"My stop was above my liquidation price and I still got liquidated"

All market figures below are Bitunix public futures data for ETHUSDT, fetched at 9:45 PM ET on Nov 4, 2026: last 2,430.49, mark 2,431, index 2,431.53, 24h high 2,449.92, 24h low 2,225.01, funding -0.000825% per 8 hours.

Three prices, two jobs

• Last price: the most recent trade on Bitunix's own order book. It can spike on a single large order.
• Index price: an average of spot prices from several large exchanges.
• Mark price: a steadier reference used for unrealized PnL and liquidation checks. Bitunix's own guides say liquidation checks use mark price, not the last traded price.

Your TP/SL is a separate setting. Bitunix's TP/SL orders take a trigger type of either last price or mark price, so check which one yours uses.

At the 9:45 PM ET check, last was 0.51 below mark and 1.04 below index. That gap is tiny on a calm evening. In a fast market it can open wide, and its direction decides which of the two lines gets touched first.

How the stop and the liquidation can trade places

Case 1: last falls faster than mark. A dump hits Bitunix's book first. Last races down, mark lags because it follows the index. Your last-price stop fires first. This is the case people expect, and it works.

Case 2: last stays above mark. The perp trades at a premium, then the premium collapses while the wider market drifts lower. Mark keeps falling with the index. Last, held up by local buyers, does not reach your stop. Mark reaches your liquidation line first. The engine closes the position. Your stop never saw its trigger price, because it was watching last.

Case 3: the stop triggers but fills late. A stop that triggers becomes a market order. In a thin, fast book the fill can land well past the trigger. If liquidation was only a little below, it can arrive between trigger and fill.

The math to check before you place it

Simplified isolated margin, before fees. Bitunix uses tiered maintenance margin rates (MMR) that grow with position size; the rate for your pair and tier sits next to the pair name on the contract page.

• Long liquidation price is about entry x (1 - 1/leverage + MMR)
• Cushion is about 1/leverage - MMR
• At leverage L, entering at the 9:45 PM ET mark of 2,431: the line sits above 2,431 x (1 - 1/L), pulled closer by your MMR. The cushion is under 1/L.

The 24h low at the same check, 2,225.01, was 8.47% below that mark ((2,431 - 2,225.01) / 2,431). At any leverage where 1/L is under 8.47%, which means L above about 11.8 even before MMR, the day's swing was wider than the whole cushion and the range alone would have reached the line. No stop placement fixes that; only lower leverage or a smaller position does.

A practical setup

1. Measure the space from your stop to your liquidation price using mark, not last.
2. Keep that space wider than a normal wick for the coin. A rough check: compare it with the 24h high to low range.
3. If you want the stop to watch the same price as liquidation, set the trigger to mark price.
4. If you keep a last-price trigger for faster exits, give liquidation extra room for Case 2.
5. Re-check after adding to the position. Adding moves your average entry and your liquidation line.

FAQ

Q: Was this a bug? A: Almost never. Check the order history: if the TP/SL shows no trigger and the close shows as liquidation, the two prices simply diverged.

Q: Does cross margin fix it? A: Cross margin pulls from the rest of your futures balance, which moves the line further away, but it also puts that balance at risk.

Q: Does negative funding matter here? A: At -0.000825% per 8 hours shorts were paying longs, a small amount. It does not cause the divergence; it only moves your margin a little each settlement.

Which price does your stop watch right now, last or mark?