Zero-Sum by Design
Perpetual swaps are negative-sum after fees; every dollar of P&L is peeled from another player’s hide. Meme-coin perps just make the knife fight visible: no cash-flow, no DCF, only attention arbitrage. Once participants accept the arena is not collaborative, the only question becomes how to weaponize human bugs—greed and loss aversion—for protocol cash flow.

Leverage ≠ Capital Efficiency; Leverage = Emotion Steroids
10× turns a 5 % move into a 50 % equity shock, but the real product is hormonal. Cortisol and dopamine spikes print more volume than any APY table. The exchange’s edge is keeping the hormonal loop humming long after rational agents would walk away.

Winner UI: Turn Ego into Open Interest
Leaderboards, flashing green “+127 %” badges, one-tap Twitter brags—every pixel is engineered to harvest over-confidence. The protocol quietly increases default leverage on the next position; the brain, awash in dopamine, reads it as skill validation. Net result: the same wallet increases notional 3-4× within 48 h of a big win.

Loser UI: Regret Is a Renewable Resource
Liquidation pop-ups that highlight “price missed your stop by $0.18”, instant coupons for fee rebates, and a red “Revenge Trade” button that pre-fills the opposite side—each pattern interrupts the logical response (quit) and triggers the limbic one (double down). Loss-aversion pain is ~2× the pleasure of an equivalent gain; the exchange monetises the gap.

Liquidity Spiral: From Neurochemistry to Moat

1. Addicted core → predictable tape → tighter spreads → prop MM capital → deeper book → lower slippage → more addicts.

2. Once the book depth exceeds CEX equivalents, “mercenary” quant funds park inventory permanently; exit liquidity becomes entry liquidity.

3. Competitors now need eight-figure depth subsidies to match the user experience—an impossible ask without the same psychological flywheel.

Catalyst Design: Pay for Rank, Not for Click
Flat trading rebates are dead. Effective campaigns pay only the top-10 % P&L leaderboard, zero-sum style. The 90 % who miss the cut leave with fresh resentment and a trading plan for next week—no inflationary token required. The protocol buys behavioural addiction cheaper than it buys liquidity.

Sustainable Bubble Thesis
PVP systems are polyvinylpyrrolidone for speculation: they don’t eliminate froth, they cross-link it into a resilient film. Volume survives volatility because the emotional stakes are stickier than any yield. In the next funding round, investors will not ask “What’s your taker fee?”—they will ask “What’s your median user heart-rate delta on liquidation?” The exchange that can answer wins.