Taps

In brief

• Bitcoin hit $106,000 before slipping 3.8% to $102,450 in a matter of hours

• Ethereum tumbled 4.3% on Monday to $2,400, prompting $264.4 million worth of liquidations

• The Federal Reserve warned that Trump’s tariffs could cause inflation to rise, with Walmart also increasing its prices due to the trade war.

Leading cryptocurrency Bitcoin has had a volatile start to the week as it rose 2.5% from $103,850 to $106,500 before slumping 3.8% to $102,450 on Monday.

With Bitcoin’s major moves $178.46 million worth of positions have been liquidated over the past 24 hours, according to CoinGlass, with a fairly equal split between long and short positions.

This comes as a class action lawsuit was filed against MicroStrategy, the firm led by Michael Saylor that is bullishly acquiring Bitcoin, claiming that the firm is misleading investors—a matter of hours later the company announced the acquisition of $764.9 million worth of BTC.

Plus, an Australian judge ruled that Bitcoin is a form of money, according to the Australian Financial Review. That will potentially open the door to Bitcoin being exempt from capital gains tax.

Meanwhile, Ethereum has tumbled 4.3% on the day from $2,500 to $2,400 after what was considered a great month for the second largest cryptocurrency. As such $264.40 million worth of Ethereum positions have been liquidated, according to CoinGlass, with $205.28 million of these being longs.

This follows a month of green action for most of the crypto industry, as President Trump’s trade war appears to be coming to a close.

At the start of May, the U.S. and the UK agreed on a trade deal in what the UK Treasury minister called a “huge relief.” Then, last week, China reached an agreement with the States prompting a major roll back in tariffs between the countries.

However, inflation concerns have resurfaced following the Federal Reserve keeping its benchmark interest rate at 4.25% to 4.50%, with no sign of an immediate shift in policy—despite criticism from Trump. The Fed also warned that the risk of higher inflation and unemployment were rising due to Trump’s tariff war.

These concerns were compounded last week by Walmart announcing plans to raise prices this month, due to the impact that tariffs had on imports.

This may explain why Bitcoin has had such a surprisingly volatile week. It hit a weekly low of $101,750 on Tuesday followed by multiple peaks and troughs before hitting $106,500 high on Monday, and slumping back to $102,450 hours later.

Despite Bitcoin’s 1.4% drop on the day, according to CoinGecko, it remains just 5.8% from its all-time high of $108,786 hit in January of this year. Ethereum, by comparison, is still 50.9% from its all-time high of $4,878 achieved in 2021.

Edited by Stacy Elliott.

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