Optimism
OP#117OP is the governance token of Optimism, whose OP Stack software runs OP Mainnet and a family of Ethereum layer-2 chains.
Passes our 8 Shariah criteria. Needs caution: excessive uncertainty (gharar) and usage.
- 6 pass
- 2 caution
- 0 fail
Verdict history
- HalalCurrent
First publication
Fundamentals, market picture and news will appear here.
Halal analysis
Can a Muslim hold Optimism?8 Shariah criteria
6 pass · 2 caution · 0 failHolding OP pays nothing, and the Collective's income is transaction-fee revenue, not interest.
Riba means interest or any guaranteed increase on a loan. OP has no built-in reward for holders and no native staking. The Collective earns a share of Superchain sequencer revenue, which is fee income, and spends half of it buying OP for the treasury. Part of the Foundation's ETH is staked with Ether.fi, which earns Ethereum validation rewards rather than lending interest. With no interest reaching holders, the criterion gets the maximum score; CryptoUmmah finds no riba element.
OP governs a large, working network family, but its only function is governance; fees are paid in ETH.
Mal is property that Islamic law recognises as having value and that can be owned and traded. OP gives votes over a working network: OP Mainnet secured about $1.95 billion on 1 October 2026 (L2BEAT), and the OP Stack runs chains such as Base and Unichain. CryptoUmmah rates it halal. The score is lowered within pass for a concrete limit: OP is not needed to use the network, because gas is paid in ETH, so its utility is narrower than a coin that pays for the network's services.
OP is not a gambling token, but most of its trading volume is in perpetual futures.
Maysir is gambling: winning or losing by chance rather than through productive exchange. OP has no chance-based payout and a real governance role. On 1 October 2026 perpetual futures were about 80% of OP/USDT volume on Binance and Bybit combined (single-day snapshot). The futures dominance lowers the score within pass.
The Collective earns a share of transaction-fee revenue from Superchain chains and uses half of it to purchase OP.
This criterion asks how the protocol earns. Superchain chains pay the Optimism Collective the greater of 2.5% of chain revenue or 15% of on-chain profit; this came to 5,868 ETH in the 12 months to January 2026. That is a share of fees for services. Since February 2026, 50% of it funds monthly OP purchases. The Foundation also offers managed chain operations through OP Enterprise. No interest-bearing or other impermissible income stream was found, so the criterion gets the maximum score.
A 2-of-2 multisig (Foundation and Security Council) can upgrade OP Mainnet instantly with no exit window, and one operator runs the sequencer.
Gharar is excessive uncertainty or hidden information in a deal. Revenue sharing and the buyback plan are published, and OP Mainnet has permissionless fault proofs. But L2BEAT warns that funds can be stolen through a malicious upgrade: a 2-of-2 multisig of the Optimism Foundation and a 10-of-13 Security Council controls core contract upgrades with no delay, so users have no window to exit before an unwanted change. A single centralised sequencer orders transactions and could front-run users, although users can force transactions in through Ethereum.
These are concrete, sourced risks to holders, so the criterion is caution.
About half of the money in OP Mainnet DeFi sits in lending markets and lending vaults.
This criterion looks at what the network is actually used for. OP Mainnet is general infrastructure, and institutions are bringing tokenised funds to it. But by Liberandum's sum of DefiLlama data on 1 October 2026, lending protocols held about 31.5% of the roughly $1.22 billion in OP Mainnet DeFi (led by the EtherFi borrowing market) and risk curators, which mostly manage lending vaults, a further 19.2%. With roughly half of activity in interest-based lending, the criterion is caution. The breakdown comes only from a secondary aggregator.
Fully paid spot OP is widely available and can be held in one's own wallet.
This criterion asks whether the asset can be owned in a permissible way. OP trades spot with full payment and delivery on major exchanges such as Binance and Bybit and can be withdrawn to a self-custody wallet on OP Mainnet. Ownership does not depend on derivatives, so the criterion gets the maximum score.
The OP Stack makes Ethereum cheaper to use and is open source; no concrete harm specific to OP was found.
