Bitcoin Rebounds Past $61K After $1.6B Liquidation Rout
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- Bitcoin fell as low as $59,227 overnight before buyers stepped in, with the token recovering more than $1,500 off the low to trade around $61,000 — easing fears that a break below the round $60,000 level would cascade into a deeper breakdown.
- Friday's nonfarm payrolls report came in solid and markets repriced the Federal Reserve outlook hard: swaps now fully price a rate increase by the end of 2026, a reversal from the cuts expected under newly confirmed chair Kevin Warsh.
- Two-year Treasury yields jumped 12 basis points to 4.16%, the dollar rose, and the Nasdaq 100 sank about 5% — its steepest drop since April 2025 — while a chipmakers gauge tumbled 10% and the S&P 500 fell 2.6%, failing to complete a tenth straight weekly gain.
- Crypto markets saw roughly $1.6 billion in positions liquidated over 24 hours across about 308,000 traders, with longs accounting for $1.21 billion; Bitcoin alone saw $534 million in liquidations and ether $423 million.
- Altcoins remain deep in the red on the week: ether is down 21.6% to around $1,575, solana fell 23.7% to $63, and XRP, dogecoin and BNB are all 13–20% lower; Zcash logged another $115 million in liquidations amid a 44% collapse tied to a disclosed bug in its Orchard privacy pool.
- The slide toward $60,000 was preceded by a record run of ETF outflows and Strategy's first bitcoin sale since 2022, which removed buyers that had previously supported the price.
Why it matters: Bitcoin holders absorbed $534 million in liquidations and the token briefly lost the $60,000 floor, but a swift $1,500+ recovery shows buyers defended the level. The trigger — a single hot jobs print repricing the Fed toward hikes by 2026 — underscores how tightly crypto is now tethered to macro rates, meaning $60,000 is back on the table if another strong labor print lands before the bounce firms up.
