Bitcoin breaks below $80,000, signalling fresh crisis of confidence

By Sidhartha Shukla and Olga Kharif

 

Price, relevance, conviction — Bitcoin is bleeding all three.

 

The world’s largest cryptocurrency slipped below $76,000 in thin weekend trading, dropping about 40% from its 2025 peak and revisiting levels last seen in the aftermath of the “Liberation Day” tariff fallout.

 

What began as a sharp crash in October has morphed into something more corrosive: a selloff shaped not by panic, but by absence of buyers, momentum and belief.

 

Unlike the October drawdown, there’s been no obvious spark, cascading liquidations or systemic shock — just fading demand, thinning liquidity, and a token that’s untethered to broader markets. Bitcoin has failed to respond to geopolitical stress, dollar weakness, or risk rallies. Even during gold and silver’s violent swings in recent weeks, crypto saw no rotation.

 

Bitcoin fell nearly 11% in January, marking its fourth straight monthly decline — the longest losing streak since 2018, during the crash that followed the 2017 boom in initial coin offerings.

 

“I don’t think we’ll see a new all-time high for Bitcoin in 2026,” said Paul Howard, director at market maker Wincent.

 

Bitcoin was trading at $77,190 as of 11:20 a.m in New York on Sunday.

 

Even more striking than the drop itself is the relative lack of optimism around it on social media. In a space known for relentless bravado and “number go up” memes, Bitcoin’s slide has been met with little cheerleading or dip-buying fanfare.

 

All this comes despite a wave of regulatory wins from the Trump administration’s pro-crypto pivot and a surge in institutional investment. Many investors say that optimism was front-run. Prices rallied early — and then stalled.

 

Meanwhile, spot ETFs continue to bleed, a sign of weakening conviction among mainstream buyers — many of whom are now underwater after buying at higher prices. Large institutional players such as digital asset treasuries have also eased up on their purchases following the bursting of their own stock price bubbles last year, further sapping demand from the top end of the market.

 

Bitcoin’s market depth, a measure of capital available to absorb large trades, remains more than 30% below its October peak, according to Kaiko data. The last time liquidity fell this far was after the FTX collapse in 2022.

 

Historical patterns offer little comfort. After the 2021 peak, Bitcoin took 28 months to recover. After the 2017 boom in initial coin offerings, it took nearly three years. By those standards, the current downturn may still be in its early innings.

 

“Looking at historical crypto exchange volume contractions, from 2017’s peak throughout the 2018–2019 winter, we saw a 60% to 70% volume decline across spot exchanges,” said Laurens Fraussen, an analyst at Kaiko. 

 

In contrast, the 2021–2023 drawdown saw a more moderate 30% to 40% contraction, Fraussen said. 

 

“In terms of where I think we are in the current cycle, probably about 25% of the way through,” he said. “Cyclically speaking, we usually see our worst drawdown at around the 50% mark.”

 

Fraussen estimates it could take another six to nine months before a meaningful recovery takes hold, with volumes likely to remain muted during the latter stages of correction and re-accumulation. 

 

Others see a more fundamental challenge: competition for capital.

 

Richard Hodges, founder of Ferro BTC Volatility Fund, said he has warned large Bitcoin holders that patience will be required.

 

“I speak with a lot of Bitcoin whales and I have told them categorically that they’re not going to see another all-time high for 1,000 days,” Hodges said.

 

He pointed to AI-linked stocks and the resurgence of precious metals, which have drawn in both macro traders and momentum chasers. 

 

“Bitcoin was like three-years-ago news, not today,” Hodges said. “AI stocks are going to the moon. We saw the beginning of the gold ramp up, then silver went ballistic.”