Maslahah weighs public benefit against harm. The OP Stack is open-source software that lowers the cost of using Ethereum and powers many chains, and it is being used for institutional tokenisation and payments pilots. No study found links OP specifically to fraud, sanctions evasion or exploitation at scale. Lending-heavy use is counted under usage, not again here, so the criterion gets the maximum score.
How you can use it
Tap a card for the ruling and sourcesBuying OP with full payment and immediate delivery is widely available, and tokens can be moved to a self-custody wallet. Spot is acceptable for a HALAL-rated asset.
No spot OP exchange-traded fund was identified in this review. Any fund must be checked separately for lending of the token and interest income.
OP is a governance token and is not used as a means of payment; network fees are paid in ETH. Tier-1 bodies such as Indonesia's MUI rule that using cryptocurrency as currency is not permissible.
OP has no native staking: the network does not use OP to validate blocks, and delegating votes earns nothing. Products advertised as 'OP staking' pay from other sources and must be checked product by product.
Margin trading in OP is never acceptable: it is a deferred exchange with borrowed money and leverage (AAOIFI SS 20).
OP perpetual futures make up most of its trading volume, but futures, perpetuals and options always fail under AAOIFI SS 20: deferred exchange without delivery, usually with leverage.
Lending OP on protocols such as Aave or through exchange programmes pays depositors interest from borrowers. This is riba.
OP yield products built on lending, leverage or basis trading pay interest or interest-like returns and fail. Since OP has no network reward of its own, any promised yield has to come from somewhere else.
Scholars quotes
The opinion on this is the same as doing the same with any halal assets such as shares – 1) is permissible, 2) is more debatable and there are differing opinions on short-term trading.As I mentioned at the beginning of this article it is not necessary to substantiate the permissibility of something as long as there are no prohibited factors involved in it or surrounding it.Penggunaan cryptocurrency sebagai mata uang hukumnya haram, karena mengandung gharar (ketidakjelasan), dharar (bahaya) dan bertentangan dengan Undang-Undang nomor 7 tahun 2011 tentang Mata Uang dan Peraturan Bank Indonesia nomor 17 tahun 2015 tentang Kewajiban Penggunaan Rupiah di Wilayah Negara Kesatuan Republik Indonesia.Sebagaimana mata wang yang lain, mata wang digital hendaklah tidak digunakan sebagai bayaran kepada barangan, perkhidmatan dan aktiviti tidak patuh Syariah seperti pembelian dadah, pelacuran, perjudian dan pendanaan aktiviti keganasan serta penggubahan wang haram.The SAC has also resolved that investment and trading of Digital Assets that fulfil the above requirements and which are traded on Digital Asset Exchange (DAX) registered with SC are permissible.Third: In light of the above and given the significant risks associated with this type of currencies and the instability of their transactions, the Council of the Academy recommends pursuing research and studies on issues affecting its ruling.Bitcoin is a digital currency that does not meet the legal and Sharia criteria that make it a currency subject to the rulings of dealing with official legal currencies recognized internationally.بناءً على ذلك: فلا يجوز شرعًا تداول عملة "البتكوين" والتعامل من خلالها بالبيعِ والشراءِ والإجارةِ وغيرها، بل يُمنع من الاشتراكِ فيها؛ لعدمِ اعتبارِها كوسيطٍ مقبولٍ للتبادلِ من الجهاتِ المخُتصَّةِ، ولِمَا تشتمل عليه من الضررِ الناشئ عن الغررِ والجهالةِ والغشِّ في مَصْرِفها ومِعْيارها وقِيمتها، فضلًا عما تؤدي إليه ممارستُها من مخاطرَ عاليةٍ على الأفراد والدول.According to research and opinion of experts so far, cryptocurrency is not considered ‘ maal ’ (wealth) in Sharia.Muhammadiyah memandang transaksi dan investasi kripto pada dasarnya mubah (boleh) tetapi dengan syarat tertentu.Our current position is 'tawaquf'; we can't say it is halal or haram, but we say it is better not to engage in itAI-assisted analysis checked against sources. Not a fatwa or investment advice.
Where it trades
Section in preparation
Similar halal assets
Halal verdict, same category
