Crypto Exchanges & Bitcoin Price Crashes: Is Market Manipulation the Real Culprit?

When Bitcoin tumbles, fingers point straight at the trading desks. Are the very platforms built to serve the market actually rigging it against you?

The Wash Trade Whisper

Spot markets look liquid—until you realize a single entity might be trading with itself. Fake volume paints a picture of stability that evaporates the moment real sell pressure hits. It's the oldest trick in the book, just with a blockchain wrapper.

Derivatives Domino Effect

Leverage is the accelerant. Expositions offering 100x futures create a powder keg. A minor dip triggers a cascade of liquidations, and exchanges profit from the fees on every blown-up position. Convenient, isn't it?

The Opaque Order Book

Who's behind those massive sell walls? Proprietary trading desks operating within the same exchange group face zero conflict-of-interest rules. They can see your stop-losses before you're stopped out—a structural advantage that would make any traditional finance regulator's head spin, if they were actually paying attention.

So, is the crash manufactured? Not always. But the ecosystem is wired to amplify volatility for profit. In the end, the 'free market' often looks a lot like a casino where the house trades against its own customers—the ultimate insider trading scheme, dressed up as financial innovation.

Crypto Pundit Accuses Crypto Exchanges Of Manipulating Bitcoin Price

In an X post, Wimar asserted that crypto exchanges are manipulating the Bitcoin price. He noted how BTC just dumped from $95,500 to $91,900 with no news. The pundit claimed it is the same script, over and over again, as the flagship crypto rose from $89,000 to $95,000 and has now fallen to $91,000, just as it did when it rose from $85,000 to $88,000 and then fell to $84,000. 

Wimar claimed that this is a liquidity hunt, alluding to the flows to prove that the bitcoin price is manipulated. He noted that within minutes, Wintermute, Binance, Coinbase, and ETF-linked wallets were all active simultaneously. Large blocks were said to have moved from exchange to exchange, with huge market buys hitting thin books, and then, just as fast, these tokens were dumped.  

The crypto pundit also highlighted Arkham data, noting that the flows tell the real story. Wimar claimed that coins MOVE into exchanges right after the pump, which he stated is not a coincidence. The pundit further remarked that these crypto exchanges wait for a setup where liquidity is low, leverage is high, and funding is stretched. 

Wimar asserted that these crypto exchanges run the same play every time, where they first pump the Bitcoin price fast on thin books to trigger FOMO and then liquidate shorts. Retail investors then see green candles and open long positions because the price action appears to be a breakout, but they fall into the trap, according to the pundit. 

Wimar stated that once enough people are stuck in leverage, the coins hit crypto exchanges and selling starts, leading to a Bitcoin price crash. The pundit accused these exchanges of dumping into the demand they just created, forcing fresh longs to get liquidated and farming both long and short traders with no news. 

BTC’s Current Price Action Isn’t Based On Headlines

Wimar doubled down on his accusation of crypto exchanges being responsible for the Bitcoin price crash, stating that BTC doesn’t move like this because of headlines. He claimed that it moves like because leverage piles up, and someone decides it is “payday.” As such, the pundit suggested that the TRUMP tariffs fears aren’t what is sparking this recent market crash.

Trump had announced fresh tariffs on France, the U.K., the Netherlands, Denmark, Germany, Sweden, Finland, and Norway over the weekend. The Bitcoin price had remained unchanged following the announcement, but began to crash following reports that the European Union (EU) was considering retaliatory tariffs. 

At the time of writing, the Bitcoin price is trading at around $90,900, down over 2% in the last 24 hours, according to data from CoinMarketCap.

Featured image from Pixabay, chart from Tradingview.com