Bitcoin reminded the whole market why leverage can hurt. The token fell to about $73,761 late Sunday — its lowest level since August — before rebounding above $75,000, while ether crashed below $2,100 before bouncing back. In the wreckage, more than $1 billion in leveraged crypto positions were liquidated in 24 hours, according to CoinGlass.
The longs took the beating. Traders betting prices would rise accounted for $913 million of the liquidations, meaning the market punished exactly the people positioned for bullish price action. Ether took the bigger hit relative to bitcoin, with $448 million in liquidations — nearly double bitcoin's $272 million — and the single largest liquidation order was also in ETH, worth $48 million.
The volatility came as the market digested two uncomfortable headlines over the weekend. First, Nvidia's board said it opened an independent investigation after reports that CEO Jensen Huang had a relationship with a business executive whom U.S. intelligence agencies believe was passing information to Beijing. Huang acknowledged the affair in a message to employees, writing that he had been unfaithful to his wife and apologizing for the harm caused. Nvidia said it had no reason to believe national security or company secrets had been compromised, but said its inquiry would examine all available information, with the board overseeing the review with outside independent counsel. Second, U.S. officials said negotiations with Iran had stalled, keeping geopolitical uncertainty high.
Digital assets, the only open market over the weekend, took both developments as risk-off signals first. The stakes around Nvidia run larger than one company's headlines: Nvidia sits at the center of the AI boom, which has galvanized risk-taking across all corners of the financial market, including crypto, in recent years. The tokenized version of Nvidia stock traded on xStock dropped 3.55% to $180.42 over the last 24 hours, against an underlying Nasdaq close of $186.64 on Friday — a discount that suggests crypto traders are anticipating a sharper drop when the traditional stock market opens on Monday. Investors have grown worried about the durability of the AI narrative: the Nasdaq fell nearly 5% last week, extending a four-week losing streak.
The bounce to $75,000 is a relief for bulls, but it has already stalled as of this writing, according to CoinDesk data. Whether it holds largely depends on how traditional markets react on Monday. On the price chart, bitcoin is now stuck between the 200-day average support at around $73,150 and the 100-day average resistance at $77,430.
The DAOS take: a billion dollars gone in a day, mostly from people betting the price would go up. That is the leverage game in one line — the market does not care about your conviction, it cares about your liquidation price. Bitcoin dropping below $74K and bouncing is not the story. The story is that weekend headlines moved a market that never sleeps, and the traders with the most leverage got carried out first. If you are in the game, size your bets like the crash is coming, because one weekend it will be.
Sources: CoinDesk
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