Bitcoin news: BTC and gold fall together as a rate-hike bet hits every hedge

The relief rally that lifted crypto off last week's lows is unwinding alongside tech stocks and gold, with traders bracing for a US inflation print and a Warsh Fed that may stay hawkish.

Bitcoin's bounce off last week's lows is rolling over, and gold is going down with it.

BTC changed hands at $61,233 on Wednesday, down 3% over 24 hours and 6.9% on the week, while gold fell 2% to below $4,200 an ounce. The market is betting on higher interest rates punishes anything that doesn't pay one, and that is weighing on crypto and gold markets at once.

Ether fell 3.4% to $1,625 and solana dropped 4.1% to $64.24, according to CoinDesk data. XRP lost 4.3% to $1.12, while BNB and dogecoin each slid less than 3%. Hyperliquid's HYPE was the worst of the majors again, down 10.2% on the day and 21.3% on the week to $55.52, the highest-beta name in the group as risk came off.

South Korea's Kospi, the market most exposed to the artificial-intelligence trade through its chipmakers, tumbled 6.3%, leading a 2.5% drop in MSCI's broad Asia-Pacific equity gauge and its fourth loss in five days. Nasdaq 100 futures pointed 0.8% lower after a volatile Wall Street session. Brent crude traded near $92 a barrel as renewed US strikes on Iran kept a bid under oil, and the 10-year Treasury yield rose to 4.54%.

Gold and bitcoin rarely fall in lockstep, as both are stores of value that pay no yield, so both lose their appeal when traders bet on higher rates, and that is what Wednesday's US inflation report could force.

A hot reading would harden the case for new Federal Reserve Chair Kevin Warsh to keep rates higher for longer, draining liquidity from the assets that ran hardest on cheap money.

The bounce that ran into Monday was a short squeeze, not fresh buying, as over $500 million in bearish bets were liquidated in the highest such figures since April.

Some market watchers say spot demand never showed up behind it.

"Buyers have stepped in after the move lower, but spot demand has yet to return in a meaningful way," said Diana Pires, chief business officer at sFOX, pointing to a run of US spot bitcoin ETF outflows that has kept institutional money cautious. When new demand isn't broad enough to cover the selling, she said, rallies struggle to hold.

Watch whether bitcoin can hold a bid through the inflation print or keeps trading tick for tick with the Nasdaq. If gold steadies and bitcoin keeps falling, the case for it as a macro hedge thins further.