Key Highlights
- A mysterious Hyperliquid trader increased their Bitcoin short position to nearly $500 million
- The trader is nicknamed “insider whale” due to a perfectly timed $192M short placed just before a Trump tariff announcement
- The massive fund is connected to Garrett Jin, the former CEO of the defunct exchange BitForex
- Jin confirmed the connection but stated the funds belong to his clients and are traded based on “in-house insights”
A mysterious, highly influential trader on the Hyperliquid platform, nicknamed the “insider whale,” is making waves in the crypto community by aggressively betting against Bitcoin. This whale, who previously made a fortune by shorting the recent market crash, has now placed a massive, nearly half-a-billion-dollar short on Bitcoin, prompting widespread speculation about their identity and potential access to non-public information.
Doubling Down on a Massive Short
The whale has put down an enormous $496 million short position on Bitcoin (BTC), utilizing 10x leverage on the Hyperliquid decentralized exchange. This massive bet against the market means the liquidation price the point at which their position would be automatically closed, and their collateral lost is set at $124,270. Over just two days, the trader has more than doubled their initial position, which started at $163 million. This isn’t their first aggressive move; they previously opened $900 million worth of short positions on both Bitcoin and Ether (ETH) last week.
This trader first gained notoriety about two months ago when the crypto community discovered they held an astronomical $11 billion worth of BTC.
The Curious Timing and “Insider Whale” Nickname
The “insider whale” moniker comes from the curiously impeccable timing of their previous short. The trader opened a significant short position less than an hour before a major financial event: US President Donald Trump’s announcement of new tariffs on Friday. That announcement sent the crypto market into a sharp decline, allowing the whale to cash in big, reportedly banking $192 million from that single move. The precision of this timing led the community and blockchain analysts to suspect the trader might have had insider knowledge of the impending announcement, thus giving them an unfair advantage.
The Identity Hunt: A Link to BitForex’s Former CEO
The true identity of the wallet owner remains unconfirmed, but blockchain investigators quickly followed the digital trail. Over the past weekend, suspicion focused on Garrett Jin, the former CEO of the now-defunct crypto exchange BitForex.
The speculation began when a crypto researcher named Eye publicly alleged the wallet belonged to Jin. This allegation gained significant traction after Binance CEO Changpeng “CZ” Zhao reposted the thread on X (formerly Twitter) and asked for verification. Later analysis from other well-known sleuths, such as ZachXBT, suggested it was more likely one of Jin’s close associates rather than Jin himself.
However, the connection was essentially confirmed by Jin on Sunday when he chose to directly respond to CZ’s post on X.
Garrett Jin’s Response:
Jin fired back at the Binance CEO, writing: “@cz_binance, thanks for sharing my personal and private information. To clarify, I have no connection with the Trump family or @DonaldJTrumpJr. This isn’t insider trading.”
He followed up with a second post less than 20 minutes later, providing a critical detail that shifted the narrative from him being the sole whale: “the fund isn’t mine, it’s my clients’. We run nodes and provide in-house insights for them.”
The Open Questions
While Garrett Jin has admitted to being connected to the massive funds and the trades, stating they belong to his clients and that he provides “in-house insights,” this disclosure raises more questions than it answers.
The crypto community is now focused on:
- The Nature of the “In-House Insights”: What kind of proprietary information is Jin or his team generating for their clients? Was the timing of the short genuinely based on sharp market analysis, or did it indeed stem from information that qualifies as insider knowledge?
- The Identity of the Clients: Who are the high-net-worth clients with access to these insights, and are they in a position to have political or market-moving information?
- The Risk of the New Bet: The whale is now risking half a billion dollars that Bitcoin’s price will drop further. Given their successful track record, the market is anxiously watching to see if this aggressive, leveraged short position will pay off once again, or if the price of BTC will surge past the $124,270 liquidation mark, leading to a massive loss.
For now, the Hyperliquid “insider whale” remains a figure of intense fascination and scrutiny, embodying the high-stakes, opaque world of leveraged crypto trading, where a single, well-timed trade can move markets and spark serious allegations of impropriety.
