Why Is the Crypto Market Down as 2 Billion Dollars in Liquidations Hit Bitcoin and Ethereum

 

The cryptocurrency market downturn across the first nine days of November 2026 is the result of a three-part macro and institutional deleveraging shock: a hawkish repricing of U.S. interest rates following October's 165,000 nonfarm payrolls beat, a 5.52% post-election plunge in the Nasdaq Composite, and $1.3 billion in early-November U.S. spot Bitcoin ETF redemptions that combined to trigger two separate liquidation cascades totaling $2.08 billion between November 6 and November 9. Following a 15-minute Sunday night flash crash on November 8 that sent Bitcoin (BTC) down from $75,690 to an intraday low of $73,477 (trading at $74,133.11 USD as of November 9 at 10:31 UTC / 18:31 SGT) and knocked Ethereum (ETH) down over 5% to $2,104.42 USD, Bitcoin is now trading beneath both its Short-Term Holder Realized Price ($75,820) and Strategy's corporate treasury average cost ($75,451), meaning bulls must reclaim the $75,450 to $75,820 band on a daily close to prevent a deeper test of $70,000, while Ethereum must defend the $2,000 psychological floor and recover $2,157 to $2,242 to arrest its slide.

 

 

 

Rather than stemming from a protocol failure or crypto-native insolvency, the November 2026 pullback reflects synchronized institutional de-risking across equities, ETFs, and leveraged perpetual futures. Total cryptocurrency market capitalization has contracted from $2.62 trillion on November 4 to roughly $2.52 trillion on November 9, pushing the Crypto Fear and Greed Index down to 28 to 29 (Fear). Three verifiable forces drove the selloff: first, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported on November 6 that October nonfarm payrolls rose by 165,000 (more than double the 65,000 consensus forecast), reinforcing hawkish Federal Reserve expectations ahead of the December 8 to 9 FOMC meeting; second, U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs suffered $1.3 billion in net outflows across the first five trading days of November (led by a -$430.2 million single-day exodus on November 5), flipping full-year 2026 cumulative Bitcoin ETF flows negative to -$416 million to -$502 million while spot Ethereum ETF holders remain underwater below their ~$3,200 average cost basis; third, thin Sunday night order books on November 8 were hit by news of Nvidia's board inquiry and stalled U.S.–Iran talks, sparking over $1.0 billion in 15-minute liquidations led by $448 million in ETH and $272 million in BTC. Market participants tracking whether spot buyers are absorbing this forced selling can monitor real-time turnover on the live Bitcoin price and live Ethereum price dashboards.

 

 

Tracing the market tape from November 3 through November 9 shows that the crypto selloff occurred in two distinct waves—the first driven by Wall Street macro and tech contagion on Thursday and Friday, and the second driven by a derivatives liquidation cascade during thin Sunday night liquidity.

 

Wave one began on Thursday, November 5, when the Nasdaq Composite plunged 5.52%—its worst single-day drop since April 2025—after Democratic victories in the U.S. midterm elections raised the prospect of state-level moratoriums on new AI data centers in Texas, Georgia, and Ohio. That equity risk-off move intensified on Friday, November 6, when the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics released the October employment report, showing that total nonfarm payroll employment rose by 165,000 in October (crushing the 65,000 consensus estimate and more than triple the prior 12-month average monthly gain of 48,000) while the unemployment rate edged down to 4.1%. Because the Federal Reserve had just voted 10 to 2 on October 28 to keep the federal funds rate at 3.75% to 4.00%—with two governors dissenting in favor of a 25-basis-point rate hike—the 165,000 payrolls beat immediately revived fears that the Fed could hike or hold rates restrictive into 2027. Per November 6 liquidation data, total crypto market cap dropped 7.32% to $2.58 trillion on November 6 as 78 of the top 100 tokens declined and $1.08 billion in leveraged derivatives positions were liquidated over 24 hours ($954.38 million in long positions, or 88.2%, versus $127.30 million in shorts).

 

 

Wave two struck during thin weekend trading on Sunday, November 8 at 22:00 UTC (Monday, November 9 at 06:00 SGT). Headlines confirming that Nvidia's board had opened an independent inquiry involving CEO Jensen Huang and a $4.8 billion Southeast Asian chip probe—alongside reports of stalled U.S.–Iran diplomatic talks—triggered automated selling across crypto futures before U.S. equity index futures opened. As documented in the Sunday flash drop report, Bitcoin fell roughly $2,213 inside 15 minutes from $75,690 to an intraday low of $73,477 (its lowest print since August 2026), while Ethereum plunged through $2,157 to touch $2,091. CoinGlass logged more than $1.0 billion in liquidations during that 15-minute window alone, with Ethereum long liquidations ($448 million) exceeding Bitcoin liquidations ($272 million) by 64.7%. As noted in the Morningstar Dow Jones dispatch on November 9, while spot buyers stepped in near $73,500 to lift BTC back above $74,100, directional conviction remains muted entering the new week.

