The price of Bitcoin experienced a sharp decline overnight as the United States and Israel initiated “major combat operations” against Iran, targeting military installations in a bid to disrupt the country’s nuclear and ballistic missile programs. The military actions also aimed to eliminate key military leaders within Iran. Following the announcement of these strikes, Bitcoin’s price plummeted from $65,572 to as low as $63,176 within a single hour. However, the cryptocurrency has since regained much of its lost value, currently trading at around $65,051. This reflects a daily loss of approximately 0.8% and a notable decline of 5.2% over the past week.
Other major cryptocurrencies, including Ethereum, XRP, and Solana, also faced similar declines immediately after the attacks. Like Bitcoin, these altcoins have mostly recovered and are now showing daily losses of less than 2%.
The swift market downturn triggered a wave of crypto liquidations, with CoinGlass reporting nearly $490 million worth of positions liquidated over the last 24 hours. Bitcoin accounted for approximately $196 million of those liquidated positions, while Ethereum saw around $132 million in liquidations.
At its lowest point, Bitcoin’s value was nearly 50% off its all-time high of over $126,000 from last October. Over the past month, Bitcoin has dropped about 23%, having started the year at approximately $87,000. Historical trends indicate that cryptocurrency prices are often susceptible to geopolitical events, a pattern that has been evident since the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
In response to the bombings, Iran launched retaliatory attacks against U.S. military assets across the Middle East. Iranian state media reported significant civilian casualties, including at least 85 deaths following an attack on a girls’ school in the Minah province.
Interestingly, users on Myriad, a prediction market run by Decrypt’s parent company Dastan, have begun to speculate about the future of the Iranian regime, with predictions indicating a 51% chance of its collapse before October—an increase of 20% in the past day alone.
