Image credit: Grok/X
On January 19, 2025, the crypto market experienced significant turmoil as liquidations exceeded $1 billion, triggered by a sharp decline in Bitcoin's price which briefly fell below the $100,000 mark after reaching close to its all-time high.
According to market data, the liquidations affected nearly 406,000 traders, with a total of $1.18 billion wiped out. Of this, $921 million were long positions, while $260 million were short positions that were liquidated.
Bitcoin later rallied and was trading around $102,400 on Monday.
Ether (ETH) was at the forefront of this liquidation wave, with over $207.5 million in long positions liquidated in the last 24 hours, closely followed by Bitcoin with liquidations amounting to more than $202 million.
Bitcoin's price saw a decline of over 6%, dropping from a high of $106,300 to approximately $99,700 during the trading day. This downturn was reminiscent of a previous drop on January 7, where Bitcoin had a significant fall, bottoming at just over $90,000 by January 13.
Amid this market upheaval, crypto trader "Bluntz" took to X to express caution, noting, "Top signs are everywhere. It might be time to take some chips off the table," suggesting a wary approach to the current market conditions.
Altcoins were not spared from the market's wrath, with Ether experiencing a drop of over 5%, though it managed to stay within its trading range for the month.
Other notable altcoins like XRP, Dogecoin, Cardano, Avalanche, Sui, and Stellar (XLM) suffered double-digit percentage losses, contributing to the overall negative sentiment in the market.
In a related development, the hype around Donald Trump's memecoin quickly diminished. After achieving a fully diluted valuation of over $70 billion over the weekend, the token's value dropped by more than 40% on January 20.
This decline came as Melania Trump launched a competing token on January 19, which rapidly reached a valuation of over $13 billion within hours of its debut.
This recent market-wide sell-off and the subsequent liquidation frenzy underscore the persistent volatility in the cryptocurrency space, keeping investors vigilant amidst the erratic price movements of both Bitcoin and various altcoins.