This is just a mild crypto winter

Market overview

The crypto market capitalisation rose by another 1.1% over 24 hours to $3.02 trillion, mirroring the dollar's weakening during this period. But this strengthening looks pale, as high-risk assets such as cryptocurrencies often move in much larger steps. For example, along with an 8% weakening of the dollar from April to June last year, Bitcoin rose by more than 50%. Without delving too deeply into history, it is easy to see that the 4% drop in the dollar index in less than two weeks was met with a 30% jump in silver and a 15% jump in gold. The US S&P 500 is also rewriting historical highs. Against this backdrop, even a slight increase in market capitalisation looks like a mild winter for cryptocurrencies, and a deeper decline is only a matter of time.

Bitcoin continues to attempt to consolidate above $89K. This resistance level, approaching a round number, is reinforced by the 50-day moving average. BTC's position relative to this curve indicates a bearish market. Due to a relatively favourable external environment, it has managed to successfully defend support near $85K. Still, fluctuations about a third below the highs of the last two months are cause for pessimism. Neither institutional demand nor the president's pro-cryptocurrency administration has helped to overcome the accumulated fatigue after the rally of the previous three years.

News background

In these times of uncertainty and stress in the markets, investors are selling the first cryptocurrency en masse to get cash, turning Bitcoin into an ‘ATM,’ according to NYDIG. This is damaging Bitcoin's reputation.

According to Santiment, against the backdrop of the gold rally, the capitalisation of stablecoins has fallen by $2.24 billion over the past 10 days. This indicates an outflow of capital from the cryptocurrency market into traditional safe-haven assets and may delay its recovery.

Strategy has reduced its Bitcoin purchases by almost eight times in a week. The company purchased 2,932 BTC ($264.1 million) between 19 and 25January at an average price of $90,061 per coin. Strategy now owns 712,647 BTC, purchased for $54.2 billion at an average price of $76,037 per Bitcoin.

Japanese company Metaplanet incurred an unrealised loss of $680 million in 2025 due to the depreciation of its Bitcoin reserve. According to BitcoinTreasuries, the ‘Asian Strategy’ owns 35,102 BTC worth $3.1 billion.

Bitmine, the largest corporate holder of Ethereum, reported that it has accumulated 4,243,338 ETH worth more than $12 billion. This represents 3.52% of the total ETH supply, with a target of 5%.

Tether has launched a separate stablecoin for the US market. USAT was created in accordance with last year's Genius Act, which sets rules for stablecoins and is the first significant piece of legislation for the crypto industry in the country.