The cryptocurrency market tilted sharply Thursday night into Friday morning, with Bitcoin plunging more than 30% from its October high and briefly trading below $80,000.
The drop triggered nearly $2 billion in liquidations and erased more than $1 trillion in total market value — Bitcoin’s sharpest single-day slide since the 2022 FTX collapse.
By 9 a.m. Central time on Friday, Bitcoin had stabilized slightly around $82,500 on Coinbase, still down more than 4% in the past 24 hours. The overall crypto market wasn’t spared, with total capitalization slipping below $3 trillion and major coins like Ethereum and Solana falling 12% and 15%, respectively.
The selloff came as traders faced a wave of economic pressures, including fading expectations for a December interest-rate cut and a strong American jobs report that boosted the dollar.
Americans pulled a huge $3.79 billion out of Bitcoin ETFs in November, according to CoinDesk, the biggest withdrawal since these funds started trading in America last year. (A Bitcoin ETF lets investors buy shares that track Bitcoin’s price through the stock market, while buying Bitcoin means owning the actual digital asset directly.)
For a moment, Bitcoin’s price dropped below the average price these ETF buyers had paid (around $90,000), meaning many who bought recently were suddenly losing money on paper.
This week’s Bitcoin drop played out in real time on X, where traders picked apart the slide.
“Massive crash at the last hours of trading in Japan. What’s next for the coming 24 hours on #Bitcoin? Well, I think we’ll continue to fall until US opens and then we’ll see. Likely we’ll be having a strong bounce up when it hits the low, the question is: where does it find a low?” Crypto analyst Michael van de Poppe posted on X on Friday morning.
“What’s next coming period?
– High volatility.
– Consolidation.
– Forming a base and then we’ll either continue or we reverse.
The chances of a V-Shape recovery are slim,” He added.
Roughly $1.7–$1.9 billion in positions were wiped out, including a single $37 million BTC liquidation, per BlockPost. Nearly 400,000 traders were affected, most of them long-side bets.
The turmoil has renewed questions about Bitcoin’s value as a safe-haven asset.
After rising earlier this year under new pro-crypto policies, Bitcoin has now erased its 2025 gains and is lagging behind gold, bonds, and even short-term Treasuries.
Traders are bracing for more turbulence. A report from Reuters shows that some platforms place the odds of Bitcoin finishing the year below $90,000 at about 50%.
No federal regulators issued immediate statements Friday, though the SEC has repeatedly warned about the volatility of crypto trading.
As markets reopen, traders are watching upcoming inflation data and Fed commentary to determine whether this slide marks the start of a deeper downturn or a temporary shakeout.