Trump's Iran pledge underpins crypto gains as bitcoin bears face liquidation pressure
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Bitcoin BTC$83,178.91 held near $82,600 after President Donald Trump said he would not strike Iran before the U.S. midterm elections, pulling the largest cryptocurrency off Thursday’s low of roughly $80,400 and turning the liquidation pressure onto bearish traders.
Ether ETH$2,504.55 slipped 2% over 24 hours to about $2,500, still nursing the worst of Thursday’s flush, when ether bets were wiped out at six times bitcoin’s rate relative to its market value.
SOL was the laggard among the major coins, losing nearly 4% over the same period to around $110, while XRP and HYPE were little changed. The broader CoinDesk 20 index slipped about 2%.
Thursday’s dip tested a level traders watch for the medium-term trend.
“At the peak of its decline on Thursday, Bitcoin fell to $80.4K, touching its lowest level in the past three weeks and its 50-day moving average, where the balance shifted in favour of buyers,” Alex Kuptsikevich, the chief market analyst at FxPro, said in an email to CoinDesk.