Crypto market traders were hit by record liquidations just days after Bitcoin touched an all-time high, volatility triggered in large part by the latest round of tariffs from US President Donald Trump.
Cryptocurrency prices tumbled on Friday after Trump said he would impose an additional 100% tariff on China and export controls on software. The declines precipitated, and then were made worse by what data tracker Coinglass described as “the largest liquidation event in crypto history.”
While market weakness had already been present coming into Friday, Trump’s post sparked a decline of more than 12% in Bitcoin. The largest token, which had earlier this week reached a record of more than $125,000, was hovering below $113,000 as of Saturday morning in London.
Over the past 24 hours, bets worth more than $19 billion have been wiped out, and more than 1.6 million traders liquidated, according to Coinglass data. More than $7 billion of those positions were sold in less than one hour of trading on Friday.
In its post on X, Coinglass said the total might be much higher given that exchanges don’t necessarily report such orders in real time. Binance Holdings Ltd., the world’s largest crypto exchange, only reports one liquidation order per second, according to the post.
“The focus now turns to counterparty exposure and whether this triggers broader market contagion,” said Brian Strugats, head trader at Multicoin Capital. He added that some estimates place total liquidations above $30 billion.
Next Key Level
The next major support level for Bitcoin is $100,000, according to Caroline Mauron, co-founder of Orbit Markets, below which “would signal the end of past three-year bull cycle.” Bitcoin options market reflected Mauron’s views with highest number of ‘put’ or sell strikes at $110,000 and next highest at $100,000, according to data on Deribit platform.
The ratcheting up of rhetoric between the US and China sent shock waves across markets, hammering stocks, oil and crypto while spurring a dash for the perceived safety of Treasuries and gold.
“A renewed trade war between China and the US erupted on Friday, causing uncertainty in markets and a rout in risk assets,” said Ravi Doshi, co-head of markets at prime broker FalconX. The firm’s derivatives desk saw outsized demand for downside protection during the day, Doshi said.
David Jeong, chief executive officer at Tread.fi, an algorithmic crypto trading platform for institutional traders, said the market was experiencing a “black swan event.”
“It is likely that many institutions did not expect this level of volatility and with how leveraged perpetual futures are designed, many large traders, including institutions, would have gotten liquidated,” he said.
Perpetual futures are a type of contract with no expiration, and are used by crypto traders to trade leveraged positions around the clock.
Vincent Liu, chief investment officer at Kronos Research, said the rout was “sparked by US-China tariff fears but fueled by institutional over-leverage.”
“This highlights crypto’s macro ties,” he said. “Expect volatility, but watch for rebound signals in cleared markets.”
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