Bitcoin retreats below $100,000, causing $850 million in crypto liquidations over past day

Bitcoin saw a notable pullback and retreated to trading below the $100,000 mark. The foremost cryptocurrency is trading at $99,100, with a 5.7% decline over the past day, according to the Block's price page .

Similarly, the price of Ether dipped below $3,100 and is currently trading at $3,065 — an 8.2% drawdown on the day. The native crypto of Solana (SOL) dropped 10% to around $230.

According to Coinglass  data , the market drop resulted in crypto traders liquidating over $850 million worth of crypto on exchanges over the last 24 hours, primarily affecting long positions.

The AI agents category was among the hardest hit by the latest market slide, declining 20% in market capitalization over the past 24 hours, according to CoinGecko. Among AI agent coins, Fartcoin led the losses with a 23% drop, followed by a steep 21% fall in Virtuals Protocol. Other key AI agent tokens, such as ai16z, AIXBT, and AI Rig, also saw substantial pullbacks.

The memecoin sector wasn’t spared either, witnessing an 11% fall overall. Over the past 24 hours, Pepe declined 16%, SPX6900 dropped 16%, and Dogecoin pulled back 11%. Trump family memecoins TRUMP and MELANIA, experienced declines as well. TRUMP peaked at over $70 per token on Jan. 19 and has since dropped nearly 170% to trade at $25.5 — with a 17% drop since yesterday. Its fully diluted valuation stands at $25.5 billion.

Since early December, Bitcoin has been trading sideways around $100,000 and has consolidated around this mark, although there have been notable fluctuations. Up to U.S. President Trump’s inauguration, Bitcoin reached a new all-time high, surpassing $109,000. This was primarily driven by market optimism about Trump’s pro-crypto policies. The price has since cooled off and returned to around $100,000.

Arthur Hayes, co-founder of BitMEX, contributed to the discourse with a post on the X platform, suggesting a bearish outlook for Bitcoin in the short term. Hayes predicted that Bitcoin’s price could drop between $70,000 and $75,000 due to the impact of what he claims is a “mini financial crisis.”

However, Hayes also projected a dramatic rebound for Bitcoin, expecting it to reach as high as $250,000 this year, driven by a potential resumption of monetary easing policies.

Amid these market dynamics, the new Trump administration has been proactive, introducing a crypto working group to propose new regulations and explore a digital assets stockpile .