Seven major encryption projects will be closed in 2026: Notice for investors

Seven major encryption projects are shut down: the beginning and end of the incident and future outlook

The list of encryption projects to be shut down in 2026 continues to increase, and the latest batch includes the names that once defined the entire track. Seven projects covering games, wallets, derivatives and DeFi lending were announced to be closed or have ceased operations within weeks. In 2026 alone, more than 79 crypto projects were shut down, bankrupt or went dormant, and this batch of projects shows that this trend has spread to the entire industry, not just the weak corners.

BitMEX and Loopring were not failed projects. BitMEX invented the 100-fold leveraged perpetual contract, a contract type that remains at the core of most crypto transactions. Loopring launched the first zk-rollup decentralized exchange on Ethereum. Pioneering innovation has left a legacy for both, but once transaction volume is concentrated on a few leading platforms, this does not guarantee their survival. The other two projects that were closed, SecondFi and Radiant Capital, were caused by hacking attacks rather than market pressure, and in the long bear market, there was no room for redemption after either attack.

List of closed projects

Project status category reasons
YGG Play closes July 31, 2026 Web3 game publisher The economic model is unsustainable after the market crash in October 2025
Ctrl Wallet closes self-managed wallet security vulnerabilities on August 3, 2026. No fix found
BitMEX closes derivatives exchange strategic business review on September 23, 2026
SecondFi has closed the $2.4 million vulnerability attack on Cardano Wallet and cannot be recovered
Movement Labs has closed (bankrupt) Layer 1 blockchain token scandal, weak revenue
Loopring has closed zk-rollover DEX adoption rate, facing newer competitor
Radiant Capital has closed (DAO dissolved) DeFi borrowed US$50 million vulnerability attack, unable to recover

YGG Play

YGG Play is the Web3 game publishing division of Yield Guild Games. Since its launch in 2025, it owns games such as LOL Land and Waifu Sweeper. The division has generated more than $9 million in cumulative revenue, which sounds good, but if you look at when its peak revenue occurred: October 2025, just before a major market liquidation event severely damaged retail confidence.

Yield Guild Games itself is still in operation. Its YGG token trading price is approximately US$0.019, and its market value is approximately US$15 million. The parent company didn't shut down, just closed the division, laid off 35 employees, and redirected its $20.6 million treasury funds to selling game behavior data to AI companies rather than continuing to publish games.

What users should do: Any points related to YGG Play or pledged YGG must be unpledged and rewarded before July 31. The two games on the platform, GIGACHADBAT and Ragnarok Breaker, will continue to be operated by the original developers, so these specific games will not disappear even if the distribution department closes.

Ctrl Wallet

Ctrl Wallet, a self-managed wallet that supports more than 2500 blockchains, will be completely closed on August 3, 2026. The trigger was a security breach discovered on June 23 that affected some hot wallets on the platform associated with Cardano, part of a broader wave of vulnerabilities that affected SecondFi and Emurgo integration capabilities during the same period.

Ctrl Wallet has no native tokens, so there is no market value or price data directly related to the closure. The team chose to deactivate the app rather than patch and rebuild it, and new downloads have now been removed from the app store.

What should be done for users: The full wallet function, including sending, receiving and redemption, will only be available until August 2. Starting August 3, the only feature retained is exporting your recovery phrase, so any user who still has funds in that wallet will need to transfer funds or back up their mnemons before this date.

BitMEX

BitMEX is the oldest and arguably the most influential crypto project shut down this week. It was launched in 2014 and invented 100-fold leveraged perpetual contracts, which are now available on almost all major exchanges. HDR Global Trading, the company behind BitMEX, announced on July 23, 2026 that after a strategic review of its business and the entire industry, the exchange will be permanently closed at 04:00 UTC on September 23, 2026. The company did not cite financial distress or regulatory action as a reason.

BitMEX has immediately stopped accepting new account registrations. Starting from August 26, the platform will prevent the opening of new positions, only allowing traders to reduce existing positions, and then forcibly liquidate all remaining positions before the September 23 deadline. It is worth noting that BitMEX said that in its more than 11 years of operation, it has never lost customer funds due to hacking, a record rarely matched by exchanges of its age.

What users should do: close positions and withdraw funds as soon as possible before September 23. Those who still have a balance in their accounts after closure will face a monthly custody fee, which the company has warned may increase over time.

