After climbing approx. 7% to over $79,000 from frantic weekend lows near $74,000 mark, bitcoin again giving ground during the morning’s US trade.
Bitcoin recently changed hands at $77,100, down 2% over the past 24 hours. Ether fared worse, down to $2,260, or 4.7% lower.
The sell-off comes as gold and silver both show strong gains in what appears to be a genuine recovery from their own panicked price action last Friday.
At the same time, U.S. stocks — especially a significant group of AI-related names — are falling. Nvidia ( NVDA ), Oracle ( ORCL ), Broadcom ( AVGO ), Micron ( MU ), and Microsoft ( MSTR ) are all lower by 3%-5%, leading the Nasdaq’s 1% decline.
The largest publicly traded bitcoin holder strategy (MSTR) continues to make fresh lows, falling more than 2%. Coinbase (COIN) and Bullish (BLSH) are from the same amount.
Galaxy Digital ( GLXY ) shares fall more than 12% after disappointing fourth-quarter results. Stablecoin issuer Circle (CRCL) is down another 3.5%.
Bitcoin miners turned AI infrastructure providers are posting gains, led by TeraWulf ( WULF ), which advanced 12% after acquiring two industrial plants in the US that could more than double the company’s power capacity to 2.8 gigawatts. Cipher Mining (CIFR) shares are up 4% after announcing plans to raise $2 billion in the junk bond market to finance its Black Pearl data center in Texas, which will provide 300 megawatts of capacity under a long-term lease with Amazon Web Services.
Dead cat jumping
Options flows suggest traders are preparing for a short-term rejection of the weekend’s lows below the $75,000 level, according to Jake Ostrovskis, head of OTC at crypto trading firm Wintermute.
The absence of demand for upside exposure reflects conditions seen in April 2025, he added.
Strong demand for short-term downside protection has distorted the options market, pushing short-term volatility higher than longer-dated contracts, a setup known as backwardation, Ostrovskis noted. The analyst said he sees volatility easing and the options curve normalizing back to contango as bottom signals.
“At that point I would be more comfortable calling local lows,” he said.
