Layer-1 blockchain Dango will wind down operations by halting trading on its perpetual decentralized exchange (DEX) on Wednesday and shutting down its network on Aug. 13.
“Despite our best effort, various reasons have led us to conclude there is no viable path to a lasting commercial success,” Dango said in a Friday X announcement.
Dango founder Larry Liu added that the team faced cash shortages, legal challenges that slowed momentum, the loss of team members, and broader market conditions.
Dango launched its mainnet in January after raising $3.6 million in a 2024 seed round led by Hack VC and Lemniscap. It rolled out its perpetual DEX in April, only to suffer a roughly $410,000 exploit days after launch. The attacker later returned the funds in exchange for a bug bounty.
Related: BitMEX hit with 623 BTC lawsuit on day it announces shutdown
Dango’s open interest dwarfed by Hyperliquid, Aster
According to DefiLlama, Dango’s total value locked fell from a peak of roughly $4.5 million in early May to about $1.6 million before the announcement.
The perp DEX market is increasingly competitive and dominated by a handful of platforms.
Hyperliquid held more than $11 billion in open interest on Saturday, which represents the value of outstanding perpetual futures contracts that haven’t been closed.
Perp DEX ranking by open interest. Source: DefiLlama
Only Aster and Variational also hold more than $1 billion in open interest. Dango held just under $391,000 in open interest.
CoinGecko said in its second quarter industry report that Hyperliquid became the second-largest perpetual exchange by open interest on July 1, behind only Binance.
A summer of crypto shutdowns
Dango’s shutdown adds to a growing list of crypto platform closures in July, including 11-year-old perpetual futures pioneer BitMEX.
Restructuring adviser Roshan Dharia told Cointelegraph that BitMEX’s shutdown reflects structural pressures facing mid-sized centralized exchanges, where liquidity has increasingly concentrated among the industry’s largest players and regulatory compliance costs continue to rise.
“The top five platforms now control an estimated 80% of global spot volume, leaving mid-tier and regional exchanges with shrinking margins and no viable path to scale,” Dharia said.
Other recent closures include DEX aggregator Odos Protocol and perp DEX Satori Finance.
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