SecondFi

SecondFi, a re-branding successor to Cardano's long-running Yoroi wallet, has closed. Developer Emurgo confirmed that the platform will not resume normal operations even after the security audit is completed. The reason was a random number-derived flaw in the wallet's own transaction signature code, rather than the Cardano network itself, which allowed the attacker to steal approximately 16 million ADAs from 374 wallets in late June 2026, worth approximately $2.4 million. Another white-hat hacker transferred another 129 million ADAs to safe custody during the Incident Response Service.

SecondFi itself does not have a separate token; the asset affected is ADA, Cardano's native coin, which is traded independently of the incident. Emurgo's responsibilities have been reduced to a dedicated recovery team focused on returning stolen funds to affected users.

What users should do: If your wallet is one of the 374 affected addresses, please follow Emurgo's official channels to check out the wallet status checker and export tool expected to be launched in August, and avoid any third-party websites that offer "migration tokens" because Emurgo has confirmed that no such tokens exist.

Movement Labs

Movement Labs, the company behind the Movement blockchain built on Meta's defunct Move programming language, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in Delaware on July 15, 2026. Previously, starting in December 2024, a market-making agreement caused approximately 66 million MOVE tokens to flood the open market immediately after the tokens were put online, causing prices to plummet and triggering an exchange ban.

The company raised more than $141 million from investors, but never generated enough on-chain revenue to maintain itself independently; its daily network fees were as low as $1 in the 24 hours before filing for bankruptcy. The current trading price of MOVE tokens is approximately US$0.0106, and the market value is close to US$44.2 million, down about 99% from the historical high.

What users should do: The underlying Movement network is still technically run through a separate entity, Move Industries, which says it is operating normally and is not part of the bankruptcy filing. Court records show that creditors can file claims before September 14, 2026, and the reorganization plan is expected to be announced before October 13.

Loopring

Loopring immediately shut down its decentralized exchanges, automated market makers and repeaters on June 28, 2026, ending the operation of Ethereum's first zero-knowledge rolling DEX. The team calls itself an "engineer, not a business operator," and points to three specific reasons: the protocol never achieved meaningful adoption; its early architecture lacked virtual machines, which newer zkEVM competitors now offer; and a wave of exchange withdrawals on its LRC tokens in 2026 added further to the pressure.

Loopring's total lock-in value plummeted from a peak of US$760 million in November 2021 to approximately US$8 million at the time of its closure, a drop of more than 99%. Currently, LRC is trading at close to $0.01225 and has a market value of close to $16.77 million.

What Users Should Do: Loopring said it will calculate the final balance and distribute the funds directly to users 'Ethereum wallets in batches, and bear Gas fees at its own expense. Balances above the minimum threshold are eligible, and the team said there will be a two-week review window before distribution begins.

Radiant Capital

Radiant Capital, once one of the largest cross-chain lending agreements in DeFi, announced on June 1, 2026 that its DAO will cease proactive development after 18 months of failed recovery attempts. Attackers linked to North Korea's Lazarus Group stole more than $50 million in a routine update by hacking into three of the protocol's 11 multi-signature wallet keys. Radiant's total lockdown value was never restored, falling from $386.8 million to approximately $5 million within a month after the attack.

The agreement token RDNT currently trades at approximately US$0.000557 and has a market value of nearly US$794,580, a small fraction of its 2023 peak. The DAO has stopped issuing RDNT emissions and set borrowing caps to zero in all markets, but the agreement has not completely disappeared.

What Users Should Do: Radiant said withdrawal, repayment and position management functions will continue until the end of 2026. The remediation portal will be open indefinitely, and any funds recovered from the 2024 attack will be returned to affected users through this channel.

The market implications of this round of closures

Looking at the closures of these seven encryption projects together, one pattern transcends any single failure case. Starting first in a category, whether it's perpetual contracts, zk-rollup or cross-chain lending, does not protect projects once the market is integrated into the hands of a few leading platforms. In addition, the two hacker-driven shutdowns here, SecondFi and Radiant Capital, further confirm a more brutal fact of this market cycle: After a serious vulnerability attack in a bear market, it is almost impossible to make a comeback because there is neither money nor user trust to rebuild.

For any user holding assets related to these platforms, the top priorities in all seven cases are the same: check official announcement channels directly, move funds or export recovery phrases before prescribed deadlines, and treat any unofficial offers of "migrate" or "compensate" tokens as red flags because none of these teams have announced such plans. This wave of crypto closures reminds us that deadlines here are real and rarely extended.