Bitcoin Slips to $80k Amid Fed Dissents, Tech Earnings and AI Token Drop

Bitcoin BTC $80,070.04 declined 1.4% to approximately $80,100 on Thursday after dropping as low as $79,600 before finding support. Alternative cryptocurrencies experienced heavier losses, as ether ETH $2,322.69 fell 1.7% and the CoinDesk Memecoin Index decreased by 3.4%.

South Korea’s Kospi index spearheaded the market downturn, sliding 1.2% as Samsung Electronics equities dropped 4% despite reporting a record quarterly profit, driven by investor dissatisfaction concerning shareholder payouts. Nasdaq-100 futures slid 1.1% following Alphabet’s failure to meet financial forecasts.

Although the central bank kept interest rates unchanged on Wednesday as anticipated, two officials registered dissent favoring a 25-basis-point increase, and Chair Kevin Warsh refrained from offering guidance for December. The September Personal Consumption Expenditures inflation data, serving as the Fed’s primary metric for price tracking, remains forthcoming.

Data from Farside Investors reveals that U.S. spot bitcoin exchange-traded funds brought in $137 million on Wednesday, recording their third straight session of net inflows and totaling $423.7 million over that timeframe.

Derivatives positioning

• Futures activity: Overall crypto futures volume expanded 21.8% to reach $198.8 billion across a 24-hour period, whereas open interest contracted 1.9%. Essentially, trading activity accelerated while existing positions closed out. Liquidations jumped 84% to total $337.4 million, with the taker volume distribution nearly balanced at 50.1% long and 49.9% short.
• BTC and ETH: BTC fell 1.6% alongside a 1.2% reduction in futures open interest, indicating exposure declined proportionally with price without significant capital exiting the ecosystem. ETH retreated 2.1% while open interest decreased 0.7%. Perpetual funding rates remain positive for both assets though lower than the previous day, suggesting the bullish momentum in perpetual markets is weakening. ETH liquidations of $71.6 million closely mirrored BTC’s $72.5 million despite ETH holding roughly half the open interest volume.
• Money into BNB: BNB registered a 1.7% increase in open interest despite a 0.8% price decline, pointing to fresh capital entering against the downward price movement, accompanied by a 70% surge in trading volume. Funding switched from positive into negative territory, registering the lowest rate among major digital assets, which signals that short sellers are compensating long positions and perpetual traders are tilting bearish. SUI mirrors this structural dynamic on a smaller scale.
• ZEC unwind: ZEC open interest contracted 12% alongside a 5.4% price drop, meaning capital flowed out of the contract and reversed the prior day’s expansion when open interest grew 13.9% during a 6.3% price rally. Positive funding persists, indicating longs continue paying shorts and perpetual traders have not adopted a bearish outlook.
• Funding cools: Most prominent cryptocurrencies maintain positive funding rates, yet these metrics have declined compared to 24 hours prior. This indicates longs pay less to sustain their positions, reflecting a cooling of bullish enthusiasm in perpetual markets, with BNB registering the most negative rate and monero XMR holding the highest positive rate.
• CVD turns negative: Nearly all major digital assets exhibit negative 24-hour open-interest-adjusted cumulative volume delta. This demonstrates that market sell orders outpaced market buy orders relative to open interest, reversing the prior day’s trend where most tokens recorded positive figures, with NEAR displaying the most pronounced negative shift accompanied by a sharp midday decline.
• GOOGL jump: GOOGL, representing the perpetual contract linked to Alphabet equity, experienced a 77% surge in open interest alongside a 10% price correction, while its trading volume multiplied nearly fivefold.
• Calls lead BTC options: On Deribit, four out of the six most actively traded BTC options over the past 24 hours consist of call contracts, all featuring strike prices exceeding current spot values, led by the October 30 expiry $82,500 call option, while market skew consistently favors downside protection across all durations.
• Puts lead ETH options: Five of the six highest-volume ETH options are put contracts with strike prices ranging between $2,280 and $1,500, with the December $3,200 contract serving as the sole call on the list, as ETH puts continue commanding higher prices than calls to reflect ongoing apprehension regarding downside risk.

Token talk

• Tokens associated with artificial intelligence absorbed some of the steepest losses, with NEAR Protocol NEAR $4.4156—a blockchain tailored for AI initiatives—slipping 7.8% and decentralized AI network Bittensor TAO shedding 3.1%, aligning with a roughly 10% pre-market markdown for Alphabet shares following its disappointing earnings conference call.
• Decentralized finance tokens experienced steeper corrections than the broader market, with Raydium RAY $1.6540 dropping 8.9%, Jito JTO $0.3996 falling 6.8%, and Ethena ENA decreasing 6%.
• JasmyCoin JASMY $0.003714, a Japan-centered data and internet-of-things digital asset, plummeted 10% to record the heaviest loss among CoinDesk 100 constituents, while Dash DASH $50.32 and pump.fun PUMP $0.004341 each retreated approximately 6%.
• Tron TRX $0.3312 stood out as one of the few tokens trading in positive territory, securing a 0.5% advance since midnight UTC.
• CoinMarketCap’s Altcoin Season gauge dropped from 60 on Wednesday down to 54 out of 100.

Originally published at https://www.coindesk.com/markets/2026/10/29/bitcoin-drops-to-usd80-000-on-fed-dissent-samsung-alphabet-earnings-ai-tokens-slump.