Lighter expands Chainlink integration to enhance oracle security across 125+ markets

Lighter, the zero-knowledge rollup-based decentralized exchange built on Ethereum Layer 2, has broadened its partnership with Chainlink to cover more than 125 markets across multiple asset classes and regions. The expansion adds Chainlink’s 24/5 US Equities Streams to the platform, giving perpetual futures traders access to low-latency pricing data well outside traditional market hours.

From commodities to equities: what the integration covers

The original partnership between Lighter and Chainlink was announced in November 2025, designating Chainlink Data Streams as the official oracle solution for Lighter’s real-world asset derivatives markets. That initial scope covered commodities, equities, and foreign exchange pricing, the core trio that makes up the RWA derivatives universe.

The January 2026 expansion layers on Chainlink’s 24/5 US Equities Streams specifically. This is the product Chainlink built to serve continuous equity price data during hours when the New York Stock Exchange and Nasdaq are closed, enabling crypto-native platforms to offer trading on equity-linked products around the clock (minus weekends, hence the “24/5” label).

With the expanded integration, Lighter now supports over 125 markets spanning multiple asset types. The Chainlink feeds power several critical functions on the platform: liquidations, margin calculations, and conditional or limit orders that depend on precise, real-time pricing.

Why oracles matter more for RWA derivatives

Oracle security is a perennial concern in DeFi, but it becomes especially acute when the assets being traded don’t live natively on-chain. A Bitcoin perpetual contract can reference on-chain liquidity for its price feed. A perpetual contract on Tesla stock or gold futures cannot.

Chainlink has built its reputation as the dominant oracle provider in DeFi precisely because of this dynamic. Its decentralized network of node operators aggregates pricing data from multiple sources, reducing the risk that any single point of failure corrupts the feed. For a platform like Lighter, which runs a verifiable order-book system designed to prevent frontrunning, pairing that execution layer with a robust oracle creates a more coherent security story.

CEO Vladimir Novakovski has spoken publicly about the partnership’s significance, including at SmartCon 2025, framing the Chainlink integration as central to Lighter’s ability to scale its RWA derivatives offering while maintaining data integrity.

The competitive landscape for on-chain perps

What distinguishes Lighter’s approach is the combination of ZK rollup technology with a verifiable order book. Most on-chain perps platforms use automated market maker (AMM) models, where liquidity pools replace traditional order books. Lighter’s order-book design is more familiar to traders coming from centralized exchanges, but it introduces complexity around ensuring that the order matching itself is transparent and tamper-resistant.

The ZK rollup layer handles that verification. Every trade execution can be cryptographically proven, which in theory eliminates the possibility of the exchange operator reordering or censoring transactions.

Lighter claims hundreds of thousands of users on its platform as of early 2026.