Bitcoin Slips Below $77K as ETF Exodus Tops $1B, Miners Lock $90B AI Deals

Bitcoin News

Bitcoin miners have emerged as decisive suppliers in the global race to scale artificial intelligence infrastructure, with research analysts at Bernstein highlighting the industry's collective 27 gigawatts of planned power capacity across the United States. The Tuesday note followed reports that Google and Blackstone are forming a new AI cloud venture, with the private equity firm committing $5 billion and retaining majority control. Power, not chips, has become the binding constraint on hyperscale buildouts, and securing a single gigawatt of grid-connected capacity can take more than four years. Miners suddenly hold what Silicon Valley most needs: shovel-ready electricity at scale, deployable in months rather than years.

Public miners have already converted that leverage into more than $90 billion in announced AI contracts covering 3.7 gigawatts of allocated capacity, with roughly one-third of the deals struck directly with hyperscalers. IREN's recently signed agreement with Nvidia is valued at $3.4 billion, including a $2.1 billion equity commitment from the chipmaker tied to GPU deployment. Riot Platforms locked in an AI colocation arrangement with AMD, while Core Scientific and HUT 8 closed transactions with major cloud customers. The equity-linked structures align both sides on capacity expansion, transforming what were once cyclical hash-rate operators into long-duration infrastructure partners with diversified, dollar-denominated revenue streams.

Bitcoin itself slipped beneath $77,000 in early Tuesday trading, capping a four-day losing streak that has erased roughly $5,000 from last week's $82,000 high. The total crypto market capitalization has shed more than $100 billion since Friday, retreating to approximately $2.65 trillion. The pullback reflects a convergence of macro-driven risk reduction, accelerating institutional outflows, and on-chain readings that paint the prior rebound as capital-light. Spot prices opened Monday near $77,500 before sliding through the session, with sellers pressing successive lows as algorithmic flows piled onto deteriorating sentiment. The depth of the correction has reopened questions about the durability of this bull cycle.

U.S. spot Bitcoin ETF flows turned sharply negative, with $648.6 million leaving the products on Monday alone — the largest single-day net outflow since late January. BlackRock's IBIT bore the brunt with $448.3 million in redemptions, followed by Ark's ARKB at $109.6 million and Fidelity's FBTC at $63.4 million. Combined with last week's $1 billion in net outflows that ended a six-week positive streak, cumulative redemptions since May 16 now sit just under $1 billion. Derivatives markets amplified the move: 24-hour crypto liquidations reached $657 million, with $584 million — about 89% — coming from long positions caught leaning the wrong way.

On-chain readings reinforce the cautious framing. The Realised Cap 30-Day Net Position Change, which tracks the monthly fluctuation of capital actually entering the network, peaked at roughly $2.8 billion per month during the run to $82,000 — well shy of the readings historically associated with sustained expansion phases. Analysts note that the gap signals a recovery driven by price momentum rather than aggressive new commitment from larger cohorts. With sentiment shifting from acute fear into persistent uncertainty, the metric will need to expand materially before structural buyers can credibly be said to be back, and until then rallies remain vulnerable to swift retracements like the current leg.

Away from price action, Btrust completed a long-planned governance transition, seating Janet Maingi, Bruno Garcia, and Laurence Aderemi as its incoming Board of Directors. The non-profit, originally funded with a 500 BTC endowment from Jack Dorsey and Jay-Z worth roughly $24.5 million at announcement, focuses on decentralizing Bitcoin open-source development across Africa and India. The handover, finalized April 30, followed a multi-stage selection guided by the organization's Genesis Principles and structured collaboration with the outgoing board led by CEO Abubakar Nur Khalil. The fresh board brings expertise spanning Bitcoin infrastructure, energy systems, and open-source software, signalling continuity rather than a strategic pivot for the Global South-focused mission.

Bitcoin's tape now sits at $76,912, holding just above first support at $76,114 with deeper bids stacked at $73,925 and $72,673. RSI at 44.75 sits in neutral-to-soft territory, while MACD prints a bearish signal consistent with the sideways structure on the daily candlestick chart. A reclaim of $78,069 would relieve immediate pressure and open a path toward $79,352 and the heavier $82,762 resistance shelf. Loss of $76,114 on a daily close, however, would invalidate the consolidation thesis and likely accelerate into the mid-$73,000 zone. With 24-hour volume at $13.2 billion against a $1.54 trillion market cap, conviction remains light — buyers need a fresh trigger to flip the structure.