Bitcoin Tanks Below $80K, Spurring Bloodbath Across Crypto Market

It's the dip that keeps on dipping. Bitcoin took another hit early Friday, falling below $80,000 and taking February's decline to over 20%.

The cryptocurrency market experienced a downturn in the past 24 hours, with Bitcoin falling below $80,000 following a 15% decline from Thursday's high of $95,000. This fall occurred as President Donald Trump announced plans to impose new tariffs on imports from Canada, Mexico, and China, diverting attention from personal consumption and expenditure data.

As reported by CoinDesk, Trump stated that tariffs of 25% on imports from Canada and Mexico, along with an additional 10% tariff on Chinese imports, would take effect on March 4. These tariffs are in response to what Trump deems excessive tariffs imposed by other countries on U.S. goods.

The administration is aiming for the new tariffs to be applied broadly across all goods from the three countries, focusing on products like maple syrup from Canada, avocado toast from Mexico, and solar panels and seafood from China.

However, the implementation of this reciprocal tariff program, designed to align U.S. trade duties with those of other nations, is encountering delays. Despite an April 2 report being anticipated, full deployment of the program is expected in several months' time.

The looming tariffs and anticipation of soft personal consumption and expenditure data, set to be released by the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis at 8:30 a.m. ET, threaten to dampen any significant rebound in risk assets.

Moreover, macroeconomic trends are shifting as optimism over lower inflation is waning. The PCE price index, a key inflation measure preferred by the Federal Reserve, is forecast to rise by 0.3% in January on both the headline and core levels, according to economists polled by Dow Jones.

This would mark a slowdown from December's 0.3% increase in the headline index and 0.2% rise in the core index.

Furthermore, year-over-year, the core PCE price index is projected to decrease to 2.6% from 2.8%, while the headline index is expected to decline to 2.5% from 2.6%.

These changes suggest a potential slowdown in the U.S. economy, which could have implications for the cryptocurrency market.

Crypto Prices Today

* Bitcoin BTC fell 3.3% in the past 24 hours to $80,552.45 by 4 p.m. ET.

* Ether slid 4.62% to $2,135.58.

* The CoinDesk 20 index dropped 4.63%.

* The DeCenter (EDC) price index slid 4.48%.

Crypto futures on a rollup by day IV

Perpetual funding rates for TRX and TRON turned negative on Friday morning as the crypto sell-off deepened, indicating greater bearish or short interest in the markets. Most other major coins still had positive funding rates.

The 7-day and 30-day options skew on decentralized exchange Derive.xyz showed a sharp decrease for ETH, falling to -15% and -6% respectively. This deep skew implied a strong preference for protective puts among options traders.

The deep skew on 7-day and 30-day options for ETH showed a strong bias for protective puts as the market anticipates potential volatility.

The way bitcoin options on on Derive were priced at press time showed a 44% chance BTC settling below $80K by the end of June. And just 3.5% chance of prices rising to $150K, talk about the fear in the market. BTC options on Deribit showed a bias for puts in expiries up to the April end.

Top Gainer (24 Hour)

The top 24-hour performing cryptocurrency was Aleph Zero, which rose 30.8%.

Top Loser (24 Hour)

The worst-performing cryptocurrency in 24 hours was Anyswap, which fell 23.4%.