45 minutes. $2,300 gone. And panic everywhere.
Bitcoin dropped from near 89,000 to around 86,650. Then it bounced back above 88,000. Fast move. No major bad news.
What happened? Record options expiry on Deribit. $27 billion. The biggest ever in crypto.
Liquidity was thin because of holidays. That made the move sharper. Some traders pointed at BlackRock wallet transfers. But those flows are normal for ETF rebalancing.
My view. This looks like an expiry driven shakeout. Stops got cleared. Emotions got tested.
Key level to watch now is 86,000. As long as price holds above it, structure stays intact. ETF inflows are still positive this year. That signals demand is not gone.
No Santa rally yet. But this does not kill the trend. It just shows you how brutal volatility can be.
$BTC #USCryptoStakingTaxReview
