ETH broke both whales' liquidation lines. They sold first, right at the bottom

Daily · Oct 17, 2026 · CryptoAnimon · All posts

Yesterday in one line: a slow bleed. BTC fell 0.8% (82,211 → 81,589) and touched 80,772, ETH fell 0.8% to 2,422 after a low of 2,391.7, and HYPE fell 1.8% to 80.26. $56.6M of positions were liquidated, 87% of them longs. Open interest on Hyperliquid's main perps fell 2.7% to $11.28B. Trades of $100K or more net-sold $51.1M of BTC and $46.8M of ETH, more than a quarter of ETH's big-trade volume. ZEC fell 5.9% and its open interest dropped 10.8%.

Yesterday we flagged two ETH liquidation lines: 2,406 for the $187M whale, 2,404 for Machi Big Brother. At 17:19 UTC, ETH traded at 2,391.7. Below both.

Neither was liquidated.

How the Hyperliquid whales dodged the ETH liquidation

ETH 1-minute candles on Hyperliquid, Oct 16 16:45–17:50 UTC: ETH falls through the 2,406 and 2,404 liquidation lines to a low of 2,391.7 at 17:19. 0x30af sells 11,698 ETH and 1,188 BTC from 17:06 to 17:29; Machi's last sale is at 2,396.7 at 17:18; 0x4b0c opens a $26.5M ETH short at 17:15–17:16; ETH is back at 2,417 by 17:49

0x30af…393e, the former stock trader with $187M of longs, didn't wait. From 17:06 to 17:29 UTC it sold every single minute: 11,698 ETH and 1,188 BTC, about $124M in 24 minutes. Each sale pushed its liquidation lines further away. Its biggest minute was 17:18: 3,258 ETH at 2,394.9, one minute before the low.

It locked in a $2.35M loss.

Eight minutes later, from 17:37 to 17:42, it bought back 722 BTC at an average of 81,479. That's $525 per coin above where it had just sold.

It also changed how the bet is built. Yesterday its BTC and ETH shared one pool of margin, so the two lines moved together. Now each position stands alone (isolated margin):

1,356 BTC ($110.5M) at 40x, liquidation 80,275 (−1.5%)
4,894 ETH ($11.9M) at 25x, liquidation 2,378 (−1.9%)

Smaller bet, but the BTC line is now closer than yesterday's 1.7%.

Machi took profit on the way down

0x020c…5872, the wallet tracked as Machi Big Brother's, started selling much earlier. At 13:00 UTC he sold 1,100 ETH in profit. By 17:18 he had sold close to 5,000 ETH over the day, his last sale at 2,396.7.

For the day, his closed trades made +$43K. Not bad for a man whose account was liquidated two days ago.

He kept the rest: 3,325 ETH ($8.1M) at 25x, liquidation 2,380 (−1.9%). Together with 0x30af's ETH, about $20M of longs sit at 2,378–2,380.

The shorts who opened at the bottom

The other side was busy too.

0x4b0c…b370 opened $26.5M of ETH shorts at 17:15–17:16, three minutes before the low, and added to 12,000 ETH ($29.1M) at 25x. Average 2,404.7. It's down $244K. Liquidation 2,480 (+2.3%).
0x6998…79ba had its $6.4M BTC long liquidated at 17:08 (−$83K). Nine minutes later it went short. By 17:24 it held 85.7 BTC ($7.0M) at 40x, average 80,879. BTC bottomed at 80,772 one minute later. Its new liquidation: 82,154, 0.8% above the price.

Liquidated as a long, then 0.8% from being liquidated as a short. Same afternoon.

Wall Street is coming to Hyperliquid. Stock perps are already liquidating millions.

The biggest Hyperliquid headlines yesterday weren't about crypto. Yellow.com: "Ripple Prime brings weekend trading to 100 traditional markets via Hyperliquid." CryptoSlate: "Ripple opens Wall Street's door." Pump.fun also launched perps powered by Hyperliquid.

The stock perps on Hyperliquid were already busy. Yesterday, four of them liquidated $14.0M of positions, about a quarter of the day's total: TSLA $5.8M, S&P 500 $4.2M, SOXL $2.5M, NBIS $1.5M.

TSLA's perp fell 8.7% from its morning high (382.55) to 349.36.

0x7d04…9e7b bought $4.0M of TSLA between 08:00 and 11:00 UTC, at 375–379. At 13:30 it was liquidated for $2.2M. The account is now empty.
0x2322…895a had $3.4M of S&P 500 longs liquidated yesterday, and still holds $6.1M of S&P 500 at 50x. Liquidation 7,601. The price is 7,645: 0.6% away.

The S&P 500 is closed until Monday. This market isn't.

One more headline, checked

KuCoin reported a Hyperliquid trader holding an "$11.2M HYPE long with $58M unrealized profit." The HYPE long in our data with that kind of profit is 0x082e…ca88. Its position is $109.8M, not $11.2M: 1.38M HYPE at 5x, up $56.5M, liquidation 72.91 (−8.4%).

Levels to watch

BTC (about 81,500)

Below: 80,275, 0x30af's $110.5M 40x long (−1.5%). 77,622, 0x0c4a…1b19's $31.3M 40x long (−4.8%). 74,907, 0x36cd…d195's $37.9M 10x long (−8.1%), which added $17.4M yesterday. 74,493, 0x6046…b21d's $81.7M 12x long (−8.6%).
Above: 82,154, 0x6998's $7.0M 40x short (+0.8%). 85,044, 0xaeaa…2416's $28.5M 20x short (+4.3%), down $364K. 86,907, 0x4b62…57ca's 40x short, cut from $24.1M to $8.6M (+6.6%). 90,678, 0x218a…7da2's $58.8M 8x short (+11.3%).

ETH (about 2,425)

Below: 2,378–2,380, 0x30af and Machi, about $20M (−1.9%). 2,291–2,302, the cliff: 0x0392…d7d9 and 0x77dd…e0e9, $192.2M (−5.1% to −5.5%), down $4.1M and $8.9M.
Above: 2,480, 0x4b0c's $29.1M 25x short (+2.3%).

HYPE (about 79.58)

Below: 72.91, the $109.8M whale (−8.4%).

S&P 500 perp (about 7,645)

Below: 7,601, 0x2322's $6.1M 50x long (−0.6%).

Live liquidation maps: BTC · ETH · HYPE. To get a Telegram alert when one of these wallets moves, tap 🔔 next to the title on its wallet page.

Data: Hyperliquid on-chain fills, liquidations and positions, compiled by CryptoAnimon; Ripple Prime and KuCoin items as reported by Yellow.com, CryptoSlate and KuCoin. Positions and prices as of 04:20 UTC, Oct 17; "yesterday" means Oct 16 (UTC).

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