MEXC CEO Vugar Usi: "I Struggle to Construct a Retail Case for 500x Leverage"

MEXC chief executive Vugar Usi said he sees little justification for offering retail clients 500x leverage, arguing the crypto industry has yet to settle on a common risk standard as exchanges expand into forex, commodities and U.S. equities. His comments were made in an interview with FinanceMagnates.com.

"I struggle to construct a retail case for that number," Usi said, referring to 500x offers on forex and gold. He pointed to MEXC's August 2025 launch of U.S. stock futures with a 5x ceiling, matching the cap European rules impose on retail contracts for difference tied to individual shares.

That ceiling has since risen. A notice dated 30 July lists maximum leverage of 200x on futures linked to Sandisk, Micron and SpaceX, with position limits tightening as the selected leverage increases. An April report promoted up to 100x on stock futures and as much as 1,000x on precious-metals perpetuals, supported by competitions, rewards and zero-fee campaigns. FM Intelligence found MEXC advertises up to 200x on selected stock futures and up to 1,000x on metals perpetuals, while its public pages do not indicate which jurisdictions can access the highest settings. MEXC previously reported 7.1 billion USDT in SpaceX futures volume, a self-reported figure that was not independently audited.

One account, three sets of rights

MEXC now offers three routes to equity exposure. Futures are leveraged price contracts; the exchange's tokenized-securities terms state that holders do not receive legal title to the underlying shares. RealStocks routes orders for actual U.S. shares through a brokerage and custody chain, and an FAQ dated 14 August names VistaMX Markets Limited, Atomic Vaults Securities, Clear Street and RQD among the intermediaries. The shares sit in an institutional omnibus account, and MEXC says Securities Investor Protection Corporation coverage applies at the eligible omnibus-account level rather than separately to each end user. The same FAQ notes that transfers to another broker and dividend reinvestment are not yet supported, and that the default U.S. withholding rate on dividends remains 30%.

Several crypto venues are building similar products around stablecoin-funded accounts. Binance added access to more than 7,000 U.S. stocks in June through Nest Trading and Alpaca, while Gate followed in August with 10,000 stocks and exchange-traded funds. Bitget and Bybit have offered parts of their traditional-finance ranges through MetaTrader 5 with leverage advertised at up to 500x.

Regulatory attention is building. The European Securities and Markets Authority said in February that perpetual futures meeting the definition of a CFD are likely to fall under national product-intervention measures, which include leverage caps, margin close-out requirements and negative balance protection.