It reclaimed $80K for just one day before crashing: $1.25 billion liquidated last night—and crypto wasn’t to blame!
The election results were finalized the day before yesterday, and BTC closed at $80,055. But as soon as U.S. stocks opened last night, all of its gains evaporated. BTC hit an intraday low of around $75,200 and is now around $76,200, down about 5.3% in 24 hours. ETH fell about 7.9% to around $2,240, after touching an intraday low of about $2,206. The crypto market shed about 5% overnight.
The liquidation figures paint an even clearer picture. CoinGlass data shows that about $1.25 billion was liquidated across the market in the past 24 hours, wiping out nearly 240,000 traders. Long positions accounted for about $1.11 billion of that. In the hour BTC fell below $77,000, $370 million was liquidated. This wasn’t a slow bleed—it was a liquidation cascade.
Let’s be clear: crypto wasn’t to blame. The trigger was a tech-stock crash. The Nasdaq plunged about 5.5% last night, its worst single-day performance since April 2025, and entered correction territory. Nvidia fell about 7%, wiping roughly $300 billion off its market cap; AMD dropped about 12.5%, and Tesla about 9%. Why the crash? After Democrats swept both chambers of Congress, markets feared tighter AI regulation. Democratic lawmakers have already said publicly that the new Congress’s top priority should be to “pause advanced AI development” and restrict data-center expansion. On top of that, initial jobless claims released the same day came in at just 189,000, the lowest since 1969. With employment this strong, the Fed has even less reason to ease policy.
So why did crypto fall harder than stocks? Two channels of contagion. First, cross-asset hedge funds facing a stock-market plunge had to meet margin calls, so they sold the most liquid assets first: spot BTC. Second, and more importantly, Wednesday’s move back above $80,000 was driven by a short squeeze. Shorts worth $378 million were liquidated within an hour, pushing the price up as traders bought back their positions—but spot buying didn’t follow. Spot BTC ETFs saw just about $74 million in inflows that day, after more than $1.1 billion flowed out over the previous three trading days. The rally was built on shaky ground. Traders borrowed money to chase it, and when stocks crashed, they were the first to get caught in the downdraft. That’s how the cascade started.
My take: crypto’s fundamentals didn’t blow up. This was a macro-driven flight from risk, combined with a thorough leverage flush. The claim that BTC had firmly reclaimed $80,000 has been disproved. The next time it moves above that level, we’ll need to see whether spot buyers and ETF inflows follow. There’s another wild card tonight: Friday’s U.S. jobs report. An overly strong number could revive tightening fears and trigger another sell-off; a weaker number might give risk assets some breathing room.
$BTC $ETH
The election results were finalized the day before yesterday, and BTC closed at $80,055. But as soon as U.S. stocks opened last night, all of its gains evaporated. BTC hit an intraday low of around $75,200 and is now around $76,200, down about 5.3% in 24 hours. ETH fell about 7.9% to around $2,240, after touching an intraday low of about $2,206. The crypto market shed about 5% overnight.
The liquidation figures paint an even clearer picture. CoinGlass data shows that about $1.25 billion was liquidated across the market in the past 24 hours, wiping out nearly 240,000 traders. Long positions accounted for about $1.11 billion of that. In the hour BTC fell below $77,000, $370 million was liquidated. This wasn’t a slow bleed—it was a liquidation cascade.
Let’s be clear: crypto wasn’t to blame. The trigger was a tech-stock crash. The Nasdaq plunged about 5.5% last night, its worst single-day performance since April 2025, and entered correction territory. Nvidia fell about 7%, wiping roughly $300 billion off its market cap; AMD dropped about 12.5%, and Tesla about 9%. Why the crash? After Democrats swept both chambers of Congress, markets feared tighter AI regulation. Democratic lawmakers have already said publicly that the new Congress’s top priority should be to “pause advanced AI development” and restrict data-center expansion. On top of that, initial jobless claims released the same day came in at just 189,000, the lowest since 1969. With employment this strong, the Fed has even less reason to ease policy.
So why did crypto fall harder than stocks? Two channels of contagion. First, cross-asset hedge funds facing a stock-market plunge had to meet margin calls, so they sold the most liquid assets first: spot BTC. Second, and more importantly, Wednesday’s move back above $80,000 was driven by a short squeeze. Shorts worth $378 million were liquidated within an hour, pushing the price up as traders bought back their positions—but spot buying didn’t follow. Spot BTC ETFs saw just about $74 million in inflows that day, after more than $1.1 billion flowed out over the previous three trading days. The rally was built on shaky ground. Traders borrowed money to chase it, and when stocks crashed, they were the first to get caught in the downdraft. That’s how the cascade started.
My take: crypto’s fundamentals didn’t blow up. This was a macro-driven flight from risk, combined with a thorough leverage flush. The claim that BTC had firmly reclaimed $80,000 has been disproved. The next time it moves above that level, we’ll need to see whether spot buyers and ETF inflows follow. There’s another wild card tonight: Friday’s U.S. jobs report. An overly strong number could revive tightening fears and trigger another sell-off; a weaker number might give risk assets some breathing room.
$BTC $ETH
