Hydration ran a treasury-funded market maker on Krakens HDX/USD and HDX/EUR books from 22 May to 11 September 2026. Referendum 335 funded the three-month test, the three-month review reported on it and referendum 382 renewed the mandate for six months on 19 August.

Eight days after that renewal, Kraken announced it was delisting HDX along with 20 other assets. Trading stopped on 11 September at 14:00 UTC. That's why the service ended - the venue closed.

The treasury finished roughly $8,700 ahead. Every asset it put to work came back bigger than it went out.

What the treasury deployed and what came back

8,000,000 HDX and 59,000 stablecoins went out across the two referenda. 9,268,308 HDX and 63,217 stablecoins came back, plus the fees the program paid the treasury while it ran.

	HDX	HOLLAR	USDC	USDT
Ref 335 inventory · 21 May	−8,000,000	−19,500	−19,500	—
Ref 335 operator fee · 21 May	—	−3,600	—	—
Ref 382 inventory · 19 Aug	—	−20,000	—	—
Ref 382 operator fee · 19 Aug	—	−7,200	—	—
Fees paid to treasury	+5,096.95	—	+60.04	+60.02
Final sweep · 15 Sep	+9,268,308.20	+43,717.34	+19,500.06	—
Unearned fee refund · 16 Sep	—	+6,000	—	—
Net to treasury	+1,273,405.14	−582.66	+60.10	+60.02

The whole inventory went back in one transaction: 14633438-2. Kraken itself was emptied on 11 September, after the trading stop, so nothing was left to be caught by the December withdrawal cutoff or the forced liquidation after it.

Ref 382 prepaid six months of operator fee and the service only ran one of them. The unearned 6,000 HOLLAR went back at 14688562-e8.

Net of the 4,800 HOLLAR the operator actually earned, that leaves about $8,700 of value created, held in kind rather than as a paper mark. The program's hedging also generated roughly $1,700 of Omnipool fees, most of which reached the treasury as the holder of 97% of the HDX pool - though any arbitrageur closing the same gap would have produced similar fees, so that part isn't unique to the program.

None of Kraken's stated delisting triggers were met

Kraken's listing policy names three grounds for removing an asset.

Sustained illiquidity. August 2026 was one of the biggest month HDX ever traded on Kraken, at $589.6k. Across the whole venue it ranked #362 of 638 listed assets by 30-day volume, up 100 places in a month, ahead of 276 other Kraken listings. And the book was guaranteed two-sided by a funded program that cost Kraken nothing.

Repeated technical failures. None, across three and a half years listed. No halted deposits, no withdrawal issues, no chain stalls.

Adverse regulatory action. Nothing against HDX or Hydration. The same batch contained an asset flagged for compliance, one the SEC ruled a security and one under DOJ investigation, so it can't be read as one standard applied evenly to 21 names.

Monthly HDX volume on Kraken, USD-equivalent, EUR converted at 1.15. Before the program HDX averaged about $36k a month; over the program's three full months it averaged $335k. The split starts 22 May when the program went live, so May's pink segment only covers the last ten days of the month. September covers 1–11 September, when trading was cut off.

Where HDX sat inside its own delisting batch

Of the 21 assets named, four had effectively dead books, a fifth had lost 98% of its volume pace and five were dead or impaired protocols. HDX came 4th by 30-day volume and was one of only two names in the batch with a positive 90-day price return - the only one where volume and price were both rising.

Kraken volume in the 30 days to 27 August 2026, USD and EUR pairs combined. Notes on the right flag assets that aren't fair volume comparables.

And where it sat on Kraken as a whole

All 638 Kraken-listed base assets ranked by 30-day USD-equivalent volume across 1,245 online pairs. The pink section is the 276 assets (43%) that traded less than HDX. Pairs already in cancel-only or post-only mode are excluded.

---

Hydration tried to appeal the delisting and reached out through several channels, but never got far enough to make the case. It went ahead anyway. The numbers are recorded here because they're still the honest picture of the book at the moment it closed.

For detailed data over the timeframe - spreads, book depth, uptime, fill counts, the behaviour through each flash crash and the discussion that led to the renewal - see Protocol-Owned HDX Liquidity on Kraken - 3-Month Review & Continuation Discussion.