Bitcoin traders faced significant losses on Saturday as the cryptocurrency briefly dipped below $80,000, leading to $404.15 million in long positions being liquidated over four hours. The liquidations occurred in two major bursts, with $208.21 million wiped out in 15 minutes around 10:15 a.m. ET and another $131.17 million in the following hour. The total liquidations for the day reached $815.26 million, a 218% increase from the previous day, affecting 201,012 traders.
Ether also saw substantial liquidations, totaling $136.72 million, despite having only about 18% of Bitcoin's market capitalization. The largest single liquidation was an $11.85 million ETH-USDT long on Binance. Binance accounted for $226.07 million of the liquidations, with 96% being longs, while Hyperliquid saw $70.47 million in liquidations, 99.8% of which were longs.
Spot Bitcoin ETFs recorded two consecutive days of outflows, with $137.94 million leaving on Friday, primarily from BlackRock's IBIT and Fidelity's FBTC. This followed a worse day on Thursday with $635.49 million in outflows. Despite the outflows, the funds held total net assets worth $104.43 billion as of Friday. Spot Ether ETFs had $4.35 million in net inflows on Friday but still logged $220.60 million in net outflows for the week.
BitMEX co-founder Arthur Hayes announced early Saturday that he had closed out the directional book at Maelstrom, his family office. 'I dumped it all,' Hayes wrote on X, adding that he took profits on ETH, ENA, UNI, and other assets. He expressed concerns about macro and geopolitical risks, stating, 'I think we gotta go down to go up.' The State Department's reduction of staff at U.S. embassies in the Middle East was cited as a potential geopolitical risk.