Bitcoin Price Never Recovered From the $19B Crash That Hit a Year Ago

Key Takeaways

• Over $19B in positions held by 1.6M traders were liquidated on Oct. 10-11, 2025, per Coinglass data.
• Bitcoin is trading near $82,700 today, roughly 34% under its $126,080 high from Oct. 6, 2025.
• About $3.3B in BTC shorts sit exposed up to $85,000, the next test for bulls after the Oct. 8 low.

The Night That Broke the Market

On Oct. 10, 2025, President Trump announced a 100% tariff on Chinese imports and what followed was the largest liquidation event crypto has ever recorded, with over $19 billion in leveraged positions forcibly closed and more than 1.6 million trading accounts liquidated.

To elaborate, roughly 70% of the damage, about $6.93 billion, hit in a 40-minute window, and $3.21 billion was liquidated in a single minute at 21:15 UTC. Subsequently, bitcoin fell from $122,574 to $104,782 and the ethena stablecoin (USDe) briefly traded at $0.65, with Binance later paying out over $283 million to affected users.

• $16.7 billion of the losses were longs, and that total perpetual futures open interest collapsed 43% in a day, from $217 billion to $123 billion.
• Some market makers believe the true total was closer to $30 billion to $40 billion, since not every venue reports in full.