Bitcoin bounces near $60,000 after 50% retreat from October highs

By Suvashree Ghosh and Sidhartha Shukla

 

Bitcoin whipsawed in a volatile trading session in Asia after a selloff that briefly dragged the token to a more than 50 per cent retreat from an October peak.  

The original cryptocurrency fell as much as 4.8 per cent to a fresh low of $60,033 on Friday morning, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. From there it bounced back to as high as $65,926. 

 

Other tokens also fell sharply before rebounding. Solana was at one point down as much as 14 per cent, only to erase those losses entirely a few hours later. 

 

Cryptocurrencies have been on shaky ground ever since a brutal series of liquidations in October that sapped market confidence. The selling has picked up steam this week in line with the unwinding of leveraged bets and broader market turbulence.

 

Bitcoin fell over 13 per cent on Thursday, its largest single-day drop since Nov. 2022, when Sam Bankman-Fried’s FTX collapsed. The decline meant the token had briefly more than halved in value from an all-time high on Oct. 6 of over $126,000. 

 

Overall sentiment in Asia is negative with “sharp selling in thin liquidity,” said Damien Loh, chief investment officer at Ericsenz Capital. 

 

The bounce back from $60,000 suggests there’s “strong support there,” but traders shouldn’t “expect a sharp rally back up” as sentiment remains cautious, he added.  

 

About $2.3 billion of bullish bets across all cryptocurrencies were liquidated in the last 24 hours, according to CoinGlass data. 

 

Bitcoin hoarders are among those feeling the pinch. In an earnings announcement Thursday, Michael Saylor’s Strategy Inc. confirmed a net loss of $12.4 billion for the fourth quarter, driven by the mark-to-market decline in its vast holdings. 

 

Traders are now focused on whether Bitcoin can hold $60,000, said Rachael Lucas, an analyst at BTC Markets. A failure to do so “could see downside in the mid-$50,000” range,” she added. 

 

“There’s very little appetite to step in front of this move, particularly given how liquidation-driven the selloff has been,” she said. “Repeated failures to hold support levels have shifted behaviour.”

 

Bitcoin was trading at $64,420 as of 10:28 a.m. in Singapore on Friday.