Bitcoin holds, ether, solana slide as Mideast woes drag Asian equities to multi-year lows

The largest cryptocurrency briefly reclaimed the top of its range on Tuesday before sellers pushed it back to $67,000, while South Korean stocks posted their worst two-day drop since 2008.

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What to know:

• Bitcoin has repeatedly failed to hold the $70,000 level, trading around $67,600 in Asian hours Wednesday even as it remains modestly higher on the week.
• Major cryptocurrencies have broadly retraced from Tuesday’s highs, with altcoins like Solana, Cardano and Dogecoin underperforming while BNB and XRP show relative resilience.
• Analysts say geopolitical tensions around Iran, surging oil prices and sliding Asian equities are weighing on risk assets, with Bitcoin’s next move hinging on ETF inflows and whether support holds above roughly $63,000.

Bitcoin has now dropped from the $70,000 level three times since the Feb. 5 crash as Wednesday's Asian session found the market back at $67,600, according to CoinDesk market data, after another failed attempt earlier in the week.

BTC was trading at $67,612 as of Asian morning hours on Wednesday, down 0.7% over the past 24 hours but up 3.4% on the week as the post-strike recovery held. Ether slipped 2.2% to $1,957, giving back some of its bounce but still up 2.6% on a seven-day basis. BNB was the quiet outperformer, up 5.2% on the week at $629.

The damage was concentrated further down the board. Dogecoin fell 2.9% in 24 hours and is down 3.9% on the week. Cardano dropped 4.2% on the day and 3.5% over seven days. Solana lost 0.8% to $85.16 and remains the worst-performing major on a weekly basis at -4.2%, still carrying the weight of Saturday's sell-off. XRP held relatively flat, down 1.3% to $1.35 with a modest 1.5% weekly gain.

The pattern across the board is the same. Most majors recovered from the weekend lows but couldn't hold Tuesday's highs, leaving the market in a holding pattern while it waits for clarity on the Iran situation and Monday's traditional market reaction to settle.

"BTC bouncing back to $70K looks like a classic shock, flush, rebuild move. A lot of the weekend selling was forced, and liquidity was thin, so the rebound can be fast once pressure lifts," said Wojciech Kaszycki, CSO of BTCS SA, said in an email. "After BTC's move back above $70K, the real signal isn't the price spike. It's whether ETF inflows stay steady this week."

FxPro chief analyst Alex Kuptsikevich noted that Tuesday's rejection "forces us to consider a decline to $63K as a working scenario" if the upper boundary continues to hold.

The macro backdrop isn't helping. Asian equities sold off hard Wednesday, with South Korean stocks posting their biggest two-day decline since 2008 as the Iran conflict continued to rattle investors.

Tech stocks across the MSCI Asia Pacific index fell 4%, dragging Japan, Taiwan, and South Korea lower. The Indian rupee dropped to a record low on the oil price hit. Gold climbed higher, pulling silver with it for the first time this week.

Oil remains the key variable. Brent jumped again Wednesday despite the U.S. announcing plans to escort tankers through the Strait of Hormuz, which has been effectively closed since the weekend strikes.

Meanwhile, U.S president Donald Trump floated an insurance scheme for oil tankers but provided no details. The longer the strait stays disrupted, the more energy prices feed into inflation expectations, which pushes rate cuts further out, which tightens the liquidity environment that drives risk assets.

"We think that Bitcoin is an emerging reserve asset," said Gracy Chen, CEO at Bitget in comments to CoinDesk. "Many people simply cannot fully accept this yet because it is easier to invest into gold, which has existed for many years, than into Bitcoin, which is still young and risky."

Chen pointed to the broader disappointment in crypto markets following earlier crashes, noting that "the current decline in Bitcoin is largely driven by this disappointment, especially against the backdrop of rising equities, gold, silver, and stock indices reaching new highs."

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