what's wintermute?
Wintermute is a prominent algorithmic trading firm and market maker in the cryptocurrency industry, focused on providing liquidity and fostering efficient markets for digital assets. Founded in 2017, the firm operates as a high-frequency trading entity that engages in spot and derivatives trading across major exchanges, while also offering over-the-counter (OTC) services through its proprietary platform, NODE, which streamlines onboarding, execution, and settlement for institutional clients. Wintermute maintains a market-neutral trading strategy with minimal leverage and supports a diverse venture portfolio investing in early-stage crypto projects, though it has faced recent solvency rumors amid broader market volatility. The firm actively participates in DeFi governance, liquidity provision for new token launches, and regulatory preparations, including compliance with the EU's Markets in Crypto-Assets (MiCA) framework. Key features include API-driven trading, real-time market insights via Wintermute Pulse reports, and an accelerator program called Construct to support crypto builders.
Wintermute received stETH/ETH, sold BTC, and transferred SOL/ETH.
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x.com/wintermute_tSold 3,521 BTC at $63,000 on Coinbase on February 28, 2026.
Received 325,000 UNI tokens (valued at approximately $1.24M) from a whale wallet on 2026-02-26.
Merges with Jane Street.
Accumulated 7,188 BTC worth approximately $255 million in a 30-minute period.
Accumulating millions of dollars in BTC on Binance on 2026-02-25.
Warns that AI hype and deglobalization are core drivers of crypto weakness, pointing to weakening institutional demand and macro regime shifts as structural headwinds that could keep prices suppressed through Q1 2026.
Participated in Based's $11.5 million Series A funding round led by Pantera Capital, alongside Coinbase Ventures, structured as equity with token warrants.
Launched OTC trading for tokenized gold PAXG and XAUt with 24/7 liquidity, targeting hedge funds.
Received 11.142 million ZRO tokens (valued at $21.5 million) from Alameda Research bankruptcy liquidation address on February 13th, 2026.
Serves as a crypto-native market maker for BlackRock's BUIDL token integration with Uniswap via UniswapX RFQ routing system.
Began market making for Rivian on 2025-12-20.
Received 12,458 stETH ($23.76M) and 2,566 ETH ($5.38M) from two wallets possibly linked to Konstantin Lomashuk on February 6, 2026.
Sold 6,172 BTC within a 30-minute period on February 5, 2026.
Branch Johnson joined as Managing Director.
Transferred 52,000 ETH on February 3rd, 2026.
Transferred 3,242 BTC on February 3rd, 2026.
Transferred 599,000 SOL on February 3rd, 2026.
Sold 3,771 BTC during low-liquidity hours as part of coordinated market activity on February 1, 2026.
Sold 3,410 BTC in the last 10 hours as of 2026-01-31.
Sold 4,785 BTC within a 30-minute period on January 30, 2026.
Liquidated over $250M in long positions on Binance within 15 minutes on January 29, 2026.
Liquidating millions of dollars in BTC and ETH holdings in continuous transactions following the Fed interest rate decision on January 28, 2026.
Hiring for BD & Partnerships Associate, BD & Partnerships Manager, DeFi Algorithmic Trader, Graduate Algorithmic Trader 2026, and Quant Researcher (MFT Focus) roles in London and New York.
Accumulates millions of dollars in BTC on Binance on January 23, 2026.
Sold 2,539 BTC on January 23, 2026.
Hiring a Business Development & Partnerships Manager for a full-time position in New York.
Facilitated OTC purchase of 50,013 ETH worth $148 million at an average price of $2,966 over a two-day period ending around January 23, 2026
Sold 4,191 BTC in a large transfer within one hour on 2026-01-19.
Sold 2,647 BTC during low liquidity hours on January 7th, 2026.
Pays more than $1 million per employee amid high-profit digital asset trading conditions.
Received a deposit of 288 BTC ($26.3M) from Bitcoin mining firm MARA on January 4, 2026.
Accumulated 4,811 BTC on January 3, 2026, representing approximately $500M in value as part of coordinated large-scale Bitcoin purchases by major entities.
Started bidding back tax loss positions.
Has invested in AAVE since 2022 and participates in its governance.
Bought 2,622 BTC in a 10-hour period on December 22, 2025.
Transferred 6,500 BTC in a single-hour period on December 19, 2025, as part of coordinated large-scale Bitcoin movements totaling over $2.5B across multiple exchanges and market makers.
Sold over $10 billion worth of Bitcoin on December 18, 2025.
Purchased 3,000 BTC on December 17, 2025.
