Bubblemaps: BMEX Plummets 95%, 75% of Shares Never Circulated
After BitMEX announced its closure in September, the platform's token BMEX plummeted by about 95% today.
Bubblemaps on-chain analysis shows that in the 2021 model, 92% of BMEX is locked in vesting contracts, with only 8% allocated for listing; the only distribution was 63.75 million tokens to product and liquidity addresses on November 2, 2022, while about 75% of employee incentives, ecosystem growth, and long-term reserves have never been circulated.
The shutdown event triggered a sell-off, with funds flowing out of positions. The platform has released all staked BMEX back to accounts, putting pressure on holders with no additional compensation arrangements.
Source: Public Information
ABAB AI Insight
BitMEX was founded by Arthur Hayes and pioneered 100x leverage perpetual contracts in 2016, with daily trading volumes exceeding $16 billion. Its parent company, HDR Global Trading, decided to close after a strategic review, following executive changes and market share erosion by decentralized platforms like Hyperliquid.
The token distribution, designed in 2021, has most of its supply locked and unreleased, with only a limited circulating supply for airdrops and liquidity, aimed at controlling supply and binding platform utility. However, after the shutdown, its utility function has dropped to zero, highlighting a disconnect between allocation and actual execution for the unreleased long-term reserves.
In comparison to the handling of customer assets during the bankruptcies of FTX and Voyager, and the rapid decline of current CEX tokens like BNX under platform risk, BMEX is in the final stage of transitioning from utility-bound exchange tokens to unsupported assets.
This essentially represents a transfer of pricing power, as the platform's closure cuts off all utility demand, compounded by the sudden loss of anchor due to low circulating supply, leading to price discovery being entirely dominated by remaining holders' sell-offs.
ABAB News · Law of Cognition
Unreleased shares are the true invisible supply
When the platform collapses, utility tokens drop to zero the fastest
Locking does not mean never circulating; closure is the ultimate unlock