TL;DR: “Bitmex had $524M net outflows in July. It had never had more than $100M in a single month,” according to cryptocurrency trading analyst Ceteris Paribus. “2018 brought in $1.3B, and there was not a single month where outflows were greater than inflows.” Those staggering numbers come after a tough few weeks for the exchange, including a brutal debate between its CEO and a famous economist, US regulator investigation rumors, and increasing competition from other exchanges offering margin trading.

BitMEX July Net Outflows More Than $500 Million

July for BitMEX began with their heavily marketed Tangle in Taipei, a debate pitting CEO Arthur Hayes against American economist Nouriel Roubini (known as Dr. Doom for his often dark forecasts and extreme hatred of cryptocurrency). It soon unraveled into a profanity-laden all-out attack by Roubini against Hayes and the exchange, calling both “sick and rotten,” “making money off of people going into financial ruin.”

Controversy gathered only steam after the debate when BitMEX refused to release the moderated encounter in full, slow-burning it instead through YouTube clips and then eventually many days later revealing the entire context. Roubini continued his verbal assault on BitMEX and Hayes, publically insisting, “Crypto is a mafia hush money racket. The blockchain conference organizers cowed and caved to BitMEX’s censorship and didn’t tape or broadcast my debate with @CryptoHayes; he had his underlings make the only tape of the debate and is hiding it from view. Release that tape coward!”

The clips were widely thought, ironically enough, to be favorable toward Roubini who many crypto enthusiasts reluctantly insisted won the debate. Legacy financial media outlet Bloomberg a couple of weeks later claimed the Commodity Futures Trading Commission launched a heavy investigation into the exchange’s doings as they relate to allowing US citizens to trade.

BitMEX is registered in Victoria, Seychelles, a point Roubini continued to harp-on during the debate as evidence Hayes and the company were less than on the up-and-up. BitMEX formally stopped allowing US customers to trade on its platform in 2018 after Canadian regulators insisted it needed to be licensed. Rumored CFTC investigation combined with major competitors such as Binance moving into BitMEX’s bread and butter, margin trading, are thought to be leading contributors to net outflow movement from the exchange. At the time of publication, neither BitMEX nor Hayes has commented on the phenomenon. Hayes’ last tweet seemed to signal a long vacation, “I traded in a yacht for the jungle. See y’all in September.”

DISCLOSURE: The author holds cryptocurrency as part of his financial portfolio, including BCH.

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