Lawsuit Accuses BitMEX of Rigging Liquidations as It Winds Down

Two plaintiffs sued BitMEX on July 23, alleging the crypto derivatives exchange rigged forced liquidations to seize traders' collateral. The proposed class action arrived the same day BitMEX announced it will close permanently on September 23, 2026.

The claimed losses total 622.66 BTC, roughly $40.7 million at current prices. That is the oldest grievance in the book against the exchange that invented the 100x perpetual swap, revived at the worst possible moment: thousands of traders are already on a hard deadline to close positions and pull their funds.

What the Complaint Alleges

BKX Services and David Namdar filed the suit in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York. It names BitMEX, parent company HDR Global Trading, and co-founders Arthur Hayes, Ben Delo, and Samuel Reed.

According to the complaint, BitMEX liquidated positions while the collateral behind them still exceeded the losses, then moved the leftover Bitcoin into its insurance fund. The plaintiffs also allege an internal trading desk saw private customer data and kept trading during server freezes that locked everyone else out. None of this is proven.

BitMEX had not responded to requests for comment as of July 24, and a similar class action filed in 2020 closed in June 2025 without a ruling on the liquidation claims.

Shutdown Grinds On Around the Suit

The wind-down FairGambling covered the week of July 20 is already in motion. On July 30, BitMEX delists 35 derivatives contracts: trading ends at 4 a.m. UTC, settlement hits at noon UTC, and each contract's lifetime profit and loss lands in users' Bitcoin or Tether balances.

Risk limits from August 26 at 4 a.m. UTC block new positions. Forced closures follow soon after. Anything still open at the final deadline gets shut automatically, and verified users who leave funds behind pay a fee of $50 equivalent or 1% per year, whichever is greater.

A Contested Legacy Heads to Court

The farewell has been loud. Some traders thanked the exchange in replies to the official X post announcing the closure; others lambasted BitMEX and Hayes for what extreme leverage did to retail accounts, and the lawsuit now carries that resentment into a courtroom. BitMEX built more than a derivatives engine.

Its trollbox chat became crypto's rowdiest trading floor, and its meme culture outlived entire market cycles.