 

 

Behind the derivatives liquidations lies a steady drain of institutional spot demand through U.S. exchange-traded funds.

 

According to the Farside ETF flow table and the TFTC November ETF ledger updated through November 7, U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs recorded $1.3 billion in month-to-date net outflows across the first five trading days of November 2026, logging four outflow sessions against just one inflow session (+$74.6 million on November 4). The heaviest single-day redemption occurred on Thursday, November 5, when U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs bled $430.2 million and not a single one of the twelve listed funds recorded a net inflow. Across the early-November window, BlackRock's iShares Bitcoin Trust (IBIT) accounted for $1.2 billion in net outflows (including -$95.0 million on November 3, -$201.2 million on November 4, and -$105.0 million on November 5), far outweighing the $93.1 million in month-to-date net inflows captured by Fidelity's Wise Origin Bitcoin Fund (FBTC).

 

 

Cross-referencing cumulative figures on the SoSoValue ETF tracker reveals a pivotal psychological shift: following the -$643.3 million outflow on October 30, -$398.62 million on November 2, -$115.56 million on November 3, and -$430.20 million on November 5, total 2026 year-to-date net flows across all U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs flipped negative to between -$416 million and -$502 million, pulling total fund net assets down from $113.29 billion to $96.65 billion. As explained in our spot ETF flow tracker, when spot ETFs experience multi-hundred-million-dollar daily redemptions, authorized participants unwind baskets by selling physical Bitcoin on spot exchanges during U.S. trading hours.

 

For Ethereum, the ETF overhang is compounded by an underwater cost basis. According to the Ether ETF cost-basis study, U.S. spot Ether ETFs hold roughly 5.86 million ETH (4.8% of total circulating supply, valued at $13.32 billion across $12.06 billion in cumulative historical inflows), but the weighted average purchase price of those ETF shares sits near $3,200 per ETH. With ETH trading at $2,104.42 on November 9, the average institutional ETF holder sits on an unrealized loss of roughly 34%. Yet on-chain staking telemetry tells a markedly different story from Wall Street ETF redemptions: 986,847 ETH are currently queued to enter Ethereum's staking validators against just 4,320 ETH waiting in the exit queue—a 228-to-1 entry-to-exit ratio proving that native on-chain whales continue locking up ETH for long-term yield despite depressed spot prices.

 

 

With Bitcoin trading at $74,133.11 on Monday, November 9, the market has reached a decisive technical and on-chain inflection point: for the first time since late summer, spot BTC has slipped beneath the dual cost-basis floor of active on-chain buyers and its largest corporate holder.

 

As detailed in our MVRV and Realized Price guide, the Short-Term Holder (STH) Realized Price—measuring the average acquisition cost of coins moved on-chain within the past 155 days—sits at $75,820. Directly beneath that line sits the $75,451 average acquisition price of Strategy across its 849,327 BTC corporate treasury (following its purchase of 811 BTC between October 26 and November 1). Throughout late October and the first week of November, buyers repeatedly defended the $75,451 to $75,820 zone; Sunday night's drop to $73,477 pushed spot price roughly 1.7% to 2.2% below that institutional shelf.

 

 

Over the coming two weeks, Bitcoin's trajectory hinges on how daily candles behave around the $75,451 to $75,820 zone:

 

In the Bullish Reclaim Scenario (False Breakdown), Sunday night's 15-minute wick to $73,477 acts as a classic liquidity sweep that cleared out $1.0 billion in late-week leverage during thin weekend hours. If institutional spot buyers step in during U.S. hours to push BTC back above $75,451 and secure consecutive daily closes above $75,820, the breakdown is invalidated, setting up a squeeze back toward the November 4 high at $78,600 and the Q3 closing benchmark at $83,570.

