Bitcoin Slides Below $80,000 Amid Profit-Taking and Thin Liquidity
Bitcoin fell to its lowest levels since April 2025 on Saturday, as early holders cashed in profits while liquidity thinned and fresh capital failed to enter the market. The world’s largest cryptocurrency dropped as much as 10% to $75,709.88 during New York trading hours, extending a drawdown that has erased over 30% of its peak value.
The broader crypto market also showed weakness, with Ether and Solana each falling roughly 17% at one point. The selloff wiped about $111 billion from total market capitalization in the past 24 hours, according to CoinGecko, while roughly $1.6 billion in leveraged long and short positions were liquidated, mostly in Bitcoin and Ether, data from Coinglass shows.
Analysts point to thin liquidity and muted buying interest as key factors behind the decline. Ki Young Ju, CEO of on-chain analytics firm CryptoQuant, noted that Bitcoin’s realized capitalization has largely flatlined, signaling that new money is no longer flowing into the asset. “When market cap falls without realized cap growing, that’s not a bull market,” Ju said on X.
Early Bitcoin holders have been sitting on substantial unrealized gains following months of aggressive buying driven by spot Bitcoin ETFs and Michael Saylor’s Strategy (MSTR). While those inflows helped support prices near $100,000 for much of last year, profit-taking has persisted since early 2024, colliding with slowing demand. Ju added that although Strategy has been a major driver of the rally, a deep 70% cycle-style crash is unlikely unless the firm begins selling its holdings.
Saturday’s drop below $76,037 per coin put Strategy’s Bitcoin slightly underwater but posed no immediate financial stress for the firm, according to CoinDesk.
The decline also reflects broader macro frustrations for Bitcoin. Despite a weaker U.S. dollar and gold reaching record highs in January, the asset failed to rally. Gold and silver’s sharp reversals on Friday further dampened hopes that crypto could act as a hedge, while delays in new U.S. market-structure rules for the sector have weighed on investor confidence.
Ju expects the downturn to stabilize not with a quick rebound, but through an extended period of sideways trading, leaving the market without a clear near-term bottom.
