Bybit Opens Institutional Strategy Championship With 1Token

Bybit has opened registration for the Bybit Institutional Strategy Championship, a quant trading competition co-hosted with institutional portfolio platform 1Token, offering qualifying participants minimum US$1 million in interest-free capital and the potential to access up to US$10 million. The exchange announced the campaign in Dubai on 27 April 2026.

Capital structure and eligibility

Interest-free borrowing under the championship starts at US$1 million per institution, with additional capital tied to external trading volume, assets under management, and institutional lending qualifications. According to Bybit’s campaign terms, Pro 6 participants may receive up to an additional US$5 million loan subject to approval. A US$250,000 minimum collateral requirement applies, and the interest-free benefit runs through the campaign with continued use of principal at zero interest permitted until 30 September 2026, subject to applicable conditions.

Eligibility extends to existing Bybit VIP users at level 2 and above, institutional clients, and new institutional participants on completion of Know Your Business verification. New entrants apply through a dedicated relationship manager who handles onboarding and loan application support.

Strategy tracks and ranking methodology

Participants can compete across three independent tracks — Delta Neutral, Dollar Neutral and Directional — and may enter more than one. Each strategy must reflect genuine market-driven trading; market manipulation, wash trading and artificial profit generation are prohibited.

Performance rankings will be calculated against Bybit’s official records, with 1Token providing the strategy evaluation methodology and Python scripts that feed into the ranking calculations. Each entered strategy must maintain a minimum initial position of US$500,000 within 24 hours of the official start, and competitors must operate dedicated accounts used exclusively for the championship.

Ranked participants receive a one-month upgrade to the next VIP or Pro level following the competition, running 1 September 2026 to 30 September 2026. Non-Pro users will be upgraded to Pro 1 where applicable.

Timeline

Registration is open through 23:59 UTC on 31 May 2026. A warm-up period from 16 May to 31 May 2026 will allow teams to test strategies with no restriction on initial trading capital, but trades during this window will not count toward official rankings. The competition period runs from 00:00 UTC on 1 June 2026 to 23:59 UTC on 31 August 2026.

Executive comment

“This championship reflects our commitment to supporting institutional growth by combining deep liquidity with meaningful capital efficiency,” said Yoyee Wang, Head of Institutional and Enterprise Business at Bybit. Wang said the campaign aims to provide a venue where sophisticated trading strategies can be deployed, tested, and recognised at scale.

“By bringing a structured evaluation framework to the championship, we aim to enhance transparency and comparability across diverse trading strategies,” said Damon Xu, Chief Executive Officer and Co-founder of 1Token. Xu framed the initiative as a tool for institutional participants to benchmark performance against a wider market sample.

Context: Bybit’s institutional push

The championship is the latest step in a sustained build-out of Bybit’s institutional offering. The exchange restructured its Interest-Free Loan Program on 3 March 2026, introducing three qualification categories — trading volume, account equity and open interest — and lowering qualification thresholds for institutional clients. Borrowing limits under the standalone institutional loan product scale up to US$10 million in USDT or USDC.

Bybit and 1Token also jointly published the 2025 Crypto Quant Strategy Index Report in March 2026, drawing on data from 25 professional trading teams managing more than US$10 billion in AUM and benchmarking strategies on time-weighted PnL, drawdown, Sharpe, Sortino and Calmar metrics. That methodology underpins the championship’s evaluation framework.

1Token, named Hedgeweek’s 2024 Portfolio Management Solution of the Year, serves more than 100 institutional clients globally and supports over US$20 billion in assets across CeFi and DeFi venues.

FAQ

What is the Bybit Institutional Strategy Championship?
It is a three-month institutional quant trading competition co-hosted by Bybit and 1Token, with registration opened on 27 April 2026. Qualifying participants can access minimum US$1 million in interest-free capital, with the potential to unlock up to US$10 million subject to eligibility and approval, and compete across Delta Neutral, Dollar Neutral and Directional strategy tracks.

When does the championship run?
Registration is open until 23:59 UTC on 31 May 2026. A warm-up period runs 16–31 May 2026, with no trades counting toward rankings. The official competition period runs from 00:00 UTC on 1 June 2026 to 23:59 UTC on 31 August 2026, with VIP and Pro level upgrades for ranked participants applied 1–30 September 2026.

Who can enter?
Existing Bybit VIP users at level 2 and above, institutional clients, and new institutional participants subject to Know Your Business verification can enter. New institutional applicants are assigned a relationship manager who provides onboarding support and loan-application guidance, and each entered strategy must maintain a minimum initial position of US$500,000.

The championship places Bybit alongside a small group of centralised exchanges using interest-free capital and structured benchmarking to compete for institutional flow. Whether it converts into durable AUM growth — beyond the August finish — will depend on how many of the new institutional entrants stay on Bybit’s rails once the campaign rate window closes on 30 September 2026.