Bitcoin Slumps Below $80K as ETH Breaks $2,260; $320M Liquidations

Published: 2026-05-13 01:26:38 |

Bitcoin (BTC) sold off sharply after US macro pressure intensified. Following a hotter-than-expected April CPI print and hawkish Fed warnings about “overheating,” BTC broke below the key $80,000 psychological level. Ethereum (ETH) also failed support, dropping to around $2,260. The move triggered a broad deleveraging. Per CoinGlass data, in the past 24 hours there were 107,591 forced liquidations across crypto markets, totaling about $320 million. Most of the liquidations were long positions. The largest single liquidation occurred on Binance in the ETHUSDT pair, worth roughly $2.71 million, highlighting how concentrated leverage was even after prior rebounds (including BTC’s earlier reclaim of the 200-day moving average). The article frames this as a “inflation panic” phase spilling from traditional markets into crypto risk assets. For traders, the key takeaway is that Bitcoin weakness is currently driving cross-market liquidation dynamics, with ETH showing faster downside once $2,260 breaks.

Bearish

This is bearish because the catalyst is macro-driven risk-off: a hotter-than-expected CPI and hawkish Fed messaging typically pressure liquidity and raise discount rates, which reduces appetite for high-beta assets like crypto. The immediate confirmation is the scale of forced liquidations and the dominance of long-position clears—classic signs of leverage being burned off rather than healthy dip-buying. In similar events, when Bitcoin breaks a major psychological level (here $80K) alongside ETH losing a near-term support (around $2,260), short-term volatility usually remains elevated even if prices stabilize later. Longs that are liquidated often return cautiously, while new longs require clearer stabilization signals (e.g., reduced liquidation velocity, improving funding/risk metrics). Longer term, if CPI keeps cooling and Fed guidance shifts, the deleveraging can reset positioning and allow a base to form; but until macro pressure eases, rallies are more likely to be sold.