Reform UK takes £72 million from two crypto donors in two days

Reform UK received a second £36 million donation on Saturday, 12 September, after cryptocurrency investor Christopher Harborne matched the gift that BitMEX co-founder Ben Delo announced on Friday. Together the two transfers come to £72 million, about $97 million. Delo's sum is the largest single donation ever recorded for a British political party, above the £10 million that Lord John Sainsbury left the Conservatives in 2022.

Delo, born in Sheffield and now based in Hong Kong, wrote in the Daily Telegraph that he wanted a "fair fight and a level playing field." He said he would have paid £1 million a month until the last possible 2029 election date, then chose to send the whole amount at once in case Parliament caps large gifts. He has already given Reform £4 million. In 2025 President Donald Trump issued an unconditional pardon covering a Bank Secrecy Act breach at BitMEX to which Delo had pleaded guilty in 2022. Co-founders Arthur Hayes and Samuel Reed received the same pardon.

Harborne's matching gift

Harborne, who lives in Thailand and is a Tether investor, wrote in the Telegraph that "competitive spirit" led him to match Delo and that he expected "nothing personally" in return. He called the money "a philanthropic gift to our country." He has been Reform's largest donor, including about £9 million last August and roughly £1 million a month more recently. A separate £5 million gift from Harborne to Nigel Farage is under review by the parliamentary standards watchdog because Farage did not enter it in the register of interests.

Farage said he was "honoured and humbled" by Delo and that the two gifts would let Reform "fight and win the next general election on a level playing field." A party spokesman said the money would hire "the brightest and best minds" for policy work and "up to 400 campaign managers in every target constituency."

The bill that arrives on Monday

The House of Lords is due to debate the Representation of the People Bill on Monday. Draft language reported this weekend would stop crypto donations and cap overseas giving at £100,000 a year. There is at present no cap on what a UK-based donor may give. Duncan Hames of Transparency International UK called the weekend "a watershed moment, with two billionaires pledging £72 million to one political party in less than 48 hours."

Reform has spent the year under pressure over its accounts and over a slide in some polls. The two gifts change the cash arithmetic of a campaign that still has as long as three years to run. They also hand the government a fresh exhibit for a cap that would, if it passes, close the window that Delo said he was trying to beat.

The Electoral Commission will have to record the money. The Lords will have to decide whether a cap written after the cheques have cleared is worth the fight. Those are separate clocks. They started on the same weekend.