The largest single-day liquidation in crypto history was 10 October 2025: CoinDesk, citing CoinGlass data, reported more than $19 billion of leveraged positions liquidated in 24 hours, and The Block, also citing CoinGlass, put the number of traders liquidated at about 1.7 million. Second and third are 18 April 2021 at about $10 billion and 19 May 2021 at more than $8 billion (both CoinDesk, citing Bybt data). Liquidation totals are estimates by third-party data sites, which cover different venues and time windows, so figures for the same day can differ several times over.
The big liquidation days look much alike: a headline sends price down fast, highly leveraged longs are liquidated in a chain, and the forced selling pushes price lower again. Below are eight large liquidation days with mainstream-press records, in date order: the reported total and who measured it, how BTC moved, the trigger, and what exchanges did at the time (checked 2026-10-23).
Quick answer
- Biggest day: 2025-10-10, more than $19 billion (CoinGlass, reported by CoinDesk), after the US announced an extra 100% tariff on Chinese goods. CoinGlass itself said the real total was probably higher because Binance reports liquidations more slowly than other venues.
- Top five by reported total: 2025-10-10 ($19 billion+), 2021-04-18 (about $10 billion), 2021-05-19 ($8 billion+), 2021-09-07 (about $3 billion in 4 hours), 2025-02-03 (about $2.38 billion; Bybit's CEO estimated the real figure at $8 billion to $10 billion).
- What exchanges did: mostly they ran their rules (liquidation, insurance fund, ADL). The one with compensation was Binance on 2025-10-10: about $283 million for losses tied to depegged collateral, plus a separate $400 million "Together Initiative".
- Not every collapse is a big liquidation day: LUNA (May 2022) and FTX (November 2022) did more damage, but daily futures liquidations were about $1 billion and $700 million. Most of the losses came from tokens going to zero and a platform going bankrupt.
Eight big liquidation days at a glance
| Date (UTC) | Event | Reported liquidations (measured by) | BTC move | What exchanges did |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2020-03-12 to 13 | "Black Thursday", global sell-off on COVID-19 | About $1.1 billion in 24 hours on BitMEX alone (Skew, The Block); another report gave about $1.6 billion | From about $7,300 to $3,867 in 16 hours (CoinDesk Bitcoin Price Index) | BitMEX had delays 02:16 to 02:40 UTC on 3-13, which it blamed on a hardware issue at its cloud provider; Deribit put in 500 BTC of company funds so losses were not socialised to users |
| 2021-04-18 | Weekend drop in early Asian hours | About $10 billion, of which $9.26 billion longs (Bybt, CoinDesk) | From $60,000 to $52,148 | No compensation announcement found; CoinDesk reported BTC futures on Binance and Kraken fell further than spot |
| 2021-05-19 | Continued slide after Tesla stopped accepting BTC | More than $8 billion (Bybt, CoinDesk) | Briefly below $31,000, down more than 30% in May | Coinbase and Kraken had connectivity problems; Binance paused ETH and ERC-20 withdrawals and suspended most leveraged tokens |
| 2021-09-07 | The day BTC became legal tender in El Salvador | About $3 billion in 4 hours (Bybt, CoinDesk) | From above $52,000 to $42,900 | No compensation announcement found |
| 2022-05-10 | Terra's UST stablecoin depegs, LUNA collapses | More than $1 billion in 24 hours (Coinalyze, CoinDesk); the Anchor lending protocol liquidated another ~$1.048 billion of collateral 5-07 to 5-12 (The Block) | Briefly below $30,000 | Binance delisted coin-margined LUNA perpetuals on 5-12, cut USDT-margined LUNA leverage to 8x, and suspended LUNA and UST spot trading on 5-13 |
| 2022-11-09 | Run on FTX; Binance walks away from the takeover | More than $700 million of longs in 24 hours (CoinGlass, CoinDesk) | Low of $16,027 | FTX paused withdrawals on 11-08 and filed for bankruptcy in Delaware on 11-11 |
| 2025-02-03 | US announces tariffs on Canada, Mexico and China | More than $2.38 billion in 24 hours (CoinGlass, The Block); Bybit's CEO estimated $8 billion to $10 billion | Down 7.5% to about $91,969; ETH down about 20% | Bybit said its own 24-hour liquidations were $2.1 billion while CoinGlass counted $333 million; on 2-21 Bybit upgraded its API to publish all liquidation data |
| 2025-10-10 | US announces an extra 100% tariff on Chinese goods | More than $19 billion in 24 hours, about 1.7 million traders (CoinGlass, CoinDesk, The Block) | From about $122,000 to $106,560 (CoinDesk reference rate) | Binance covered about $283 million of depeg-related losses and launched a $400 million Together Initiative; ADL kicked in at some venues |
Sources (checked 2026-10-23): 2020 The Block (2020-03-13), The Block on insurance funds (2020-03-13), CoinDesk (2020-03-24); April 2021 CoinDesk (2021-04-19); May 2021 CoinDesk (2021-05-19), CoinDesk on exchange outages (2021-05-19); September 2021 CoinDesk (2021-09-07); May 2022 CoinDesk (2022-05-10), The Block (2022-05-20), Binance announcement (2022-05-12), Binance announcement (2022-05-13); November 2022 CoinDesk (2022-11-09), The Block timeline (2022-11-11); February 2025 The Block (2025-02-03), The Block (2025-02-02), CoinDesk (2025-02-21); October 2025 CoinDesk (2025-10-17), CoinDesk (2025-10-10), The Block (2025-10-14), Binance statement (2025-10-12). Liquidation totals are third-party estimates, not official exchange totals; figures from different data sites and different windows (1, 4 or 24 hours) are not directly comparable.
