Arthur Hayes’ Mysterious $2M HYPE Purchase Sparks Frenzied Speculation—His Four-Word Response Shocks Everyone

A wallet linked to Arthur Hayes withdrew $2.09 million in HYPE from Bybit, though he insists the purchase never happened.

BitMEX co-founder Arthur Hayes appears to have bought back 33,978 HYPE tokens worth about $2.09 million, according to blockchain tracking platform Lookonchain. The platform linked the purchase to a wallet associated with Hayes, which withdrew the tokens from Bybit during Asian hours on Monday.

The alleged purchase comes four days after Hayes said he had sold his entire HYPE position to lock in profits while the token was trading above $72.

Arthur Hayes Faces New Questions

Following the update, HYPE surged by 2%. Hayes, on the other hand, has denied buying the token in response to Lookonchain’s update. His tweet read,

“I didn’t buy s**t.”

After Hayes disclosed his exit, HYPE briefly plunged to $54. The token has since recovered and is trading above $61 at the time of writing.

Hyperliquid has become one of the crypto market’s leading derivatives platforms since its launch in 2023, and Hayes has emerged as one of the token’s most prominent supporters. The sale drew sharp criticism from the crypto community. Some X users called Hayes’ actions a “douchebag” move for promoting HYPE before selling. Others said that traders who copied his trades had been “scammed” by a “big scammer.”

The backlash has continued even after the latest update. Some X users accused him of repeatedly profiting at the expense of retail traders and urged others not to become his “exit liquidity.” Others claimed he was using a “buy in secret, pump in public, dump in public” strategy and manipulating smaller investors.

Mystery Wallet Doubles Down on HYPE

Meanwhile, separate data shared by Lookonchain suggested that interest in HYPE remains strong despite the controversy surrounding Hayes. The blockchain tracker said a newly created wallet withdrew another 82,089 HYPE tokens, which were worth around $5.16 million, from exchanges on Monday.

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Over the last week, the same wallet has moved a total of 1.14 million HYPE, valued at roughly $79.22 million, off exchanges and deposited the tokens into Hyperliquid for staking.

Additionally, Hyperliquid broke into the top 10 crypto assets by market capitalization this month after surpassing Dogecoin and becoming the first DeFi protocol since Uniswap in 2021 to achieve the milestone.