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BTC Loses $93K After Rocky Weekend

Olivia Capozzalo & Denis Omelchenko
November 17, 2025

Happy Monday, Defiers

Today’s big story:

  • Crypto markets struggled over the weekend and into today on macro uncertainty, as traders await delayed U.S. economic reports this week

In other news:

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📈 Markets in the Past 24 Hours

TICKERVALUE24H
BitcoinBitcoin$93,343
-0.76 %
EthereumEthereum$3,098.18
1.37 %
XRPXRP$2.18
0.51 %
BNBBNB$914.82
0.18 %
SolanaSolana$133.53
-1.77 %

Today’s Big Story

Bitcoin Drops Below $93K as AI Fears and Fed Uncertainty Shake Markets

This weekend, Bitcoin suddenly tanked, sliding from near $100,000 all the way down to $92,856 on BitMEX, blindsiding even seasoned traders. And the drop doesn’t seem to have come from a single headline. Instead, it was a domino effect, as AI backing started shaking, policy fears surged, and risk flow bled into crypto.

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BTC 24-hour price chart. Source: CoinGecko

It all started when the AI trade wobbled on Friday. Nvidia saw fresh selling as investors questioned whether the AI story had already been fully priced in. That unease turned serious when regulatory filings revealed that American billionaire Peter Thiel had liquidated his entire Nvidia stake.

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As Bloomberg reported earlier today, in its filing for the quarter ending Sept. 30, Thiel’s hedge fund Thiel Macro LLC revealed it sold all 537,742 Nvidia shares, which reportedly made up about 40% of the fund’s total equity. Last week, SoftBank, one of the biggest AI backers around, also sold its entire Nvidia position, selling about $5.8 billion worth of Nvidia shares.

At the same time, Washington started shaking things up as Fed officials made it clear that a December rate cut was no longer a sure thing. Some officials, including Boston Fed President Susan Collins and Kansas City Fed President Jeffrey Schmid, stressed that any decision will depend on incoming economic data, which has been delayed due to the recent government shutdown.

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Prior to those comments, over 70% of Polymarket bettors had expected a 25 bps cut in December. However, now only about 45% do, with most betting that rates will stay the same after next month’s meeting.

Traders are looking ahead to two key U.S. employment reports from September that are due to come out later this week, delayed from last month.

Denis, staff reporter at The Defiant

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Top News in the Past 24 Hours

  • BlackRock’s BUIDL Fund Expands to BNB Chain BlackRock’s tokenized U.S. Treasury fund BUIDL is launching on BNB Chain, and can now be used as collateral for trading on Binance. Why it matters: The move illustrates how tokenized RWAs keep growing in popularity as investors can not only move their money faster but can keep it in a safer, digital form that earns interest.
  • Infura Expands Decentralized Infra Network to EigenLayer Following AWS Outage Infura, a blockchain infrastructure firm owned by Consensys, is expanding its API data marketplace, the Decentralized Infrastructure Network (DIN), to run on EigenLayer. Why it matters: The service is now backed by stakers who can earn rewards if it performs well, or lose part of their stake if it fails, encouraging operators to stay online.
  • Alibaba Reveals Plans for Tokenized Fiat Payments with JPMorgan Alibaba’s B2B e-commerce platform is planning to launch a tokenized USD and EUR payments next month that will use its banking partner JPMorgan’s technology. Why it matters: The firm’s president made a point of emphasizing that tokenized fiat isn’t technically a stablecoin, likely to comply with crypto regulations in China.

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