TL;DR
- USDe saw about $8.3B in net outflows after Oct. 10, with market cap dropping from nearly $14.7B to about $6.4B.
- USDe briefly depegged to $0.65 on Binance; Ethena’s Guy Young blamed an exchange oracle issue and said $2B was redeemed in 24 hours.
- The crash liquidated over $19B and cut open interest by $65B; volumes fell roughly 50% and US spot Bitcoin ETFs logged about $5B net outflows since October.
Ethena’s USDe has seen about $8.3 billion in net outflows since Oct. 10, following a wave of liquidations. 10x Research described the move as an inflection point that kicked off deleveraging after roughly $1.3 trillion, nearly 30% of crypto’s market cap at the time, was wiped out. USDe is a synthetic dollar backed by collateral and hedging, not fiat reserves. CoinMarketCap data showed its market cap falling from nearly $14.7 billion on Oct. 9 to around $6.4 billion. The capital flight signaled a confidence break in the synthetic model.
After Crypto’s October 10 Crash: Are We Entering the Final Stage of Deleveraging?
October proved to be the most consequential month for Bitcoin in 2025, marking the point at which the bull market decisively turned bearish amid a convergence of overlapping shocks.
Understanding… pic.twitter.com/W6iAKdCAA3
— 10x Research (@10x_Research) December 23, 2025
Depeg, redemptions, and the deleveraging reset
In the immediate shock, USDe briefly lost its peg and dropped to $0.65 on Binance. Ethena Labs founder Guy Young said the deviation stemmed from an exchange oracle issue, not from flaws in collateral, the protocol, or redemption mechanics. He stated minting and redemptions continued to operate normally, with roughly $2 billion redeemed in 24 hours across DeFi venues and only minor deviations elsewhere. CoinMarketCap put USDe at $0.9987. A localized issue became a market-wide risk signal.
The report cited a “sharp loss of confidence” and linked USDe’s drawdown to the post-crash retreat from leverage. Even as the team emphasized functioning liquidity and redemption pathways, the episode underscored the reputational cost of relying on external infrastructure for pricing. Within weeks, market cap shrank by more than half, reflecting that participants chose to cut exposure rather than wait for a gradual normalization, even after the peg recovered. The sustained contraction suggests perceived risk now outweighs redemption mechanics.
Oct. 10 was described as the largest liquidation event, with more than $19 billion in positions liquidated and a $65 billion drop in open interest, per CoinGlass. Since then, the report pointed to trading volumes roughly 50% lower and about $5 billion in net outflows from US spot Bitcoin ETFs since late October. 10x Research attributed the pullback to regulated capital stepping back and said Bitcoin decoupled from equities and gold. Deleveraging has become the ecosystem’s operating mandate.
