Bitcoin Price Sinks to October 2024 low: Is $70K The Floor?

Key Insights:

• Bitcoin (BTC) price kept sliding on Wednesday night to $70,000 as the sell-off gathered pace.
• As per Bloomberg analyst Eric Balchunas, Bitcoin’s outsized run in 2023 and 2024 set it so far ahead that traditional safe-haven assets still have not fully closed the gap.
• The average spot Bitcoin ETF holder was about 24% underwater.

Bitcoin (BTC) price kept sliding on Wednesday night as the sell-off gathered pace and pushed the cryptocurrency to its lowest level since October 2024.

At the same time, an overal risk-off mood spread through global markets, adding fresh pressure to the move.

BTC price fell 7.2% over the last 24 hours, dropping to $70,894 by 11:30 p.m. ET on Wednesday.  The cryptocurrency is roughly 43% below its Oct. 6 high of $126,080, according to CoinGecko.

Bitcoin Price Tests $70K After Falling to October 2024 Low

Even after the sharp drop, some analysts said Bitcoin holders are still thinking long term. They argued that the recent slump looks smaller when you zoom out.

ETF analyst Eric Balchunas made that point on Jan. 28. He said many Bitcoin investors were acting short-sighted because BTC price had climbed more than 400% since 2022.

By comparison, he noted gold was up about 177%, and silver had gained roughly 350% over the same stretch.

In his view, the outsized run of Bitcoin price in 2023 and 2024 set it so far ahead that traditional safe-haven assets still have not fully closed the gap.

He added that even with a strong year for those markets and a weak spell for Bitcoin price action, the earlier outperformance still shows up clearly in the numbers.

In essence, this latest wave of selling looked like it came mostly from long-term holders trimming their positions. In other words, some of the market’s older hands appeared to be stepping back and cutting risk.

Meanwhile, investment researcher Jim Bianco said in a post on X on Wednesday that the average spot Bitcoin ETF holder was about 24% underwater. Even so, he added that the group was still holding on overall.

Before the October slide, spot Bitcoin ETF had pulled in roughly $62.11 billion in net inflows. Since then, that figure has cooled to about $55 billion, based on preliminary numbers from Farside Investors.

Even so, analyst James Seyffart suggested the Bitcoin price pullback still looked healthy. He summed it up simply, saying the results were not too bad. In another post by Rand, the analyst said that the market had crossed a rare line.

Rand said it was a first: three straight months of outflows, something the market hasn’t seen before.

Risk-Off Mood Still Grips Markets

Analysts said the latest pullback looks less like a crypto-only problem and more like a macro story. In their view, bigger forces are dragging down risk assets across the board.

They added that crypto prices are simply moving with the wider risk-off mood, hitting other markets too. That wave of selling pressure, they said, pushed Bitcoin price to a fresh low for the year and left investor confidence at its weakest point since the last bear market.

That gloom shows up in sentiment data as well. The Crypto Fear & Greed Index is down at 12, which shows the market is deep in extreme fear.

Even so, analysts said a quick dip below $72,000 doesn’t kill the bigger bullish story for Bitcoin (BTC) price. It just means traders may need more patience before the next real move higher.

Instead, they said it simply stretched out the pullback. It also shifted the market into a phase where patience matters, rather than one where prices can quickly push higher again.