 

In the Bearish Continuation Scenario, if underwater ETF holders and short-term traders use rebounds into $75,451–$75,820 as an exit ramp—turning former support into overhead resistance—a daily close below Sunday's low of $73,477 will bring the $70,000 psychological level into play. On decentralized prediction venue Polymarket, traders are currently pricing a 46.5% probability that Bitcoin touches $70,000 before November 30, 2026. Beneath $70,000, the major structural safety net sits at the $65,000 cycle support zone and the network-wide average miner production cost floor between $53,136 and $58,544.

 

 

Ethereum has borne a disproportionate share of the early-November deleveraging wave, sliding from above $2,400 on November 4 to an intraday low of $2,091 on November 8 and trading at $2,104.42 on November 9. Losing both the 30-day closing floor at $2,242 and the crucial technical shelf at $2,157–$2,179 drove the ETH/BTC ratio down to 0.02837 (requiring 35.24 ETH to buy 1 BTC, up from 33.21 ETH on November 5).

 

Two factors explain why Ethereum underperformed Bitcoin during this drawdown: first, in macro risk-off sessions triggered by Nasdaq selloffs and rising Treasury yields, institutional desks treat ETH as a higher-beta technology proxy; second, the migration of transaction execution to Layer 2 rollups has kept mainnet EIP-1559 fee burning muted during quiet hours, leaving short-term price discovery heavily exposed to perpetual futures liquidations ($448 million flushed on Sunday night alone).

 

Going forward, Ethereum's technical roadmap centers on the $2,000 to $2,157 corridor:

 

On the downside, because ETH has closed below $2,157, the $2,000 to $2,091 zone is the immediate line in the sand. A high-volume daily close beneath $2,000 would trigger secondary stop-loss selling toward the $1,850 to $1,953 macro support band.

 

On the upside, the combination of $448 million in flushed long leverage and nearly 1 million ETH (986,847 ETH) waiting in the validator entry queue provides a clean foundation for a relief bounce—provided spot ETF outflows continue moderating from their October peak. Reclaiming $2,157 on a 4-hour and daily close is the first signal that sellers are exhausted, while a close back above $2,242 to $2,300 is required to restore a bullish medium-term structure toward Citigroup's 12-month target of $3,028.

 

For investors navigating this post-liquidation environment, avoiding market-order slippage and commission drag is critical when scaling into support zones. On MEXC, traders can place 0.00% maker fee limit orders across the $2,000 to $2,157 demand band on the ETH spot trading pair or adjust spot Bitcoin positions around the $73,500 to $75,820 cost-basis pivot with zero maker commissions, capturing volatility without surrendering basis points to exchange fees.

 

 

What actually warrants watching after a week that wiped out $2.08 billion in leveraged derivatives positions and flipped 2026 year-to-date Bitcoin ETF flows negative is the divergence between macro liquidity sellers and on-chain structural holders.

 

The headline narrative attributes the drop below $74,000 BTC and $2,100 ETH to isolated shocks—Thursday's post-election tech rout, Friday's 165,000 U.S. nonfarm payrolls beat, and Sunday night's Nvidia governance news. In reality, those three catalysts exposed a fragile leverage buildup that had formed between $76,000 and $78,600. When the 165,000 jobs print forced fixed-income markets to price out near-term Federal Reserve rate cuts, multi-asset institutional desks reduced risk across the board: they sold high-multiple semiconductor stocks on Thursday and Friday, and they redeemed $1.3 billion from U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs over five trading sessions. Once spot ETF bids stepped back, thin Sunday night order books had no buffer to absorb panic selling, allowing a $2,213 move in Bitcoin to liquidate over $1.0 billion in over-leveraged longs in 15 minutes.

 

Yet two underlying metrics show why treating this flush as the start of a multi-quarter crypto winter is premature. First, in Ethereum, even as spot price tested $2,091 and $448 million in futures longs were liquidated, the on-chain validator entry queue swelled to 986,847 ETH against just 4,320 ETH in the exit queue—proving that unleveraged on-chain capital is actively accumulating and locking up supply at these prices. Second, in Bitcoin, the $75,451 to $75,820 band (Strategy's 849,327 BTC cost basis and the Short-Term Holder Realized Price) sits less than 2.3% above current spot prices.

 

Over the next week, three concrete signals will separate a V-shaped bear trap from a deeper leg down toward $70,000 BTC and $1,950 ETH: first, whether Bitcoin can close a daily candle back above $75,820 before Friday; second, whether daily net outflows from BlackRock's IBIT moderate below $50 million as U.S. equity markets digest the Nvidia news; and third, whether Ethereum defends the $2,000 psychological floor during U.S. cash hours. Until those three confirmations align, keeping leverage low and staging passive limit bids at verified support levels remains the disciplined path forward.

