Bitcoin pulverized shorters as an explosion to $30,950 liquidated a large number of risky positions. Bitcoin passing $30,000 and hitting highs just under $31,000 has caused major pain for the traders who bet on a bearish pullback.
Data acquired from Cryptometer and TradingView confirmed that as BTC peaked at $30,960 on January 2, it liquidated $100 million of shorts.
Amid the highly volatile conditions, bitcoin tried to crack $30,000 several times on January 1 and overnight before it finally clinched the psychologically significant level on Saturday.
This steep move was accompanied by a bullish charge that soon took the biggest crypto even higher. At the moment, BTC is trying to break above the $31,000 level. While many participating in the bitcoin market celebrated, some were left worse than just minutes previously.
Liquidated short on XBTUSD: Buy 10,000,000 @ 30864 🏅🏆💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯 ~ I'm shocked, shocked to find that gambling is going on in here!
— REKT (@BXRekt) January 2, 2021
A bot that was tracking the liquidated trades on BitMEX derivatives giant highlighted:
“I’m shocked, shocked to find that gambling is going on in here!”
Available figures suggest that the shorters on the BitMEX platform alone lost around $10 million which is a sad reminder of the dangers involved in second-guessing BTC at critical levels.
Dogecoin Leads Altcoin Brigade
In other markets, altcoins started to see changes. Dogecoin (DOGE), an interesting mover, gained 42% on the day, while the leader Ether (ETH) rose back above $750. Some analysts and commentators believe that this month will kick start a broader alt season, which is quite bullish. One of them tweeted as $30,000 hit:
“The higher this impulse wave goes for #Bitcoin, the higher the next one will be as well. 2021 is going to be fire.”
Other cryptos in the top ten cryptos showed minimal volatility, but nothing seems to salvage XRP. The crypto is still languishing amid legal problems at major investor Ripple Labs.
