Bitcoin currently sits near the bottom of its month-long trading range. The ongoing conflict in the Middle East continues to scare away cautious investors. As uncertainty grows, cryptocurrencies across the entire market face heavy losses. Bitcoin recently dropped exactly 3.6% to reach $65,709 before bouncing back slightly during the New York trading session. Other digital coins suffered similar fates. Ether fell almost 5.9%, and Solana took a similarly heavy hit during the morning panic.
United States President Donald Trump sparked the latest panic during his Wednesday speech. He promised to continue the active war against Iran. This aggressive stance rattled global energy markets because experts see no clear signs that the vital Strait of Hormuz will reopen anytime soon. American benchmark crude oil quickly surged past $111 a barrel, creating serious headaches for everyday drivers and massive corporations alike. The stock market and bond prices also bounced wildly as traders realized that high oil prices would stick around for much longer.
Alex Kuptsikevich, a chief market analyst at FxPro, explained the sudden market reaction. He noted that Trump’s recent comments triggered a sharp selloff because investors desperately want to see signs of peace. Right now, Bitcoin is mostly bouncing between $66,000 and $69,000. During the peak panic, some nervous retail traders watched their personal portfolio values drop by over $5,000 in just a matter of hours. Caroline Mauron, a co-founder at Orbit Markets, added that Bitcoin largely follows the general direction of the stock market. She pointed out that the digital coin has actually ignored some bad news lately.
Surprisingly, Bitcoin handled the early days of the war much better than traditional safe assets. The digital coin ended March with a tiny 2% gain, officially breaking a painful five-month losing streak. Meanwhile, physical gold crashed hard. The precious metal ended March with a massive 11% loss as traders worried deeply that energy-driven inflation would destroy their purchasing power. Some smaller commodity funds even lost 2.4% of their total value overnight as the panic spread.
Despite surviving March, overall demand for Bitcoin looks incredibly weak right now. The current price sits a full 45% below the massive $126,000 record peak it hit back in October. A recent CryptoQuant report highlighted a major problem with buyer interest. The data showed that actual buyer demand fell short of newly mined coins by roughly 63,000 tokens late last month. This massive gap proves that buyers prefer to stay far away from the unpredictable market every day.
Large Bitcoin holders, often called “whales,” pose another massive headache for the crypto industry. These wealthy investors have completely lost confidence and have become heavy sellers over the past year. Jasper De Maere, a crypto trader at Wintermute, stated that current on-chain data clearly confirms what the price action already shows. He claims big players have absolutely zero conviction to hold their coins right now.
This lack of trust also affects traditional stock market products. Just this Wednesday, investors suddenly pulled $174 million out of American spot Bitcoin exchange-traded funds. These specific funds actually saw a decent $1.1 billion influx earlier in March. That brief success offered a moment of stabilization after the funds suffered four straight months of painful losses. However, this recent wave of massive withdrawals shows that institutional buyers will quickly dump their crypto assets the moment global politics take a dangerous turn.