 

 

 

The early-November 2026 crypto selloff was driven by four converging catalysts: a 5.52% plunge in the Nasdaq Composite on November 5 over state AI data-center moratorium fears; a hotter-than-expected U.S. October Nonfarm Payrolls report on November 6 (+165,000 jobs versus 65,000 forecast, with unemployment dipping to 4.1%) that dampened Federal Reserve rate-cut hopes; $1.3 billion in U.S. spot Bitcoin ETF net outflows across the first five trading days of November; and a 15-minute Sunday night flash crash on November 8 sparked by Nvidia's board inquiry and stalled U.S.–Iran talks, which together triggered $2.08 billion in two-wave derivatives liquidations.

 

 

Per data from Farside Investors, TFTC, and SoSoValue through November 7, U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs recorded $1.3 billion in month-to-date net outflows across the first five trading days of November (led by a -$430.2 million single-day outflow on November 5 and -$1.2 billion in early-November outflows from BlackRock's IBIT). That $1.51 billion five-session outflow streak pushed full-year 2026 year-to-date Bitcoin ETF net flows negative to -$416 million to -$502 million. Meanwhile, U.S. spot Ethereum ETFs logged seven consecutive outflow days through November 3 after shedding $1.61 billion in October, leaving ETF buyers underwater relative to their ~$3,200 average cost basis.

 

 

During the 15-minute flash crash late on Sunday, November 8—when Bitcoin dropped from $75,690 to $73,477 and Ethereum fell from $2,237 to $2,091—CoinGlass recorded over $1.0 billion in total liquidations, led by $448 million in Ethereum positions compared with $272 million in Bitcoin positions. Ethereum suffered 64.7% more forced liquidations because its sharper percentage drop (up to 6.4% versus Bitcoin's 2.4%) swept through densely clustered long stop-loss levels below the $2,242 and $2,157 support shelves.

 

 

Trading at $74,133.11 on November 9, Bitcoin sits just beneath two major institutional benchmarks: Strategy's average cost basis of $75,451 (across 849,327 BTC) and the on-chain Short-Term Holder Realized Price of $75,820. Reclaiming $75,451 to $75,820 on a daily close is the primary bullish trigger needed to reopen a recovery toward $78,600 and $83,570. If BTC fails to reclaim $75,450 and breaks below Sunday's low of $73,477, downside support sits at $70,000 to $71,500 (with Polymarket pricing a 46.5% chance of BTC touching $70,000 in November) followed by the $65,000 cycle support zone.

 

 

After losing its $2,157 late-October support floor and trading near $2,104.42 on November 9, Ethereum faces an immediate test of the $2,000 to $2,091 support zone. A daily close below $2,000 would expose the $1,850 to $1,953 macro support band. However, on-chain data shows 986,847 ETH queued to enter staking validators against only 4,320 ETH queued to exit; if spot buyers defend $2,000 and push ETH back above $2,157 and $2,242, a short-covering rebound toward $2,300 to $2,400 becomes viable.

 

 

The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported on November 6 that nonfarm payrolls expanded by 165,000 in October—more than double the 65,000 consensus forecast and well above the 48,000 trailing 12-month average—while unemployment fell to 4.1%. Because two Federal Reserve governors had already dissented in favor of a 25 bps rate hike at the October 28 FOMC meeting, the strong labor print reinforced expectations of tighter-for-longer monetary policy ahead of the December 8 to 9 FOMC decision, strengthening the U.S. dollar and pressuring risk assets including BTC and ETH.

 

 

This article is for general information only and does not constitute investment advice, financial advice, legal advice, tax advice or any trading recommendation. Prices of crypto assets, equities and other related financial assets can move sharply, and the historical data, company disclosures and third-party expectations cited here cannot guarantee future results, while the consensus estimates and third-party projections referenced do not represent actual outcomes and will change with subsequent disclosures and revisions. Readers should conduct their own research and reach independent judgments based on their own financial circumstances, investment objectives and risk tolerance, consulting a qualified professional where appropriate. The MEXC Crypto Pulse team accepts no liability for any direct or indirect losses arising from use of the information in this article.

 

 

MEXC Editorial Team provides the latest platform updates, product launches, trading feature guides, and industry insights. With a focus on developments in the global crypto market, it delivers transparent information, professional data, and forward-looking analysis. Both beginners and experienced traders can find firsthand updates, in-depth observations, and official announcements related to the MEXC ecosystem.

 

 

 

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