Wintermute sold 1,526 BTC as part of simultaneous large-scale BTC sales from multiple exchanges (Binance, Coinbase, BitMEX) totaling over $2B within minutes.
Tessera is Wintermute's Prop AMM venue on Solana, designed for large institutional-size trades and listed among the main players in the Prop AMM space that dominates 40-60% of total Solana DEX volume.
Total on-chain holdings decline 31% to $377M by December 14th from $549M peak on November 22nd. Recent outflows include 77 BTC ($6.9M) to Bitstamp and 450 ETH ($1.4M) to Binance.
Wintermute receives $365 million in stablecoins, 2,671 BTC, 73.65k ETH, and 389k SOL over 24 hours on December 11th.
Wintermute transfers millions in ETH and BTC to Binance.
Wintermute receives $309.15 million in stablecoins from Bullish, Coinbase, and Circle on Solana before FOMC meeting.
Wintermute achieves $1.17M realized PnL over 7 days, topping the Smart Money profitability leaderboard.
Binance transfers 2,214.5 BTC, 43k ETH, and 112.9k SOL to Wintermute on December 8th.
Bullish sends $132 million to Wintermute on Solana on December 8th.
Sold 9,315 BTC on February 23, 2026, alongside Binance (5,460 BTC), Coinbase (8,375 BTC), Bitfinex (3,751 BTC), BlackRock (5,193 BTC), and Bitwise (5,010 BTC), totaling 6,131 BTC for $460 million.
$200 million USDC flows into Wintermute on Solana in 24 hours.
On Dec 5th, Wintermute receives 1,584 BTC, 53.86k ETH, and 263k SOL as the most active entity in 24-hour period.
Wintermute publicly advocates for exemptive relief for DeFi trading of tokenized equities in SEC Crypto Taskforce comment letter process, joining Robinhood, Coinbase, and Securitize in vocal support.
Wintermute receives massive USDC inflows from Coinbase, Circle, and Bullish in recent days to buy SOL for institutional investors.
Wintermute bought 4,707 BTC alongside coordinated purchases from whales (20,430 BTC), Binance (8,324 BTC), Coinbase (6,814 BTC), Strategy (3,887 BTC), Kraken (1,731 BTC), and Bitstamp (1,650 BTC) during BTC rally from 83K to 93K.
Wintermute bought 8,577 BTC as part of coordinated buying activity alongside Satoshi whales, Binance, Strategy, Coinbase, and BitMEX.
On Dec 2nd, Wintermute operates as the most active market maker with $525m in volume across 982 BTC, 50.5k ETH, and 441k SOL.
Wintermute sold 9,315 BTC alongside coordinated selling from Coinbase (8,375 BTC), Bitmex (7,993 BTC), Binance (5,460 BTC), Bitwise (5,010 BTC), and Bitfinex (3,751 BTC).
Wintermute sold 8,714 BTC today alongside other major entities including Fidelity, BlackRock, Coinbase, Binance, and Bybit in selling activity totaling over $5B worth of Bitcoin.
Wintermute among multiple recipients of $REZ token distributions from RenzoProtocol Investor Distribution contract in recent days, with SevenXVentures receiving the largest allocation of 83.57M $REZ (~$514.67K).
Staggering volumes transferred from Binance to Wintermute in the last 2 days, with suspected large $SOL supply exchange executed at $130-$140 range.
Wintermute closed one-third of their delta neutral position, with the tweet referencing $mon token bidding.
$133 million transfers from Binance to Wintermute in market making activity.
Wintermute buys Bitcoin alongside major institutions including BlackRock and major exchanges in buying activity totaling over $10B.
Wintermute officially denies being the major entity that experienced losses on October 10, contradicting previous unverified reports linking the company to the incident.
Unverified insider reports claim losses occurred on October 10 from autodeleveraging of automated market making vaults, with aggressive selling of spot holdings to cover these losses.
Wintermute sold its NVIDIA stock position.
Bullish exchange becomes highly active in market making through Wintermute; the exchange went public on NYSE in August 2025 with ticker BLSH, raising over $1.1 billion.
Wintermute sends 12.29M ENA (~$3.91M) to a whale address, who then withdraws 5.27M ENA (~$1.47M) from Binance and stakes the full amount into Ethena.
Wintermute submits second response to SEC Crypto Task Force, advocating for dealer self-custody for on-chain settlement and exemption of DeFi liquidity-provision from dealer registration requirements.
Arthur Hayes sends 520 ETH worth $1.66M to Wintermute and other market makers alongside ENA and ETHFI transfers.
