If you just got a margin call, the most useful thing to know first is that it is a deadline, not a disaster. Nothing has been sold yet. Your lender is telling you that your loan has drifted into a zone it does not want, and that you have a window to bring it back. Borrowers who act calmly inside that window almost always keep their bitcoin and carry the loan on as if nothing happened. The ones who get hurt are the ones who panic, freeze, or ignore the notice. This is the playbook for being in the first group.
This is the action guide. If you want the underlying mechanics, the LTV ladders, how liquidation actually executes, and how the terms differ by lender, that all lives in our margin call and liquidation guide. Here we assume you already have a call (or fear one is coming) and you want to know what to do, in what order, right now.
First, understand what the call is asking
A margin call is asking for one thing: bring your loan-to-value back under the lender's threshold. Your loan amount is fixed, but your collateral's value moved, almost always because bitcoin's price fell, so the ratio between them crossed a line the lender set. The call is the warning and the clock. A liquidation, which is the lender selling your bitcoin for you, is what happens only if you let the clock run out.
So the entire task in front of you is mechanical, not emotional: lower that ratio. You can do that by adding to the collateral side or shrinking the loan side. That is it. Everything below is just the cleanest way to do one of those two things in the time you have.
Your options, in order
There are four ways to respond, roughly from least to most costly. Pick the one that fits the cash and collateral you can actually deploy inside the window.
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Add collateral. Post more bitcoin, or in many cases stablecoin or cash, to your loan. This raises the collateral side of the ratio and pulls your LTV down without you parting with anything permanently. It is usually the cheapest and most reversible move, because you keep your full position and simply pledge more of it. If you have reserve bitcoin or cash ready, this is normally the first thing to reach for.
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Partial repayment. Pay down part of the loan balance. This shrinks the loan side of the ratio, which also lowers your LTV, and it has the side benefit of reducing the interest you owe going forward. The trade-off is that it uses cash you may have wanted for something else, and unlike posting collateral it is not something you get back later.
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Repay in full. If you have the cash and the loan no longer feels worth the stress, closing it ends the margin-call risk entirely. This is the cleanest exit, but it gives up the reason you borrowed in the first place, so it is usually a decision to make deliberately rather than in a panic during one rough week.
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A controlled partial liquidation, as a last resort. If you genuinely cannot add collateral or repay, the least-bad version of a forced outcome is to let, or arrange for, only enough collateral to be sold to bring LTV back to safe, rather than ignoring the call and risking a larger or full liquidation. This still means selling bitcoin at a low price, so it sits at the bottom of the list, but a small controlled sale that you see coming beats a forced one you did not.
Whatever you choose, talk to the lender if you are unsure what they accept and how fast it settles. Some methods clear in minutes, others take longer, and in a fast market the difference matters.
How much to add or repay
The instinct under pressure is to add just enough to clear the threshold and stop the alert. Resist it. If you top up only to the line, a small further drop in bitcoin puts you right back into a call, possibly within hours, and you are back where you started with less in reserve.
Aim instead for a safe buffer well below the threshold. The idea is to rebuild the cushion you had when the loan was comfortable, so a normal continued wobble in the price does not immediately re-trigger a call. How much that takes depends on your exact loan size, collateral, and the lender's threshold, so do not guess and do not trust a number you half-remember.
Use the liquidation price calculator to see the price at which a call fires for your position, and the loan calculator to model how adding collateral or repaying a given amount moves your LTV. As an illustrative example only: a borrower who is called at a high LTV might choose to add or repay enough to land back near the LTV they originally opened at, rather than just under the call line. Run your own numbers rather than copying that figure, because the right buffer depends entirely on your loan.
Time matters: know your cure window
A margin call comes with a clock, and that clock is not the same everywhere. Cure windows commonly run somewhere from about 24 to 72 hours, and at least one major lender commits to no fixed window at all, meaning it can act quickly when the price is moving fast. Because a steep drop can happen overnight while you sleep, you cannot assume you have days.
So move with urgency even if the math feels manageable. Find your lender's exact window now, in their loan terms and in their review, and treat it as a hard constraint, not a suggestion. The mechanics of how different lenders structure the call, the window, and the sale are laid out lender by lender in the margin call and liquidation guide. If you are reading this before a call ever arrives, knowing your window in advance is most of the battle.
What not to do
A few reflexes make a manageable situation worse:
- Do not panic-sell your bitcoin. Dumping your stack to raise cash locks in the loss the margin call was only threatening, and it is usually the most expensive way out. Adding collateral or a partial repayment keeps far more of your position intact.
- Do not ignore the call. Silence does not buy time; it spends it. If you let the window close, the lender decides what gets sold and when, at a price you do not control and usually with a fee. Even if you cannot fully cure the call, contact the lender and do what you can.
- Do not top up only to the threshold. Curing barely under the line leaves you one small dip away from the next call. Rebuild a real buffer instead, so you are not back here tomorrow.
Preventing the next one
Once you are out of the immediate call, the goal is to make the next one unlikely. The levers are the same ones that decide your risk from the start:
- Borrow at a lower opening LTV. This is the biggest lever by far. The lower you start, the further bitcoin has to fall before a call is even possible, so a normal correction never reaches you.
- Keep reserves ready. Bitcoin or cash you can post quickly is what turns a margin call into a quiet five-minute task instead of an emergency. The cure window only helps if you have something to deploy inside it.
- Set alerts and monitor. Turn on price alerts, and any early-warning tier or auto top-up your lender offers, so you see trouble building rather than waking up to a call.
For how this fits into the full set of risks in a bitcoin-backed loan, and how to borrow on the safe side of each, see are bitcoin loans safe?. A margin call handled well is rarely the thing that hurts a careful borrower; the high-LTV, no-reserves loan is.
This is not financial advice
borrow/on/bitcoin is a comparison publisher, not a lender, broker, or financial advisor. Bitcoin loans carry real risk, including the forced sale of your collateral in a margin call or liquidation. Thresholds, cure windows, accepted cure methods, and fees vary by lender and product and can change, so verify the current terms directly with your lender, and model your own numbers, before acting on a margin call or borrowing in the first place.