That BitMEX is cutting off some of its staff is not a peculiar move as it is an industry-wide trend.
BitMEX cryptocurrency trading platform has retrenched some of its staff as it looks to cut its costs and reposition its business following the departure of former Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Alexander Hoeptner.
As reported by Coindesk citing a statement from one of the company’s Spokespersons, the exchange made some cuts to its staff but denied the claims that this number came in at 30% of the total number of its employees. The move was made about a week after the departure of Hoeptner, as the new CEO, Stephan Lutz is trying to carve a new path for the firm on all fronts.
BitMEX remains one of the most strained cryptocurrency exchanges in the world as it has battled crackdowns from US regulators and also faced the crypto winter head-on over the past year. The trading platform is not new to cutting off its staff in a bid to cut costs. Back in April of this year, the exchange laid off 75 of its employees, amounting to a quarter of its global workforce at a time when the crypto winter was just gaining momentum.
According to the Spokesperson who recently spoke to Coindesk, the exchange’s top priority is to ensure that the laid-off have the support they need.
“We are going to refocus on liquidity, latencies and a vibrant derivatives community including BMEX Token trading,” BitMEX said in a statement shared with CoinDesk. “As an undesirable consequence, we had to make changes to our workforce. Our top priority is to make sure all employees who will be impacted have the support they require.”
BitMEX is now looking to undo some of the push that Hoeptner tried to institute including the pivot away from being an only derivatives firm. Today, Lutz seems to be focusing on the company’s derivatives strength at a time when the top industry players seem to be cautious on all fronts.
BitMEX Staff Cuts: an Industry-Wide Trend
That BitMEX is cutting off some of its staff is not a peculiar move as it is an industry-wide trend. Coinbase Global Inc (NASDAQ: COIN) and Gemini Exchange came off as the first set of exchanges to let go of 18% and 10% of their workforce as it became obvious that the crypto winter will not abate anytime soon.
The persistence of the crypto winter, compounded by growing inflation and the response of the Central Banks has made investors quite conservative about risky assets, impacting the volume of trading activities on exchanges.
Despite the move by exchanges to cut staff, there are other major players like Binance Exchange who have maintained a healthy workforce. Thus far, no staff has been let go, and the exchange promised to hire more hands to help balance out its business and customer relations.
Give or take, all trading platforms, irrespective of their capitalization have been instituting new approaches to cut expensive costs of operations.
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