What happened each time
2020-03-12: Black Thursday
COVID-19 sent every market down at once, and BTC fell from about $7,300 to $3,867 in 16 hours. The Block, citing Skew, reported about $1.1 billion of liquidations on BitMEX alone in 24 hours, the most in 18 months. The steepest leg came between 02:16 and 02:40 UTC on 13 March, while BitMEX had service delays it blamed on a hardware issue at its cloud provider. The same day BitMEX's insurance fund hit a record 36,493 BTC, while Deribit's fell from 392 BTC to 198 BTC and Deribit added 500 BTC of its own so that losses were not passed on to users.
The story was still going in 2026: CoinDesk reported that the litigation administrator for the Celsius bankruptcy estate sued five BitMEX-related companies on 2026-09-12 in the US Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York, alleging fraud and manipulation in the 2020 liquidations and claiming 6,360 BTC. These are allegations in a complaint; the court has not ruled on them.
2021-04-18: the first $10 billion day
In the thin liquidity of early Sunday in Asia, BTC fell from $60,000 to $52,148. CoinDesk, citing Bybt, reported about $10 billion of liquidations that day, $9.26 billion of them longs, beating the $5.77 billion record set on 23 February the same year. The report found no single outside headline; traders mostly pointed to too much leverage and weekend liquidity.
2021-05-19: several exchanges stall at once
After Tesla stopped accepting BTC the market kept weakening, and CoinDesk reported that BTC was already down more than 30% in May. On 19 May it briefly broke below $31,000, and CoinDesk, citing Bybt, put liquidations above $8 billion. The same day Coinbase's site and app had intermittent downtime, Kraken had connectivity problems, and Binance paused ETH and ERC-20 withdrawals because of Ethereum network congestion and suspended trading in most of its leveraged tokens.
2021-09-07: El Salvador's first day
On the day BTC became legal tender in El Salvador, price fell from above $52,000 to $42,900. CoinDesk, citing Bybt, reported about $3 billion of liquidations in 4 hours; The Block Research put it at more than $2.65 billion in one hour.
May 2022: Terra/LUNA
Once UST lost its peg, LUNA kept falling. Futures liquidations passed $1 billion on 5-10 (CoinDesk, citing Coinalyze), with $87 million on LUNA futures alone. The bigger liquidation was on-chain: Anchor, the lending protocol on Terra, liquidated about $1.048 billion of collateral between 5-07 and 5-12. Binance delisted coin-margined LUNA perpetuals on 5-12, cut maximum leverage on USDT-margined LUNA contracts to 8x, and suspended LUNA and UST spot trading on 5-13. What happened afterwards is in crypto collapse history.
November 2022: FTX
FTX paused withdrawals on 11-08; Binance announced a takeover that day and dropped it the next, and BTC fell to $16,027. CoinDesk, citing CoinGlass, reported about $700 million of long liquidations in 24 hours. For FTX users the loss did not come from liquidations; their money was locked inside a bankruptcy case.
