Trading Moment: Global Asset Market Turmoil Causes BTC Confidence to Collapse, $81,000 Becomes the Last Line of Defense Against a Plunge

Daily market data review and trend analysis, produced by PANews.

1. Market Observation

Amidst a complex interplay of macroeconomic and geopolitical factors, global markets are experiencing significant volatility. Driven by strong buying from Chinese investors, copper prices saw their biggest single-day gain in 16 years, surging as much as 11% to break through the all-time high of $ 14,500 per ton before closing at $13,618. Former trader Mark Thompson exclaimed that this was a "once-in-a-lifetime move," predicting that a single supply disruption was all that was needed to push prices close to $20,000. Gold and silver also experienced rollercoaster rides. Spot gold, after reaching a record high of $5,596.7, saw a nearly $500 swing, plummeting almost 9% within 30 minutes, nearly breaking below $5,100 , before recovering. Spot silver also fell to a low of $106 after hitting a high of $121.

Furthermore, the Asian market's pursuit of physical assets is extremely fervent. Data from the World Gold Council shows that global gold demand will exceed 5,000 tons in 2025, with investment demand (2,175 tons) surpassing jewelry demand (1,542 tons) for the first time to become the dominant force. Asian investors net injected $7.1 billion into gold ETFs in January, raising concerns among some market participants about a "peak frenzy." Although institutions like UBS are bullish on gold prices reaching $6,200 in 2026, Goldman Sachs ' Trina Chen warned that metal prices have outpaced actual demand, and the market may face a "technical correction," indicating continued high volatility. Precious metals analyst Bill Holter also issued a stern warning, pointing out that COMEX silver delivery applications surged to 40 million ounces in January. If March delivery demand depletes inventory, physical defaults could occur as early as March 2026 , triggering a chain reaction in the financial system.

On the policy and political front, Trump declared a national emergency and threatened to impose tariffs on Cuban oil suppliers and Canadian aircraft . He also revealed that he had personally requested Putin to agree to a one-week ceasefire in Ukraine during the cold snap. Regarding the selection of the Federal Reserve Chairman , Kevin Warsh's chances of becoming the Fed Chairman have risen to 95% on Polymarket, thanks to his father-in-law Ronald Lauder's (Estée Lauder family) close relationship with Trump. BlackRock executive Rick Rieder has been ruled out. Trump is expected to announce the final selection tomorrow morning and reiterated his desire for the new leadership to significantly lower interest rates.

In the stock market, Microsoft's stock price plummeted nearly 10%, wiping out $430 billion in market value, marking its biggest single-day drop since 2020 and dragging down the entire software sector, amid concerns about the return on its AI investments. Conversely, Meta surged over 10% due to its robust earnings outlook.

The Bitcoin market also suffered a severe blow, with prices falling to a nine-month low near $81,000, a 35% pullback from its all-time high of $126,000. This triggered massive liquidations of $1.66 billion across nearly 270,000 traders, including the notorious "1011 Insider Whale," who lost a staggering $138 million in just two weeks, wiping out all his profits. Despite the extremely pessimistic market sentiment, renowned trader Eugene has re-entered the market, believing it to be nearing the end of its weakness, with long positions already shaken out and the current risk-reward ratio extremely favorable. He has set his stop-loss order below $80,000. However, technical analysts are generally cautious. Murphy pointed out that BTC broke through the $83,000-$92,000 high-volume trading zone, resulting in 3.88 million BTC being trapped, with significant resistance above. If it falls below $82,000 again, the next support level is at $73,000-$78,000. Joao Wedson and Ardi both warned that if $81,000 cannot be held, a capitulation-style crash similar to that of 2022 could occur, targeting $65,500 or even lower. Ali Charts gave key support levels at $75,804 and $56,196, with resistance at $98,643. Greeny pointed out that the 200-day moving average support is around $68.4k, while Castillo Trading believes that shorting at this time is chasing the decline and is extremely risky. Open4profit concluded that this crash was a coordinated deleveraging of the metals, stock, and crypto markets, not a single event. Milk Road data further shows that compared to the rapid recovery of gold and US stocks, BTC only rebounded by $22 billion, indicating that buying power is still weak and market confidence urgently needs to be restored.

