Bitcoin extended a brutal sell-off into the new week, sinking back toward the critical $60,000 level as a sudden US-Iran military escalation, relentless spot ETF outflows, and a fragile macroeconomic backdrop combined to deliver the cryptocurrency’s worst weekly decline since the FTX collapse in November 2022.
The flagship digital asset tumbled to an intraday low of $60,892 on June 9, according to Coingecko data, before a modest recovery pushed it to around $61,800—still down roughly 3% over the prior 24 hours. The move came as President Donald Trump announced retaliatory strikes against Iran after an American Apache helicopter was shot down near the Strait of Hormuz. “The United States must, of necessity, respond to this attack,” Trump declared, prompting US Central Command to launch what it called “self-defense” operations. Iran’s deputy foreign minister disputed the claim, saying the aircraft was not deliberately targeted, but the incident rattled markets already on edge.
Investors fled to traditional safe havens: gold jumped 1.8%, WTI crude surged 3.5% on supply disruption fears, and US equity futures retreated. Bitcoin, often touted as digital gold, was swept up in the risk-off wave. Even before the military flare-up, pressure had been mounting. Anticipation of the May Consumer Price Index report on June 10 compounded fears of reaccelerating inflation, while rising Treasury yields reinforced expectations that the Federal Reserve would keep interest rates higher for longer, sapping appetite for speculative assets.
Institutional demand has been evaporating for weeks. Wintermute reported that US spot Bitcoin ETFs suffered roughly $4.4 billion in net outflows between mid-May and early June, with total ETF assets slumping from over $100 billion to below $80 billion. Across 13 consecutive days, more than $5.5 billion fled the products. The trading firm noted that capital is rotating into artificial intelligence plays and equity opportunities such as the anticipated SpaceX IPO, leaving crypto starved of fresh inflows.
On-chain data from Santiment shows a split: wallets holding less than 0.01 BTC kept buying the dip, increasing their holdings by 0.36%, while wallets with 10–10,000 BTC reduced positions by 0.20%. Analyst Ted Pillows warned that no Bitcoin cycle bottom has ever formed above the “Realized Price” of $53,000, suggesting a slide toward $50,000–$52,000 may be needed before the market stabilizes. Wintermute flagged a liquidity gap between $50,000 and $59,000 that could accelerate any breakdown.
Technical indicators also paint a grim picture. Bitcoin is trading below its 20-, 50-, 100-, and 200-day EMAs, and has fallen beneath the lower Keltner Channel boundary near $62,969—a sign of extreme downside momentum. A move back above that boundary would be the first hint of easing pressure, but the 20-day EMA at $67,876 stands as a taller hurdle. The 200-week moving average, a classic bear-market signal, has also been breached.
Liquidation data underscores the knife’s edge. CoinGlass shows heavy liquidity clusters between $60,600 and $60,800, as well as right at $60,000. A decisive break below could trigger cascading forced liquidations into Wintermute’s warning zone. Conversely, significant buy-the-dip liquidity is stacked between $62,500 and $64,000; reclaiming $62,000 could ignite a short squeeze toward the mid-$63,000s.