2025-02-03: the day the data missed most of it
After the US announced tariffs on goods from Canada, Mexico and China, BTC fell 7.5% in a day to about $91,969 and ETH fell about 20%. The Block, citing CoinGlass, reported more than $2.38 billion of liquidations in 24 hours. Bybit's CEO then said Bybit alone had $2.1 billion of liquidations while CoinGlass had counted only $333 million, because the API capped how much data could be pushed per second, and estimated the market-wide total at $8 billion to $10 billion. On 2-21 Bybit moved its liquidation feed to one update every 500 milliseconds and made all records public.
2025-10-10: the biggest ever
The US announced an extra 100% tariff on Chinese goods, and BTC fell from about $122,000 to $106,560 (CoinDesk reference rate). CoinGlass data showed more than $19 billion liquidated in 24 hours and about 1.7 million traders liquidated. CoinDesk's research note says USDe briefly traded at $0.65 on Binance, which set off a second wave of selling.
Binance's official statement on 10-12 said users liquidated because they held USDe, BNSOL or WBETH as collateral during the depeg after 21:36 UTC on 10-10 had their losses, about $283 million, fully covered by Binance. On 10-14 it launched the $400 million Together Initiative: about $300 million in token vouchers of $4 to $6,000 each for users whose forced-liquidation loss was at least $50 and at least 30% of their net assets. Binance said this did not mean it accepted liability for users' losses. A post-mortem reported by CoinDesk also said ADL kicked in at some venues that night, force-closing part of the profitable opposing positions.
Why do the totals for the same day differ so much?
- The data depends on exchange feeds: sites like CoinGlass add up the liquidation feeds exchanges publish. Bybit's February 2025 case shows that when a feed has a rate cap, a burst of liquidations gets missed.
- Exchanges report at different speeds: on 2025-10-10 CoinGlass said the real total was probably higher because Binance reports more slowly than others.
- Time windows differ: the same drop gives very different numbers over 1, 4 or 24 hours; 2021-09-07 has both "about $3 billion in 4 hours" and "$2.65 billion in one hour".
- Scope differs: the 2020 figure is BitMEX only, and Anchor in May 2022 was on-chain lending, not exchange futures.
When you quote a liquidation total, say who measured it and over what window, otherwise the numbers can't be compared.
Patterns across the eight days
- Nearly all longs: longs were over 90% on 2021-04-18 and again on 2021-09-07. The danger is highest after a hot run, when leverage piles up on one side.
- Often in the thinnest hours: weekends, early Asian hours, after the US stock close. 2021-04-18 and 2025-10-10 both fit.
- Exchanges stall too: BitMEX in 2020, Coinbase and Kraken in May 2021, were hard to reach just when traders needed to place orders.
- Compensation is rare: of the eight, only Binance on 2025-10-10 paid at scale, and it covered problems on its own platform (depegs and transfer delays), not liquidations caused by the market move itself.
Worked example: same day, different leverage
Say that before the 2025-10-10 drop you went long BTC on Binance with 1,000 USDT of margin. BTC fell that day from about 122,000 to 106,560, roughly 12.7%. With isolated margin and no top-up, liquidation comes at roughly "1 ÷ leverage" minus the maintenance margin rate (exact formulas in how liquidation price is calculated):
| Leverage | Notional | Roughly how far a drop liquidates you | Result that day |
|---|---|---|---|
| 3x | 3,000 USDT | About 33% | About 381 USDT paper loss, position still open |
| 10x | 10,000 USDT | Under 10% | Liquidated, margin almost gone |
| 20x | 20,000 USDT | Under 5% | Liquidated early in the drop |
Now the other way: the 10x position with a stop 5% below entry. The stop fills for a 500 USDT loss plus a closing fee of 10,000 × 95% × 0.05% ≈ 4.75 USDT. Signed up to Binance with code FEEOTTER, the 40% rebate (20% automatic exchange rebate + 20% extra rebate) brings that to about 2.85 USDT, and, leaving out the opening fee, about 497 USDT is still in the account. If you are liquidated instead, the remaining margin does not come back and a liquidation clearance fee is charged on top.
Liquidation clearance fees and leftover margin sent to the insurance fund are not trading fees, so no rebate comes back on them. Only the opening and closing fees on orders you place yourself are rebated.
What does this have to do with rebates?
A rebate cuts the cost of every open and close, but it can't save a position that gets liquidated. On a big liquidation day, leverage and stops decide the outcome: with low leverage and a stop in place, the loss has a ceiling and the fee is still rebated; if the system liquidates you, the liquidation and clearance fees are not refunded. How the insurance fund and ADL take over liquidated positions is in liquidation, insurance fund and ADL compared; effective futures rates after the rebate are in perp fees after rebate.
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