Arthur Hayes deposits 2.62M ENA (~$733k) to Wintermute and Binance, and transfers 133k ETHFI to Wintermute.
A whale/institution purchases 19,945 ETH worth $63.82M at an average price of $3,200 through Wintermute, Coinbase, and FalconX.
Anchorage Digital receives 4,094 BTC ($405M) from multiple institutions including Wintermute, Coinbase, Cumberland, and Galaxy Digital over a 9-hour period.
Monetalis accumulates 1.85M UNI (~$14.33M) from Wintermute and FlowTraders within 24 hours, while transferring 72.9M ARB (~$19.62M) to Wintermute and B2C2.
Wintermute launches TV license forward contracts according to Bloomberg report.
Bank analyst reports institutions favor regulated equity markets over token markets due to regulatory protection concerns, referencing Wintermute as an example of token market issues.
CEO Evgeny Gaevoy states centralized exchanges are best positioned to drive transparency on token listings and market maker operations including loan terms, quoting performance, and general disclosures.
Wintermute releases market report stating October market washout has settled with positioning reset and market tone less fragile, while sentiment improvement has not yet translated to capital flows.
Monad ICO filing on Coinbase discloses Wintermute receives 20M MON tokens under a 1-year market maker agreement, while other market makers (CyantArb, Auros, Galaxy, GSR) received larger amounts with 1-month renewable terms.
Market maker tracking bot reports large Bitcoin transfer from Binance to Wintermute, with stablecoins moving to market makers.
Wintermute transfers millions of crypto to Binance exchange, with speculation about potential market manipulation similar to previous lowcap pumping and short liquidation events.
Wintermute reports only 4 $ORE tokens remain in inventory across all OTC desks.
Wintermute serves as a liquidity source for MuteSwap's Liquidity Mesh Protocol alongside Godex, Bisq, Trocadore, and DWF Labs.
Wintermute states that money has stopped flowing into crypto markets, with capital rotating internally rather than fresh capital entering, causing rallies to die fast and market breadth to narrow. (Tweet ID: 1986368726711558453)
CEO Evgeny Gaevoy confirms the firm remains financially stable despite recent losses from the Binance ADL incident.
Reports claim market-making operations are down, with comparisons to 2022 events.
CEO Evgeny Gaevoy officially denies all rumors about suing Binance, calling such claims "baseless" and stating the firm has no plans to pursue legal action now or in the future.
Wintermute's tracked wallets decline from $637M to $572M (-12%) following the crash, with reports of the firm negotiating with Binance for a refund while Binance spends $188M from its insurance fund and refunds $283M for oracle depegs (excluding ADL losses).
Wintermute takes major losses during Binance's ADL incident on 10/11 involving approximately $20B in liquidations, with CEO hinting at ADL system malfunction and sources reporting preparation for legal action against Binance.
Wintermute transfers millions in BTC and ETH to Binance exchange.
Public call for independent investigation into market manipulation allegations against Wintermute, alongside Binance and CZ, through proper legal channels.
Wintermute joins $39M Series A investment in Pave Bank, a regulated platform for businesses to transact in stablecoins, CBDCs, and tokenized real-world assets, alongside investors Accel and Tether.
Wintermute locks veAERO tokens on Aerodrome protocol on Base, positioning alongside Coinbase as smart money in the Base DeFi ecosystem.
Wintermute receives millions in BTC from multiple major centralized exchanges including Binance, OKX, Bybit, Crypto.com, and Bullish.
Wintermute appears on a New Era Finance podcast episode to provide market maker insights following a recent market crash.
Wintermute participates as a market maker in Circle's Arc public testnet launch, joining an ecosystem that includes major banks, asset managers, exchanges, and payment companies across global markets.
Wintermute issues bullish "max bid" recommendation citing BTC reclaiming 115k, easing yields, declining volatility, DeFi and AI sector leadership, and favorable Q4 setup with macro tailwinds including cooling inflation and dovish Fed policy.
Wintermute expresses buying interest in MEGA tokens at a discount to expected market value alongside Ethena in a Polymarket-related opportunity.
A whale transfers 2.5 million UNI tokens ($15.75 million) to Wintermute for sale one hour before the tweet, after transferring 1.882 million UNI ($11.61 million) six days prior.
Wintermute participates in Pave Bank's $39 million Series A funding round led by Accel, with Pave Bank being a Georgian-licensed programmable bank serving fiat and digital assets.
A public argument occurs between a Wintermute representative and CJ from Limitless regarding Limitless's onchain market making strategy.