Three firms still hold $600M in Bitcoin and Ethereum shorts after the rally

Abraxas Capital, Fasanara Capital, and Wintermute still hold more than $600 million in short positions on Bitcoin and Ethereum, even after a rally that liquidated most other bearish bets, BeInCrypto reported, citing blockchain tracker Lookonchain.

The rally, fueled by recent policy moves, triggered a wave of short liquidations. Short sellers lost $1.3 billion within 60 minutes on Aug. 19 as bitcoin climbed 2.5%, and the broader sell-off in bearish positions reached $2.74 billion as 172,202 traders got liquidated. Sellers then lost another $1.06 billion over the following 24 hours.

We covered that cascade in our report on how bitcoin's best day since February wiped out $3 billion in shorts. It set up the standoff visible now: most leveraged short sellers got forced out of the market, leaving hedging books like these three as the remainder still standing.

“It seems that all the big whales have been liquidated in this price surge! Currently, the largest short positions on the blockchain are held by market makers' hedging accounts.”

— Lookonchain, blockchain analytics account, on X

The three firms combined hold 138,569 ETH in short exposure, worth $338 million, and 3,425 BTC, worth $265 million. Abraxas Capital runs the largest book: its two ether shorts liquidate at $4,008 and $3,958 against a spot price near $2,440, and its bitcoin shorts liquidate at $128,521 and $140,437 against a $77,381 spot price. Wintermute's bitcoin position survives until $251,307. None of the three faces liquidation unless bitcoin climbs 66% or ether climbs 62% from current levels.

Market makers such as Wintermute typically run short positions like these to hedge other parts of their book, options exposure or lending desks, rather than as a directional bet that prices will fall. That distinction matters for how the positions should be read: a market maker's short doesn't signal a house view on price, it offsets risk sitting somewhere else in the firm. Lookonchain and the separate tracker Onchain Lens are both on-chain analytics accounts that follow large wallet activity in real time, and their data has become a standard reference point for traders trying to gauge where leveraged positioning sits during fast-moving rallies like this one.

• Combined short exposure: over $600 million across BTC and ETH
• Liquidation prices sit at least 62% above spot
• Abraxas Capital's unrealized losses: about $58 million across four positions
• Fasanara Capital: 18.87% underwater on a $74.81 million ETH short at 15x leverage
• Wintermute: marginally profitable on both assets, per Lookonchain

Abraxas Capital has not closed any of its four positions despite the unrealized loss. Wintermute stays marginally profitable on both trades, according to Lookonchain, though Onchain Lens found the firm raising its short exposure on Hyperliquid separately, a book that now shows $5.85 million in unrealized losses across various assets.

The pattern reads less like a broad bearish bet on crypto and more like market-making and hedging activity that happens to sit on the wrong side of a sharp move. With liquidation levels still far above spot, none of the three positions faces immediate pressure unless the rally extends significantly further.

Nothing here should be taken as financial advice — just information to consider.