Markets Drop as Altcoin Liquidations Top $440 Million

Crypto markets declined for a second day, with total market capitalization falling by 3% amid hundreds of millions of dollars worth of leveraged liquidations.

Bitcoin dropped by 2%, while Ethereum fell 3%. Polkadot and Solana plummeted by 6%.

Altcoins are having a particularly rough day, with major tokens like FTM, ENA, SUI and UNI posting losses of between 13% and 17%. Meanwhile, Bitcoin dominance has spiked above 56% for the first time since March.

Liquidations top $440 million

According to CoinGlass, 161,137 traders were liquidated within the last 24 hours, amounting to a total of $443.93 million. ETH suffered $75 million in long liquidations, while Bitcoin was hit by $47 million.

Digital asset firm 10xResearch pointed out a correlation between the altcoin crash and a decrease in spot Bitcoin ETF flows over the last week.

“The market poorly digested the massive token unlocks from Aptos $97m, IMX $51m, STRK $75m, SEI $62m, ARB $90, APE $18m, and UNI $90m—a total of $483m. Early investors and VC investors appear under pressure to cash out. These flows are dragging down BTC,” the firm noted.

Data from Farside indicates that on June 17, Bitcoin spot ETFs recorded over $145 million in outflows.

Crypto analyst Michael Van de Poppe believes the crypto markets continue to fall, as we're approaching the final capitulation phase for altcoins.

“That's part of the cycle, and I've witnessed this before in 2020,” he said.

Meanwhile, U.S. stock markets remained almost unchanged on Tuesday morning as investors evaluated the economy following weak retail sales data. Retail sales rose by 0.1% in May, slightly below the 0.2% growth forecasted by economists polled by Dow Jones. On a yearly basis, sales increased by 2.3%.