Bitcoin gave up gains made during Asian trading hours, slipping below $88,000 and dragging major altcoins lower as broader risk sentiment softened.
The largest cryptocurrency by market value briefly climbed above $90,000 before reversing course, CoinDesk data shows. The pullback disrupted early recovery attempts across the broader market, with major tokens including XRP, ether, solana and dogecoin all retreating from session highs. The CoinDesk 20 Index (CD20) fell back to around 2,726, roughly where it traded in early Asian hours, after briefly rising to 2,789.
The move mirrors weakness in equity index futures. At the time of writing, futures tied to Wall Street’s tech-heavy Nasdaq 100 were down about 0.5%, signaling a cautious start to the U.S. trading session. Bitcoin has historically shown a strong positive correlation with the Nasdaq, a relationship that tends to intensify during equity market drawdowns, according to trading firm Wintermute.
The retreat also prompted traders to modestly reduce leveraged positions. Data from Coinglass shows cumulative open interest across bitcoin futures slipped to roughly 533,000 BTC from about 540,000 BTC earlier in the day. Open interest had climbed from 524,000 BTC as bitcoin rallied toward $90,000.
Recent price action suggests bitcoin has been underperforming during U.S. trading hours, according to Laser Digital.
“An interesting trend to take note of has been the distinct underperformance during the U.S. timezone,” Laser Digital analysts wrote in a Monday note, pointing to declines of more than 3% in BTC and ETH during U.S. hours last week, offset by strength in Asia. The analysts attributed the pattern largely to year-end tax-loss harvesting, noting that crypto has been among the weaker-performing global asset classes this year.
Despite the near-term pullback, John Glover, chief investment officer at crypto lender Ledn and an Elliott Wave specialist, remains constructive on bitcoin’s longer-term outlook.
“The Bitcoin price chart looks very promising for higher prices in the future, but with less certainty in the near term,” Glover told CoinDesk in an email. He added that he expects the market to trade sideways to slightly lower in the coming weeks or months and would look to add long positions between $71,000 and $84,000.
