The end is here. After 12 years, the BitMEX crypto exchange is shutting down.

After twelve years, a pioneer of the market says goodbye

BitMEX was founded in 2014 by Arthur Hayes, Ben Delo and Samuel Reed.

According to the company itself, they created the perpetual swap product offering 100x leverage, which later became one of the most popular structures in the crypto derivatives market and has now been adopted by many exchanges.

During the 2019 bull market, BitMEX was a dominant player in crypto derivatives. Its annual trading volume exceeded $1 trillion, dominating about 57% of the global crypto derivatives market.

In July 2018, daily trading volume reached $8 billion, while daily turnover exceeded 1 million bitcoins, which at the time was also equivalent to more than $8 billion.

However, the exchange’s history has also been marred by legal issues. BitMEX was previously accused by US authorities of failing to implement adequate anti-money laundering (AML) controls, and the company later pleaded guilty to the charges.

Hayes, who was also the crypto exchange’s former CEO, was sentenced to six months of house arrest and two years of probation in May 2022 after pleading guilty to violating the law. He was also ordered to pay a $10 million fine. The house arrest has since expired, and in 2025, Hayes was pardoned by US President Donald Trump.

However, in 2026, an era will come to an end. With the shutdown of BitMEX, we will say goodbye to one of the most well-known derivatives exchanges in the crypto sector. Interestingly, the company has never lost client assets to a hacker attack in its 12 years of operation, which is a rare feat in the crypto industry.

What does this mean for users?

BitMEX is urging its clients to withdraw their assets from the platform as soon as possible.

The exchange will continue to operate until the final shutdown, but will implement new risk restrictions starting August 26. From this point on, users will no longer be able to open new positions, only reduce or close existing ones.

Until the shutdown, BitMEX will gradually force close out open positions in order to ensure an orderly market closure. At the final shutdown on September 23, all remaining open positions will be automatically closed.