Ethereum also suffered, with its price falling below the $2,700 mark. Trend Research, owned by Yilihua, has allocated $109 million to mitigate lending risks. Cointelegraph traders stated that the technical pattern confirms a triangle pattern breakout, and if it fails to recover key moving averages, the downside target could be as high as $2,250. In contrast to the price volatility, the Ethereum technology ecosystem saw significant progress. On January 29th, Davide Crapis, Head of AI at the Ethereum Foundation, announced the launch of the ERC-8004 standard on the mainnet. This standard provides decentralized trust infrastructure for AI agents, breaking the centralized API monopoly through on-chain identity, reputation, and verification mechanisms. Combined with technical components such as the x402 payment protocol, the Oasis ROFL framework, and ERC-6551 token-bound accounts, ERC-8004 will drive the construction of an "Agent protocol stack," enabling AI agents to engage in autonomous economic activities. (Related reading: When Agents Have "On-Chain Business Cards," How Does ERC-8004 Become a Decentralized "AI Yellow Pages"? )

Amidst the volatility in mainstream assets, market focus has shifted to rumors of consolidating Elon Musk's business empire. According to sources and Reuters, SpaceX is considering a merger with either Tesla or xAI. Musk has reportedly established a mergers and acquisitions entity in Nevada. A merger between SpaceX and xAI would value the company at $1.5 trillion, creating a "space + AI" system. This news spurred a 4.5% surge in Tesla's stock price in after-hours trading. Furthermore, billionaire Chamath Palihapitiya's prediction this morning regarding a SpaceX-Tesla merger, along with his tweet "Just let me buy $ELON," ignited enthusiasm in the meme market. The meme coin ELON quickly appeared on the blockchain, its market capitalization briefly surging to $17 million before settling around $9 million. It's worth noting that Chamath predicted in early January that SpaceX might be reverse-merged into Tesla, believing Musk would use this opportunity to consolidate his two most important assets into a single shareholding structure to solidify his control. (Related reading: The 2026 investment script of 4 billionaire tech billionaires: go long on copper mines, be bearish on oil, and new crypto assets will replace gold and BTC )

2. Key Data (as of 13:00 HKT on January 30)

(Data source: CoinAnk, Upbit, SoSoValue, CoinMarketCap)

• Bitcoin: $8,210 (down 6.2% year-to-date), daily spot trading volume $86.77 billion.

• Ethereum: $2,709 (-8.9% year-to-date), daily spot trading volume $45.06 billion.

• Fear of Greed Index: 16 (Extreme Panic)

• Average GAS: BTC: 1.75 sat/vB, ETH: 0.02 Gwei

• Market share: BTC 59.2%, ETH 11.8%

• Upbit 24-hour trading volume rankings: BTC, XRP, ETH, SENT, AXS

• 24-hour BTC long/short ratio: 47.45%/52.55%

• Sector Performance: The crypto market generally saw a pullback, with only AI, RWA, and CeFi sectors remaining relatively resilient.

24-hour liquidation data: A total of 266,416 people worldwide were liquidated, with a total liquidation amount of $1.683 billion. This included $780 million in BTC liquidations, $415 million in ETH liquidations, and $71.14 million in XRP liquidations.

3. ETF Flows (as of January 29)

• Bitcoin ETF: -$818 million, marking the third consecutive day of net outflows.

• Ethereum ETF: -$156 million

• XRP ETF: -$92.92 million

• SOL ETF: -$2.22 million

4. Today's Outlook

• Binance Alpha will list Infinex (INX)

• Binance Alpha will be available on Kindred Labs (KIN) on January 30th.

• Trump said he will announce the nominee for Federal Reserve Chair tonight Beijing time.

• The US government faces the risk of another shutdown at the end of the month (January 31).

• US Treasury Secretary Bessant: Milan can continue to serve as a Federal Reserve Governor after January 31.

The largest declines among the top 100 cryptocurrencies by market capitalization today were: Stable down 17.8%, Hyperliquid down 11.8%, Mantle down 11%, Worldcoin down 10.3%, and Uniswap down 10%.

5. Hot News

• Binance will convert $1 billion of stablecoin reserves held by the SAFU Fund into Bitcoin reserves.

• US media: Trump finalizes Warsh as the next Federal Reserve Chairman after meeting and phone call.

• US SEC Chairman: The time is ripe to allow cryptocurrencies into 401(k) retirement accounts.

• The AI ​​agent economic standard ERC-8004 has been launched on the Ethereum mainnet.

• The US government seized over $400 million in assets related to the dark web cryptocurrency mixing service Helix.

• MegaETH has outlined four key performance indicators (KPIs) that will determine the 53% MEGA token supply release plan.

• Trend Research withdrew 109 million USDT from Binance in the past 9 hours and deposited them into Aave to reduce liquidation risk.

• SpaceX is reportedly considering merging with Tesla or AI.

• The "1011 Insider Whale" lost approximately $53 million in two hours.

• Iran reportedly to conduct live-fire military exercises in the Strait of Hormuz

• Spot gold nearly fell below $5,100, while silver fell nearly 9% intraday.

• US cryptocurrency stocks collectively declined, with BMNR falling 8.4%.

• US stocks opened with Meta up 10%, while Microsoft fell more than 9%, marking its biggest intraday drop since 2020.

• London copper prices broke through $14,400 per tonne, surging more than 10%.

• On the Solana blockchain, Meme Coin (BP) briefly surpassed $14.9 million, a 608% increase in 24 hours.

• $9.5 billion worth of Bitcoin and Ethereum options are about to expire, with the maximum pain point for BTC at $90,000.