Basis Markets

Basis Markets (basis.markets) is a Solana crypto project that raised about US$28 million in late 2021. It sold NFTs and the BASIS token, and said the money would fund a crypto hedge fund running "basis trades". That fund never launched. Investors were later told it could not go ahead because of expected US rule changes.

The UK Serious Fraud Office (SFO) is now investigating the collapse as its first major crypto case. Two men were arrested in November 2025 on suspicion of fraud and money laundering. The SFO calls the fraud "suspected", and as of October 2026 no one has been charged.

What's left is a DAO-branded trading tool called BTX and its documentation. The project's X account has posted nothing since 21 November 2025.

Is Basis Markets a scam? The SFO investigation

The SFO says Basis Markets raised its money in two public fundraisers a month apart: an NFT sale, then a second raise "for the purpose of launching a cryptocurrency hedge fund". About six months later, investors were told the venture could not go ahead. On 20 November 2025, officers raided properties in Herne Hill, south London, and near Bradford, West Yorkshire. They arrested two men, one in his thirties and one in his forties. The SFO has not named either man.

The SFO's case page lists the investigation as open. It asks anyone who invested, or who has relevant information, to email [email protected] with their name, phone number and a short description. In its announcement, SFO Director Nick Ephgrave said the office is "determined to pursue anyone who would seek to use cryptocurrency to defraud investors".

"Suspected" matters here. An arrest in England is not a charge, and nobody has been convicted.

What The Block reported about the raise and the founders

The Block reported that the NFT sale raised 32,000 SOL (about $7 million at the time) and the token sale about $20.7 million in USDC. Membership NFTs promised a share of profits. BASIS tokens promised a cut of performance fees plus governance rights.

The Block also reported that money went to the founders' personal wallets, even though they had pledged a 12-month token lock. It says the project "went dark" in June 2022 with no refunds and no product delivered. It named one co-founder as Adam Cobb-Webb ("TraderSkew"). In August 2023 the US CFTC fined Cobb-Webb $150,000 and banned him from trading for a year for spoofing crude oil futures. That order is about his own trading, not Basis Markets. The SFO has not said whether he is one of the men arrested.

What Basis Markets promised: a basis-trade hedge fund

A basis trade buys an asset on the spot market and shorts the same amount in its perpetual futures market. Price moves on the two legs cancel out, which traders call "delta-neutral". The profit comes from the funding rate, a regular payment between perp longs and shorts. When the market is bullish, longs pay shorts.

Basis Markets pitched this as a fund for ordinary investors. NFT holders would get a share of profits and BASIS holders a share of fees. Early token descriptions, still copied by price sites such as DexPaprika, describe a "Decentralised Basis Liquidity Pool" (DBLP). BASIS stakers were to earn part of its trading fees. According to the SFO, the fund those raises paid for never ran.

Basis Trade eXecutor (BTX) and the Basis Trade Engine

The project's documentation still describes two tools. Neither is the hedge fund. Neither holds user deposits.

• Basis Trade eXecutor (BTX) connects to a trader's own exchange accounts through API keys. It scans for Long Short, Basis and Reverse Basis opportunities and shows the annual return each would have earned over the past 7, 30 and 90 days. It then opens both legs together, in batches, with settings for slippage and timing. The docs list connection guides for Binance, Bitget, Bybit, KuCoin, WOO X and Kraken. Kraken was added in November 2025.
• Basis Trade Engine (BTE) was the original analytics dashboard, covering 12+ exchanges. The docs say it is "under maintenance and is not accessible" and will return as BTE 2.0. No date is given.

The docs disagree on who can use BTX. The access page says it "is open to public" at btx.basis.markets with no NFT needed. The FAQ and overview still describe a beta open only to NFT holders. We couldn't load the BTX app, the main site or the blog to check, because all three blocked our requests.

BASIS token and BASIS NFT

The BASIS token (mint Basis9oJw9j8cw53oMV7iqsgo6ihi9ALw4QR31rcjUJa) has a fixed supply of 1 billion. Half was airdropped to NFT holders, a quarter went to the token sale and most of the rest to liquidity, per the distribution page. The docs say all of it is now circulating.

Today BASIS pays BTX trading fees, holders get tiered fee discounts, and future BTX fees are meant to buy BASIS back. There is no staking programme now. Holders of the old staked token, rBASIS, are pointed to a conversion tool.

The BASIS NFT collection has 5,000 pieces and trades on Magic Eden ME$0.051-1.3%, Solsea and Tensor. Each NFT is one vote in the Basis Markets DAO. Holders also get a 15% discount on BTX fees and a members-only Discord. Both the NFT and the token are closed to US citizens and residents under the project's terms.

Who Basis Markets is for, if anyone

Two groups have a real reason to look this project up.

• People who bought the NFT or token in 2021. The SFO investigation is the main route to recovery, so get in touch with the SFO first. UK law firms are also advertising civil claims, but check any firm yourself before signing anything.
• Traders who want a basis-trade tool. BTX only works through your own exchange accounts and API keys, so it never holds your coins. Even so, Solana Compass would not hand trading keys to a tool whose team has been silent since the SFO raids, whose app we couldn't reach, and whose docs contradict each other on access.

Basis Markets risks

• Legal: an open SFO fraud and money-laundering investigation. The outcome could include charges, asset freezes or nothing at all.
• Dormancy: the X account was posting weekly "BTX play of the week" threads until 21 November 2025, the day after the raids. It has posted nothing since. The docs still describe BTE 2.0 as coming, with no date.
• API-key exposure: BTX needs keys that can trade on your exchange account. If an operator or service is compromised, it can place trades for you, even if it can't withdraw.
• Strategy risk: funding rates can turn negative, and then a basis position loses money. BTX's projected returns use past funding data, and its own disclaimer offers "no warranty over the data or execution tools".
• Token liquidity: trade the BASIS token only on its DEX pools, through aggregators such as Jupiter JUP$0.260+4.6%. Check liquidity first, because thin pools can mean heavy slippage.
• On-chain programs: the project hasn't published any program addresses for us to check upgrade authority. BTX trades run on centralised exchanges, not on Solana.

Basis Markets alternatives for delta-neutral trading

Want funding-rate yield on Solana? On-chain perps venues such as Drift Protocol DRIFT$0.013+0.3% show their funding rates openly. Your positions sit in programs you can inspect, and no third party holds your API keys. You can also run the trade by hand: buy spot and short the perp on one exchange. That cuts out the middleman, but you have to watch the position and the funding rate yourself.

Basis Markets history and timeline

• October 2021: project founded and run as a DAO.
• November 2021: 5,000-piece NFT sale raises 32,000 SOL, per The Block.
• December 2021: BASIS token sale raises about $20.7 million in USDC, per The Block.
• June 2022: investors told the hedge fund can't go ahead because of expected US regulatory changes (SFO).
• Q1 2023: BTX beta opens to NFT holders. Multi-exchange support follows in Q2 2024, per the docs.
• August 2023: the CFTC settles a spoofing case against Adam Cobb-Webb, whom The Block names as a co-founder.
• 20 November 2025: SFO raids and two arrests. The investigation is still open.
• 21 November 2025: the project's last post on X.