Bitcoin (BTC) continues to fight for a foothold above the $60,000 level, with a retest of $58,000 overnight before a modest recovery. The latest leg down comes amid a massive $10.6 billion options expiry on Deribit and CME, the largest of the year, and a wave of bearish flows from spot exchange-traded funds. Over the past 24 hours, total liquidations topped $1 billion, with long positions accounting for more than $845 million.
ETF investors have been pulling capital at an alarming rate. Wednesday’s $469 million in outflows was followed by an even steeper $691 million on Thursday, bringing the two-day total above $1.16 billion and June's cumulative figure to over $3 billion. The selling pressure has dragged the Fear & Greed Index down to a deeply fearful 13/100, from 24 earlier this week.
With 80% of today’s expiring contracts already out-of-the-money after June’s decline, dealers hold negative gamma, meaning price swings could stay sharp until the market clears the $68,000–$70,000 zone. Historically, July has been a much stronger month for Bitcoin, delivering average returns of around 7.5% versus near-zero for June.
Ethereum (ETH) dipped to the low $1,500s but is showing signs of stabilizing, with a potential double-bottom pattern forming. Sharplink reportedly bought ETH for the first time in eight months, hinting at selective accumulation despite Bitcoin dominance remaining above 50%.
MicroStrategy (MSTR) came under heavy pressure, dropping 10% as law firms launched class-action investigations into its Bitcoin strategy and recent financial disclosures. The stock’s decline reflects growing unease over billions in unrealized losses.
Amid the market turmoil, two notable announcements offered a counterpoint. Uniswap and Spark launched the FX Layer, a unified stablecoin liquidity network built on Uniswap v4. Spark is migrating $150 million in liquidity—one of the largest moves in DeFi history—with an initial pool of USDS, USDT, and PYUSD. The project aims to create an infrastructure akin to global FX markets, letting idle stablecoins earn yield and enabling seamless swaps as more issuers enter the space.
Separately, Atlas Capital Team, with economist Nouriel Roubini’s backing, plans to issue USAFi in Q3 2026. The token is a regulated digital security backed by the Nasdaq-listed Atlas America Fund, registered with the SEC, with reserves held at the Bank of New York. Issued under Dubai’s Virtual Assets Regulatory Authority (VARA), the ERC-20 token will be tokenized by Securitize and designed to bridge institutional collateral to decentralized finance.
