Toros Options are live on Base: Powered by Derive

Crypto options are becoming a bigger part of onchain trading, with Derive leading the market in onchain options volume.

The hard part of bringing options onchain has always been liquidity. Traders want to open positions, but only if there is enough liquidity and the difference between the buy and sell price is small.

Toros Options solves this problem by connecting Derive liquidity directly to Base. The result is the most liquid options experience on Base.

For each trade, Toros checks both Derive’s order book and market maker quotes, then uses the best available price to mint option tokens on Base.

Why tokenize the position?

Once Derive fills the trade, Toros turns the option position into an ERC-20 token on Base.

A token can represent a single option or a full options strategy. For example, a spread can contain multiple options underneath, but Toros can package the whole strategy into one token. That means you only need to hold and manage one position.

From there, the position can move beyond Toros. It can be held or transferred like other onchain assets, integrated into other DeFi apps, or traded on a secondary market if a DEX supports it.

Buying calls and puts

Toros is designed to make options easy to use. Choose a market, call or put, expiry, strike and amount. At launch, Toros supports BTC, ETH, HYPE, SOL and ZEC options. The break-even price and payoff are shown before you trade.

A call is a bet that the price will finish above the strike price at expiry. A put is a bet that the price will finish below the strike. When buying either one, the most you can lose is the premium you pay upfront.

Writing puts

Writing puts can also be used as a yield strategy. 

The yield comes from the premiums paid by option buyers. In exchange, the writer takes on downside risk in the underlying asset.

For example, with BTC around $81,700, you could put up $10,000 USDC to write an $80,000 put and earn about $766 in premium. That works out to roughly 18% annualized yield at the time of the quote.

If BTC finishes above $80,000 at expiry, you keep the premium. If BTC finishes below the strike, losses increase as the price falls. In this example, the break-even price is about $73,870.

Toros locks the required USDC collateral upfront, so the position is fully covered from the start. That means there are no margin calls or liquidations.

Before submitting, you can see the required collateral, estimated premium, APY and break-even price.

Launch incentives

Toros already checks both Derive’s order book and market maker quotes for the best available price.

For a limited time, option buyers get 1% of the premium paid back immediately in USDC.

That means there are no points to wait for and no rewards to claim later. The incentive is applied directly when you trade.

Once the incentive is included, Toros offers the cheapest options onchain.

Getting started

Toros Options are live on Base, with BTC, ETH, HYPE, SOL and ZEC options available.

Positions can be closed before expiry, so you are not locked into holding a trade until expiry.

Head to toros.finance/options to view available markets, strikes and expiries and connect a wallet to start trading.

Toros Options are available only in eligible jurisdictions outside the U.S. Availability is subject to applicable laws and restrictions.