Unveiling One of the Most Devastating Crashes in Crypto History: The 312 Black Swan Event

📌 Background: Pandemic Spread + Global Panic (Q1 2020)

• The COVID-19 pandemic spreads globally, causing comprehensive market panic.
• Stocks, gold, crude oil, and cryptocurrencies all decline.

• Global investors rush to sell assets to exchange for US dollar cash.

  ⏱ Full Timeline of the 3·12 Black Swan Event

  📍 2020/3/11 (The Day Before)

• WHO declares COVID-19 a "global pandemic".
• Global stock markets plummet, investors begin withdrawing from high-risk assets.

• BTC falls from 8000 USD to around 7900 USD, panic sentiment rises.

   

  📍 2020/3/12 (Black Thursday)

  ① Global Market Crash (Early Morning ~ Morning)

• US stock three major index futures plummet, triggering circuit breakers.

• Investors fully sell off risk assets, BTC breaks below 7000 → 6000 USD.

  ② Domino Effect: On-Chain "Excess Leverage" Liquidated (Noon ~ Afternoon)

• Exchanges like BitMEX, OKEx, and Binance see massive long positions liquidated.
• The crypto market continuously dives sharply, exhibiting a "waterfall-style crash".

• 📉 Liquidation Scale: Over 1 billion USD in longs liquidated within 24 hours.

  ③ BitMEX Liquidation Engine Stutters → Market Further Out of Control

• At that time, BitMEX was the largest perpetual contracts platform.
• A large influx of liquidation orders causes system delays of several minutes.

• The liquidation system fails to execute in time, forming a "death spiral".

  👉 Market liquidity disappears, buy orders approach zero.

   

  📍 2020/3/13 (Early Morning) Event Climax

  ④ BTC Falls to 3800 USD: Largest Single-Day Drop in History

• Bitcoin price halves from 8000 USD to 3800 USD within two days.

• 24-hour drop exceeds 50%, the largest in crypto history.

  

• ⑤ Ethereum Ecosystem on the Brink of Collapse

• ETH price falls to around 90 USD.
• Gas fees soar, network congestion, causing DeFi liquidation bots to fail to operate normally.
• 📌 Result:
  MakerDAO experiences "zero-yuan auctions", some users' collateral bought for 0 Dai, triggering systemic risk.