The October 10 crypto crash wasn’t just another violent wick on the chart. According to Tom Lee, chairman of Ether-focused treasury and market-making firm BitMine, the selloff exposed “structural weaknesses” within major liquidity providers that only become visible when volatility hits hard.

Speaking with CNBC, Lee said the record liquidation cascade, nearly $20B wiped out in hours, forced over-leveraged market makers to rapidly unwind positions as collateral values sank. That derisking drained liquidity from order books, widened spreads, and accelerated the crash in a classic feedback loop.

For regular users, that kind of liquidity vacuum isn’t just macro noise. It’s when swaps fail, fees spike, and centralized wallet pipelines…