TradFi contract conceptsTradFi Contract Concepts
A TradFi contract is a synthetic price-exposure instrument — neither side holds the underlying asset, and only the change in its price is settled. Mullet's contracts have no expiry, and the fill price comes straight from aggregated quotes (decentralised oracles + major exchanges + market makers, median-filtered with outliers removed), so it tracks the real market price. Holding overnight incurs an "inventory fee" based on the financing rate, which is separate from price.
A TradFi contract is a synthetic price-exposure instrument — neither side holds the underlying asset, and only the change in its price is settled. Mullet's contracts have no expiry, and the fill price comes straight from aggregated quotes (decentralised oracles + major exchanges + market makers, median-filtered with outliers removed), so it always tracks the real market price of the underlying. Holding overnight incurs an "inventory fee" based on the financing rate, which is separate from price.
TradFi contracts vs spot vs futures
| Comparison | Spot | Traditional futures | TradFi contract |
|---|---|---|---|
| Hold the underlying | Yes | No | No |
| Expiry | None | Fixed quarterly | None |
| Leverage | None / borrowed | 10-20× | Up to 100× |
| Two-way trading | Long only | Yes | Yes |
| Inventory fee | — | — | Settled daily |
| Settlement currency | The asset | USD | USDC / USDT |
Why perpetual contracts
The perpetual contract is one of the most important innovations in the history of derivatives (pioneered by BitMEX in 2016), improving on traditional futures in several key ways:
No expiry
Traditional futures require delivery or rolling to the next month at expiry, which is fiddly and adds friction costs. Perpetuals anchor price to the underlying through the inventory fee rate, so a position can be held indefinitely.
Anchored by the inventory fee rate
When the perpetual trades above the underlying (in premium), longs pay the inventory fee to shorts, and vice versa. This balances the cost of holding each side dynamically and keeps the contract price "pinned" close to the underlying.
Two-way trading = always an opportunity
Traditional markets only let you go long and wait for a rally. With TradFi contracts you can open a short when you're bearish — both directions are opportunities.
What makes Mullet's TradFi contracts different
Mullet isn't the first platform to offer perpetuals. But we do a few things differently:
Liquidation on-chain
Every forced close and inventory fee settlement is written to Solana in real time, and you can verify each one on Solscan. See about us.
Multi-source oracles
Prices are aggregated from Pyth + Chainlink + Switchboard, so there's no single point of manipulation. See the whitepaper, Chapter 04.
Perpetuals beyond crypto
Not just BTC/ETH — Mullet offers forex, precious metals, energy and stock indices as TradFi contracts too. EUR/USD trades both ways 24/5 with up to 100× leverage.
Key terms
| Term | English | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| Position | Position | The size and direction you currently hold |
| Notional value | Notional Value | Contract size × price of the underlying (before leverage) |
| Margin | Margin | Collateral locked at entry = notional value ÷ leverage |
| Unrealised P&L | Unrealized PnL | Floating profit or loss of the current price against entry |
| Liquidation price | Liquidation Price | Touching this price closes the position automatically |
| Mark price | Mark Price | The on-chain aggregated price used for P&L and liquidation |
| Index price | Index Price | The oracle-aggregated spot price of the underlying |
| Open / close | Open / Close | Establishing a new position / closing an existing one |
Further reading: see the whitepaper, Chapters 02-05 — they describe the underlying architecture of Mullet perpetuals, the liquidation engine and how the inventory fee rate formula is derived.