BitMEX Allegedly Refunds Clients After “Black Thursday” Crash, Is Confidence Creeping Back In?

By Lujan Odera
money

A lot of talk has developed from the recent failings of BitMEX in the middle of Bitcoin’s 50% carnage on Mar. 12, 2019. A number of analysts have sided with the largest Bitcoin futures platform with others calling for traders to abandon the platform saying BitMEX “never had the intention of providing a functioning platform.”

After a three hour collapse of one of the largest BTC markets, BitMEX users were at the exchange’s head, Arthur Hayes, neck as shorts were massively “bullzooka’d” on market open. However, it seems the exchange is refunding the wrongly liquidated shorts as one user’s email from the exchange’s support team shows.

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BitMEX offering refunds?

In February, a 58% flash crash on XRP’s perpetual futures contract in February this year caused an outrage across the XRP Army calling on the exchange to refund the liquidated users. However, the exchange did not refund the users claiming the liquidations arose from a legitimate trade caused by high leverage trades by a user.

This time however, the exchange may be looking at the situation in a different light – choosing to refund the users affected by the Mar. 12 blackout. At least as one user claims, after losing Ethereum (ETH) during the flash crash. The trader tweeted,

“Wow guys, Bitmex actually refunded me after they scammed me during that crash. I now have more respect for @CryptoHayes. What a ledge. $ETH was trading at $96 & I put a limit order at $120 to short with a stop at $123. And it got bullllzooooka’d. Thanks for refund!”

One thing that perplexed the community is the reluctance of BitMEX to use the insurance fund despite the crypto market facing one of its most volatile days ever.

There’s still no official communication from the official BitMEX accounts, but will keep you updated of any response.

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Over $16 million in BTC transferred from BitMEX

Despite the reported refunds, the community continues to show restraint as funds move from the exchange to unknown wallets – the latest being two transactions of about 1,600 BTC.

Image: Twitter (Whale Alerts)

A certain fear is creeping into the field clearly manifested by the shrinking order book since the outage.

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Lujan Odera
Been in the field since 2015 and he still love everything blockchain and crypto! FC Barcelona fan. Author and journalist. Follow him at @lujanodera.
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