BitMEX Just Said It Is Closing — Users Have 8 Weeks to Get Their Money Out

BitMEX, one of the crypto industry’s oldest derivatives exchanges, announced Thursday it is permanently shutting down. The closure takes effect on September 23, giving users approximately two months to close positions and withdraw their funds. New account registrations stopped immediately with the announcement.

The decision came from the board of HDR Global Trading Limited, the parent company that owns and operates BitMEX. The company cited a strategic review of the business and the broader crypto industry as the basis for the closure, offering no further detail on what that review revealed or what specific factors drove the conclusion.

BitMEX Has Two Dates Every User Needs to Know 

According to the exchange’s announcement, on August 26, BitMEX will begin applying risk limits that prevent users from opening new positions — from that point only position reductions will be permitted. 

Between August 26 and the September 23 closure date, the exchange will begin force-closing existing open positions to wind down the market. Any positions still open at the moment of closure will be force-closed immediately. The exchange stated that it takes no responsibility for trading losses that result from users failing to close positions before that point. 

Users who fail to withdraw their funds by September 23 will face fees. Know-your-customer (KYC) verified users who still have a balance on the platform after the closure date will be charged $50 or 1% per annum — whichever is greater — applied monthly to whatever remains in their account. 

Dear BitMEX Users,

Today, we share with a very heavy heart that BitMEX exchange will shut down its operations, effective 23 September 2026 at 04:00:00 UTC.

The owner and operator of BitMEX, HDR Global Trading Limited, has made the difficult decision to close operations… pic.twitter.com/oWuqlh547f

— BitMEX (@BitMEX) July 23, 2026

The company also confirmed that all staked BMEX tokens on the platform have been unstaked and are immediately available in holder accounts. Contracts trading with limited liquidity will undergo early settlement procedures. 

The Rise and Fall 

BitMEX was founded in 2014 by Arthur Hayes, Ben Delo, and Samuel Reed. It pioneered perpetual futures contracts — derivatives that allow traders to speculate on crypto prices without an expiry date — a product that became one of the most-traded instruments in the industry and was subsequently adopted by virtually every major crypto exchange. 

At its peak, BitMEX was the dominant venue for Bitcoin (BTC) derivatives trading and processed billions of dollars in daily volume. But the company’s trajectory changed significantly in 2020 when US authorities charged Hayes, Delo, and Reed with violating the Bank Secrecy Act by failing to implement adequate anti-money laundering controls. 

Hayes pleaded guilty in 2022 and received a sentence of two years of probation. The legal issues coincided with the rise of competitors including Binance, Bybit, and OKX, which collectively absorbed much of BitMEX’s market share in the years that followed.

Featured image generated with OpenArt.