Bitcoin Holds Near $63K as Options OI Tops $34B, Ethereum Foundation Cuts 20%

Bitcoin News

Bitcoin established a fresh line in the sand near $59,000 this week, a level traders are watching more closely than the round $60,000 mark after the asset bounced off it repeatedly. The support now faces an immediate stress test from Thursday’s U.S. core PCE inflation print, the Federal Reserve’s preferred gauge, which forecasts peg at 3.3% to 3.4% year-on-year — the hottest reading since October 2023. Headline PCE is seen rising 4.1%, the highest since April 2023. A hotter-than-expected number would harden expectations that rates stay elevated for longer, lifting an already strong dollar and pressuring risk assets including Bitcoin lower.

The cryptocurrency slid to $59,023 on Wednesday, its weakest level since October 10, 2024, extending a drawdown of roughly 52% from the October 2025 record near $126,080. The move marked the third sub-$60,000 print of the year and pushed the asset into an eighth consecutive month of decline. Spot Bitcoin ETFs have bled about $182 million so far this week, on track for a seventh straight week of net redemptions, with total fund assets sliding to $77.5 billion from roughly $113 billion at the end of 2025. Each redemption forces issuers to sell underlying coins, compounding a deepening bear market.

The selloff was amplified by a leverage flush that erased more than $600 million in bullish positions within hours on June 24. Long traders bore nearly all of the damage as forced selling cascaded across major venues. Bitcoin alone accounted for $336.47 million in liquidated longs, while Ether added $188.82 million and Solana $39.09 million. Binance led every exchange with $350.58 million in liquidations, ahead of Hyperliquid at $147.24 million and Bybit at $120.08 million. Uniform red across altcoins — XRP, Solana, BNB and Dogecoin all fell more than 3.7% — pointed to broad risk-off pressure rather than any single-token catalyst.

Pressure intensified on the largest corporate Bitcoin holder as its preferred-stock vehicle buckled. Strategy’s Variable Rate Series A Perpetual Stretch Preferred Stock, known as STRC, slipped to a record low of $79.85 on Wednesday despite offering an 11.5% annual dividend. Analysts at CryptoQuant urged the company to halt Bitcoin purchases entirely and rebuild cash, noting that dividend coverage has collapsed from more than seven years at the start of 2026 to roughly 14 months. The firm’s annualized preferred-dividend obligations have nearly quadrupled to $1.2 billion, while cash reserves fell 38% this year after a $1.5 billion convertible-note repurchase in May drained liquidity that investors viewed as a backstop.

Not every signal turned bearish. Standard Chartered’s Geoffrey Kendrick reiterated that the slide to $59,000 marks the cycle bottom and a definitive end to crypto winter, holding a year-end target of $100,000 — roughly 70% above current levels. He tied that conviction to renewed ETF inflows, fresh corporate treasury buying and easing oil prices. The first signal flickered on June 23, when spot Bitcoin ETFs logged $39.2 million in net inflows, their first positive day after a prolonged bleed. Corporate buyers also stepped in: Strive Asset Management added 759 BTC near $65,850 and Strategy purchased 520 BTC, institutional bids placed into a falling market well off its all-time high.

Adam Back’s bid to build one of the largest corporate Bitcoin treasuries hit a procedural snag. A Cantor Fitzgerald-affiliated special purpose acquisition company postponed its shareholder vote on merging with Bitcoin Standard Treasury Company, or BSTR, to July 2 from an earlier June 26 date, citing previously disclosed private placements. The listing would bring 30,021 BTC to Nasdaq, with founders contributing 25,000 coins. Back is raising up to $1.5 billion to buy more, a deployment that could lift BSTR toward 53,500 BTC and into second place among public holders behind only Strategy, which still commands 847,363 BTC despite its shares slipping below $100 this week.

COINOTAG’s proprietary 42-indicator composite S/R scoring engine (as of 06:57 UTC) rates immediate resistance at $62,842 a STRONG 76/100, driven by the confluence of the Ichimoku Tenkan line and the volume point of control, while support at $59,102 scores 74/100 on the previous-day low and Donchian lower band. With spot near $61,830, Bitcoin sits pinned between the two. Derivatives positioning stays cautious: funding turned slightly negative at -0.0013%, open interest holds $11.75 billion, and a long/short account ratio of 2.32 shows 69.9% of accounts still long — a crowded stance vulnerable to further flushes. A Fear & Greed reading of 12 signals extreme fear and RSI of 36.4 nears oversold; a daily close below $59,102 invalidates the bullish case and opens the $52,600 zone.