in that course,” Fisher mentioned. “With always-on markets turning into the default venue for real-time value discovery and the regulatory atmosphere paving the way in which for on-chain perpetual entry, we’d like the infrastructure layer in place now. That’s what we’re constructing.”
“Matthew has been instrumental in constructing Katana into what it’s at the moment,” mentioned Marc Boiron, CEO of Polygon Labs. “This subsequent step displays each the energy of the foundations already in place and the rising demand for extra superior on-chain buying and selling infrastructure.”
Based in 2017, IDEX was the primary decentralized change to mix a high-performance matching engine with on-chain funds, and till 2019 was essentially the most lively decentralized change on Ethereum, persistently rating #1 in buying and selling quantity and variety of transactions amongst all DEX protocols. Its expertise and operational expertise (almost 10 years of reside buying and selling infrastructure) powers Katana Perps, enabling greater throughput execution and deeper liquidity because the platform scales.
Katana Perps is now reside and introducing leveraged buying and selling, directional publicity, and built-in liquidity inside an built-in buying and selling atmosphere. The platform is designed to help institutional-level workflows whereas remaining accessible to crypto-native customers.
Further particulars concerning the migration of current IDEX merchandise, dealing with of IDEX tokens, and knowledge for current IDEX token holders will probably be shared by way of official Katana and Katana Perps channels.
About Katana
Developed by Polygon Labs and GSR, Katana is a purpose-built DeFi blockchain that orchestrates purposes, customers, and on-chain income to ship deep liquidity and sustainable returns. The community makes use of progressive mechanisms similar to Vault Bridge, chain-owned liquidity, and centralized protocol deployment to maximise, slightly than extract, the worth of lively customers. Katana takes a novel method to DeFi infrastructure, leading to superior capital effectivity and consumer expertise in comparison with conventional blockchain designs.
For extra info, please go to katana.community.
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