Crypto liquidations reach $470M as Bitcoin retraces, altcoins surge

Bitcoin retreated after failing to break the $100,000 milestone on Nov. 24, causing one of the largest weekend crypto liquidation events in more than half a year. 

Over $470 million worth of crypto positions were liquidated over the last 24 hours. Long and short liquidations comprised $352.6 million and $119.9 million, respectively, with altcoins accounting for the vast majority of wiped positions, CoinGlass data shows.

Bitcoin BTCUSD and Ether ETHUSD accounted for a combined $108.9 million worth of liquidations, while Dogecoin DOGEUSD, XRP XRPUSD and Stellar XLMUSD rounded out the top five with $33.1 million, $27.6 million and $21.6 million liquidated.

Solana SOLUSD, The Sandbox SANDUSD, Polkadot DOTUSD and Cardano (ADA) saw the next largest liquidations.

It came as many of these altcoins from the 2020-2021 cycle unexpectedly outperformed across Nov. 23-24, increasing as much as 50% in XLM’s case.

The price rally also pushed DOGE to its highest point since May 2021 — the same month the memecoin skyrocketed to its all-time high, CoinGecko data shows.

Industry analyst Miles Deutscher said more traders from the last cycle are re-opening their crypto wallets for the first time in a while and re-investing in tokens they’re familiar with.

Others pointed to these utility tokens trading below fair value in a barbell market that has seen Bitcoin and memecoins outperform thus far.

Bitcoin is trading at $97,790, down 2% from its all-time high of $99,645 on Nov. 22, when it came within striking distance of breaking $100,000.

Bitcoin’s price has rallied nearly 44% since Nov. 5, when Republican Donald Trump won the United States presidential election.

Bitcoin dominance is now at 56.2% of the total crypto market cap, at $3.46 trillion, CoinGecko data shows.