Whale's Multi-Market Bet Backfires
On February 24, according to on-chain data monitoring, a major whale (address 0x8af) suffered significant unrealized losses after taking long positions on U.S. equities and crypto assets while shorting silver, as markets moved contrary to expectations.
- The whale holds over $20 million in long positions on XYZ100, a Nasdaq 100 index-linked contract.
- It has mirrored this exposure in Bitcoin.
- Additionally, a $12 million short position was placed on silver.
Bitcoin Position Amplifies Losses
With both U.S. equities and crypto markets pulling back, the whale faced losses across its positions. Notably, its Bitcoin longs, leveraged at 40x, have already seen a $13.8 million unrealized loss on a $23.2 million position, averaging at $100,800 per BTC — representing a staggering 2376% loss.
Despite this, the whale remains bullish, with an additional $14.25 million in open orders set to accumulate more Bitcoin between $55,000 and $59,000.
Multi-Asset Strategy Under Pressure
The whale employs a strategy centered on longs in major assets like Bitcoin and U.S. indices, hedged by shorts on various altcoins. While designed to capitalize on the relative strength of mainstream assets, recent volatility — particularly in commodities — has weighed on performance.
Despite current unrealized losses, the whale’s total profit across all positions remains at $51 million.