By JBizNews Desk | May 15, 2026
Bitcoin dropped back below the $80,000 threshold on Friday, trading at $79,108 in late-afternoon U.S. action as profit-taking and a hawkish repricing of Federal Reserve policy expectations rippled through the digital-asset market, according to live pricing data from Coinglass and SoSoValue.
Major crypto prices Friday afternoon:
- Bitcoin (BTC): $79,108
- Ethereum (ETH): $2,223
- Solana (SOL): $89.66
- XRP: $1.44
- Dogecoin (DOGE): $0.1122
- Shiba Inu (SHIB): $0.000056152
The Crypto Fear & Greed Index slipped to 46, holding sentiment in neutral territory after several weeks bouncing between greed and neutral readings.
The selling was concentrated and forceful. Coinglass data showed 127,628 traders were liquidated in the prior 24 hours for a combined $440.26 million, with the bulk of the wipeout hitting long positions that had built up on the recovery move toward $90,000 earlier this week. Funding rates across major perpetual swap markets remained negative even as spot prices firmed earlier in the week, an unusual configuration flagged by anonymous derivatives trader Cryptoinsightuk, who said the divergence “shows derivatives traders remain heavily positioned to the short side” and described Friday’s weakness as “not panic level, just logical.” The same trader argued that pullbacks toward the middle of long-term price channels often serve as logical reset zones before the market chooses a direction, and noted that the negative funding setup could fuel a sharp short squeeze if Bitcoin breaks above the current range.
The macro backdrop is doing most of the heavy lifting on the downside. April CPI released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics Tuesday came in at 3.8% year over year, the highest reading since May 2023. April PPI released Wednesday jumped 6% annually, the hottest pace since 2022. The two prints together forced traders to abandon any remaining bets on a 2026 Federal Reserve rate cut and to begin pricing in the possibility of a quarter-point hike before year-end. CME FedWatch odds of a December hike climbed to roughly 51%, with January 2027 odds near 60%, up from near-zero a month ago. The 10-year U.S. Treasury yield jumped to 4.55%, a fresh one-year high, draining liquidity from speculative assets that had been rallying on the assumption of an easier policy path.
The Fed transition added another layer. Kevin Warsh was sworn in Friday as Federal Reserve chair, replacing Jerome Powell, whose term expired the same day. Crypto traders are watching closely to see whether Warsh — known for a rules-based, anti-inflation stance — strikes a more hawkish or more rules-based dollar tone in his first communications. Geoffrey Kendrick, global head of digital assets research at Standard Chartered, recently cut his year-end Bitcoin price target to $100,000 from $150,000, citing reduced odds of rate cuts before the Iran war even factored into the model. Kendrick said the selloff to date “has been less extreme than previous ones and has not seen the collapse of any digital asset platforms,” a comment echoed by Ark Invest founder Cathie Wood, who called Bitcoin’s roughly 50% peak-to-trough drawdown “a real victory” against the 85% to 95% declines of prior cycles.
ETF flows tell a mixed story. SoSoValue data showed net inflows of $131.3 million across U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs on Thursday, a partial recovery after a brutal Wednesday print that registered net outflows of $635 million — one of the largest single-day outflow totals on record. BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin Trust (IBIT) remained the dominant flow vehicle, while Fidelity’s FBTC also recorded inflows. Total spot Bitcoin ETF assets under management stand near $109 billion, an all-time high, with the structural ratio of ETF holdings to daily miner production now sitting at roughly 10 to 1 — a dynamic that analysts at Phemex cited as the key reason this cycle’s drawdowns have been shallower than the 2018 or 2022 collapses.
Corporate Bitcoin purchases, a key marginal demand vector last year, have slowed sharply. Buying by publicly traded treasury accumulators is down roughly 80% from the prior month as institutional buyers use the price recovery to take partial profits rather than add to positions. The Iran war, the closure of the Strait of Hormuz since March 4, and WTI crude trading above $100 a barrel continue to act as a sticky inflation overlay that argues for tighter Fed policy and a stronger dollar — neither friendly to crypto. The U.S. Dollar Index is on pace for its best week since early March, having climbed for a fifth straight session to near 99.29.
For now, traders are watching three levels: $78,000 as the next major support for Bitcoin, the $2,200 line on Ether that has held since April, and the $1.40 mark on XRP, which traders said would need to break to confirm a deeper retracement. Whether Warsh’s first public remarks lean rules-based or hawkish may decide which level gives way first.
— JBizNews Desk
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