Wall Street Is Buying Crypto’s Plumbing, Not Its Ideology

BitMEX, the exchange that launched crypto’s first perpetual futures contract, will close on September 23 after 11 years. BitMart, another crypto exchange, plans to wind down by January, according to Jean-Marie Mognetti, CoinShares co-founder, president and CEO.
Key Takeaways:
- BitMEX, BitMart, Movement Labs and Storj are all closing or filing for bankruptcy this year.
- Hyperliquid now gets 54% of its trading volume from stocks and commodities, not crypto.
- CoinShares points to Nasdaq-listed, SEC-registered BRRR and BTF as regulated crypto access.
Movement Labs, the developer behind the Movement blockchain network, and Storj, which runs a decentralized cloud storage service, both filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection the same week, Mognetti wrote in a recent report.
Mognetti calls this a sorting, not a collapse. Blockchain was never going to replace the financial system, he wrote, only its back-end plumbing, and banks are now the ones building on top of it. For investors, that means bitcoin and other crypto exposure is increasingly moving into regulated ETFs, not unlicensed exchanges.
Consider Hyperliquid, one of the largest decentralized derivatives exchanges. For the first time, real-world assets, not crypto, made up 54% of its trading volume, about $26 billion, Mognetti wrote. Single stocks accounted for 61% of that volume, led by SK Hynix, the Korean semiconductor maker, not a token.
CME Group Inc. (CME) and Cboe Global Markets, Inc. (CBOE) continue to expand their crypto product lines. Crypto platforms are also increasingly listing stocks, ETFs, and commodities so investors can trade around the clock, according to Mognetti.
See more: DIME Taps Solana’s Role in Prediction Market Boom
Banks Build Out Their Own Crypto Rails
JPMorgan Chase & Co. (JPM) has processed more than $4 trillion in transactions on its Kinexys platform since launch. Daily volume now averages more than $7 billion across eight currencies, Mognetti wrote.
BlackRock, Inc. (BLK)’s tokenized Treasury fund has surpassed $2.5 billion in assets across eight blockchains. This year, it also became tradable on Uniswap and accepted as collateral on Binance, according to Mognetti.
The largest U.S. banks are also building a shared tokenized deposit network through The Clearing House, an industry-owned payments group, Mognetti wrote.
Regulation is helping decide who owns that plumbing, Mognetti wrote. The European Union’s Markets in Crypto-Assets regulation, known as MiCA, ended its transition period July 1. Thousands of unlicensed providers then had to stop serving European customers. The U.S. is moving through a similar filter with the Clarity Act, a bill that would set rules for digital assets inside the regulated financial system.
For investors, the CoinShares Bitcoin ETF (BRRR) and the CoinShares Bitcoin and Ether ETF (BTF) offer regulated exposure to bitcoin and ether. Both trade on Nasdaq and are registered with the Securities and Exchange Commission. That’s the same kind of oversight MiCA and the Clarity Act are extending to the rest of the industry.
For more news, information, and strategy, visit the CoinShares Crypto ETF Hub.

Facts Only

* BitMEX will close on September 23.
* BitMart plans to wind down by January.
* Movement Labs filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.
* Storj filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection the same week as Movement Labs.
* Hyperliquid's trading volume now consists of stocks and commodities, not crypto.
* Single stocks accounted for 61% of Hyperliquid’s trading volume, led by SK Hynix.
* CME Group Inc. (CME) and Cboe Global Markets, Inc. (CBOE) are expanding their crypto product lines.
* JPMorgan Chase & Co. has processed over $4 trillion in transactions on its Kinexys platform since launch.
* BlackRock, Inc.’s tokenized Treasury fund has assets exceeding $2.5 billion across eight blockchains.
* The European Union’s Markets in Crypto-Assets regulation (MiCA) ended its transition period on July 1.
* The U.S. is moving through legislation like the Clarity Act to set rules for digital assets within the financial system.

Executive Summary

Several major cryptocurrency exchanges face wind-down or closure timelines, with BitMEX set to close on September 23 and BitMart planning to wind down by January. Additionally, Movement Labs and Storj filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. A shift is occurring in where crypto exposure is directed, as Hyperliquid's trading volume has increasingly derived from stocks and commodities, with single stocks accounting for 61% of its volume. The broader market trend points toward regulated access methods; CoinShares highlights Nasdaq-listed, SEC-registered Bitcoin and Ether ETFs as a means of regulated exposure. Regulatory frameworks like the EU’s MiCA and the proposed U.S. Clarity Act are filtering unlicensed providers out of serving customers. Furthermore, established financial institutions, such as JPMorgan Chase, are integrating crypto through platforms like Kinexys, and large firms like BlackRock are tokenizing assets across multiple blockchains.

Full Take

The narrative shifts from a perceived collapse of decentralized crypto infrastructure to a structural migration of finance onto regulated rails. The pattern observed is that entities associated with early, less-regulated derivatives exchanges are entering insolvency or restructuring, while established financial giants and regulators implement controls that favor asset tokenization and regulated products. This suggests that the value proposition for investors is moving away from the volatility inherent in unlicensed exchanges toward assets secured by recognized regulatory oversight, specifically through securities-compliant ETFs. The shift in Hyperliquid’s volume composition—from crypto to stocks—is not merely an operational adjustment but reflects a fundamental re-anchoring of decentralized derivatives liquidity into traditional asset markets where institutional capital resides. The interplay between MiCA and the Clarity Act creates a systemic pressure forcing innovation toward permissioned systems, effectively validating the argument that blockchain serves as back-end plumbing rather than a replacement for the core financial system. The implication is that cognitive sovereignty for investors rests less on the perceived promise of unregulated platforms and more on understanding how regulatory frameworks dictate the ownership structure of digital assets. What assumptions about decentralization and utility are being selectively eroded by the introduction of jurisdictionally defined boundaries?

Sentinel — Human

Confidence

This text reads like an aggregation of expert commentary and market shifts, structured around a specific argument about the regulation and maturation of the crypto asset space rather than a pure informational dump.

Signals Detected

Sentence length variance shows natural variation; the text flows like a summary report rather than strictly uniform prose.

The piece maintains a cohesive, argumentative thread connecting disparate facts (exchanges closing, asset class shifts, regulatory context) through the central thesis of 'sorting' rather than a pure synthesis.

The structure mimics an expert opinion piece heavily reliant on internal attribution ('Mognetti wrote') and lists of related concepts, suggesting curated source material aggregation rather than raw generation.

Specific financial figures ($26 billion for Hyperliquid, $4 trillion transactions) are cited with attribution, which is a hallmark of legitimate reporting; no obvious LLM confabulation detected.

Human Indicators

The inclusion of direct quotes and specific industry regulatory names (MiCA, Clarity Act, BRRR, BTF) suggests reliance on deep domain knowledge characteristic of human expertise.

The narrative style balances a critical viewpoint with factual reporting in a way that reflects editorial framing.