BitMEX founder Ben Delo has pledged $27 million to the London Institute of Mathematics

BitMEX founder Ben Delo has pledged 20 million British pounds ($27 million) to the London Institute of Mathematical Sciences (LIMS), among the largest private donations to date to a UK research institution outside of Oxford and Cambridge, British magazine Times Higher Education reported on Tuesday.

Times Higher Education reports that the commitment includes $13.3 million up front and $13.3 million that will be released after the Mayfair institute matches the amount through additional fundraising. According to the report, the gift kicks off a broader campaign that aims to raise $80 million to secure the long-term future of LIMS.

“I want to see LIMS win Fields Medals and Nobel Prizes — they’re already doing world-class work, and I want to help,” Delo told the magazine.

Delo said he chose to support LIMS at a larger university because it allows leading researchers to focus solely on research without academic or administrative burdens. “They also approach research in an innovative way – even offering research coaching,” he said, while criticizing the UK’s “lack of vision and inconsistent approach to research funding”.

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Delo paid a $10 million fine before being pardoned by Trump

Delo, who founded the crypto exchange BitMEX in 2014, pleaded guilty to US bank fraud in 2022 along with his co-founders and paid a $10 million fine. He was pardoned by President Donald Trump in March 2025.

Delo is also a trustee of LIMS and has previously supported several causes, including neurodiversity, academic freedom, and mathematics education and research. In 2025, he funded the establishment of the Ben Delo Scholarship at the London Institute.

LIMS was founded in 2011 by physicist Thomas Fink, operating out of the Royal Institution in rooms once occupied by chemist Michael Faraday. The institute focuses exclusively on research, supporting three-year fellowships in theoretical physics, pure mathematics and artificial intelligence. In recent years, it has supported scientists in exile in Russia and Ukraine and attracted researchers from the US.

Cointelegraph reached out to LIMS for comment, but did not receive a response from the publication.

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