Trader Who Made $192M Shorting the Crypto Crash is Betting Against Bitcoin Again

A trader who pocketed $192 million shorting BTC ahead of last week’s crypto wipeout has reloaded with a large bearish position as markets attempt to recover from the Trump tariff shock.

The wallet, identified as 0xb317 on the decentralized derivatives platform Hyperliquid, opened a new $163 million short position on bitcoin late Sunday, data from Hypurrscan shows. The position is 10x leveraged and already $3.5 million in profit in Asian afternoon hours with a liquidation level of $125,500.

The same trader first drew attention on Friday when it opened a massive short roughly 30 minutes before former President Donald Trump’s surprise announcement of 100% tariffs on Chinese imports — a move that erased over $19 billion in crypto market value and triggered the largest-ever day of liquidations in the market.

The perfectly timed bet led to a gain of nearly $200 million, sparking speculation that the entity may have had advance knowledge of the policy shift.

On-chain analysts and traders have since dubbed the address an “insider whale.” Some even argue that the position itself could have accelerated the crash.

What’s Hyperliquid and Why It Matters

Hyperliquid is the biggest decentralized perpetuals exchange that lets traders open high-leverage futures positions directly on-chain, without relying on centralized intermediaries like Binance or OKX.

It has become a favorite among high-frequency traders and whales because of its deep liquidity, transparent order book, and lightning-fast execution, making it one of the few DeFi platforms capable of handling institutional-sized flows.

The platform also features Auto-Deleveraging (ADL), or a built-in safety mechanism that prevents bad debt during extreme volatility. When insurance funds are drained, ADL forcibly closes profitable positions to cover losses from bankrupt accounts. It ensures solvency, but it can also worsen selloffs, as profitable traders get liquidated to balance the system.

Over 6,000 wallets were hit during the weekend’s ADL-triggered flush, according to HyperTracker data, wiping more than $1.2 billion in trader capital on Hyperliquid alone.

The new short adds intrigue to a market already on edge as participants continue to assess contagion effects following the weekend slide.

Read MoreCoinDesk: Bitcoin, Ethereum, Crypto News and Price Data[#item_full_content]