Black Swan Trader? Who is the mysterious whale Garrett Jin?

Original author: @eyeonchains, on-chain analyst

Original translation: angelilu, Foresight News

Note from Rhythm: Discussion about the Black Swan crash event on 10.11 is ongoing, with the community continuously questioning the identity of the whale who precisely opened over $1.1 billions in short positions in advance. On-chain detective analysis suggests that the address likely belongs to former BitForex CEO Garrett Jin. Earlier today, Garrett Jin posted three consecutive updates on his personal X account, responding to market rumors for the first time, clarifying that he has no connection with the Trump family or "Little Trump," emphasizing that his previous operations were not insider trading, and that the funds used were not his own but belonged to his clients. The following is the original content:

The market witnessed a Black Swan event yesterday, marking the largest liquidation day in crypto history, yet someone was able to short in advance with precision, opening over $1.1 billions in short positions and making over $80 million in 24 hours. Was this foresight or insider information? The true identity of the whale has attracted market attention.

A Threads post by on-chain detective Eye revealed the face of this whale. To summarize, he believes the whale’s true identity is a Chinese individual named Garrett Bullish with a multifaceted background. Garrett’s crypto-related experience includes serving as Operations Director at Huobi (HTX), being the CEO of BitForex (which was embroiled in trading scandals), and founding several crypto projects. Meanwhile, the source of his massive funds also appears suspicious.

Regarding this event, CZ once retweeted a post expressing hope that someone could cross-verify the information. Lookonchain stated that JackYi, founder of Liquid Capital, might know more. The wallet 0x52d3, which sent ETH for gas, also transferred 1.31 million USDC to Trend Research’s Binance deposit address.

In the field of on-chain investigation, the credible on-chain detective ZachXBT has so far only expressed doubts about this investigation, stating, "You clearly stated in your post that the Bitcoin whale is Garrett Jin, but now in your reply to me, you say these BTCs definitely come from multiple entities."

The authenticity of this investigation has yet to be confirmed. Below is the full analysis by Eye (with minor edits in translation), with Foresight News continuing to monitor subsequent developments:

Massive Fund Flows Attract Attention

An investigation into the identity of the mysterious Hyperliquid/Hyperunit whale shows that this whale holds over 100,000 bitcoins. Recently, he sold more than $4.23 billions worth of bitcoin to purchase ethereum, and also executed a $735 million bitcoin short order on the same platform.

Between August and September, this whale used Hyperliquid/Hyperunit’s spot and perpetual contracts to sell over 35,000 bitcoins from a series of bitcoin wallets in exchange for ethereum. At the same time, multiple ethereum addresses received a total of over 570,000 ETH, all of which were subsequently deposited into the same Beacon deposit contract for staking.

Identity Clues Gradually Emerge

By analyzing the whale address that opened the $735 million bitcoin short, on-chain detective Eye noticed it received fees from a specific wallet. Tracing these transactions revealed a connection to an address named "ereignis.eth".

Further investigation showed that "ereignis.eth" also owns another ENS name: "garrettjin.eth", which points to X (Twitter) user @GarrettBullish.

Background of Garrett Jin

Garrett Jin graduated from Boston University with a degree in Economics in 2008, beginning his career at China Construction Bank. In 2012, he founded Da Yo Trading (HK), later serving as Operations Director at Huobi (HTX) until 2015. He then moved to Frankfurt, co-founded a medical platform, and left that position in 2017.

From 2017 to 2020, he served as CEO of @bitforexcom. The exchange later became embroiled in scandal, accused of faking trading volumes, and suffered a private key leak in early 2024, resulting in about $57 million being withdrawn. The exchange was subsequently issued a fraud warning by the Hong Kong SFC and ultimately shut down, leaving many users with asset losses.

Project History and Source of Funds

During the Bitforex collapse, Garrett founded WaveLabs VC in 2020 and launched several projects, including TanglePay, IotaBee, and GroupFi. The ENS name "ereignis.eth" (meaning "event" in German) further confirms his association with these large-scale operations.

Investigations show that the Hyperliquid/Hyperunit whale’s funds mainly originated from bitcoin withdrawn from exchanges such as HTX and OKX several years ago, a pattern that forms a suspicious link with his work experience at Huobi and the funds that disappeared in the Bitforex scam.

Current Status

Currently, Garrett still holds 46,295 bitcoins (worth about $5.19 billions). In addition, he is the founder of @XHash_com, a non-custodial ethereum staking platform that may be used to introduce suspicious funds.