Crypto: Bitcoin slips below $90,000 as Bybit hack deepens woes

Bitcoin faced its steepest one-day decline since August, on Tuesday, as investor sentiment weakened amid concerns over US tariffs, Nvidia’s earnings, and the fallout from the recent Bybit exchange hack.

The attack, which saw $1.5 billion worth of ether stolen, further shook confidence in the crypto market.

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The world’s largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization fell below $90,000, reaching its lowest level since November. At one point, it dropped as much as 7.5%, marking its most significant daily decline since a global market downturn in early August that also affected stocks and bonds.

Despite an initial wave of appointments of crypto-friendly officials earlier this year, investors have seen little in the way of concrete developments to drive prices higher.

“The absence of new bullish catalysts — such as progress on crypto-friendly regulation or the approval of additional cryptocurrency ETFs — has kept prices range-bound in recent weeks,” said Thomas Erdosi, head of product at CF Benchmarks.

Investor outflows from bitcoin-backed exchange-traded funds have also added to the market pressure. Data from LSEG indicates that the largest ETFs are on track for a net monthly withdrawal of approximately $644 million, the highest since their launch in January 2024.

With risk assets already on shaky ground, the revelation from Bybit that hackers had stolen digital tokens worth $1.5 billion has added to the negative sentiment.

Bybit CEO Ben Zhou confirmed that the stolen funds were taken from a “cold wallet”, an offline digital wallet designed to be more secure that was used for ether tokens.

Blockchain analytics firm Elliptic described the attack as more than double the previous largest crypto heist and noted that it “is almost certainly the single largest known theft of any kind in all time.”

Bybit, headquartered in Dubai, ranks as the second-largest cryptocurrency exchange globally, trailing only Binance.

The hack’s impact was also felt across the broader crypto market. Ether, the second-largest cryptocurrency, slid 9.5% to $2,386, its lowest level since October.

Over the past week, bitcoin has lost nearly 8% of its value, while smaller cryptocurrencies have suffered even steeper declines. Memecoin dogecoin, along with the native tokens of the Solana and Cardano networks, have each fallen by roughly 20%, according to Coingecko.

(Reuters)