About $800 million of leveraged positions were wiped out in 24 hours, most of them bets on higher prices. Bitcoin hit its low at the Korean open and was up more than 3% from there while Seoul's stocks kept falling.
The forced selling that swept crypto exchanges overnight had an unusual entry near the top of the casualty list: a memory-chip maker.
About $803 million of leveraged crypto-exchange positions were liquidated in the 24 hours to early Tuesday, according to CoinGlass data covering 10 exchanges. Bets on rising prices accounted for $694 million of that, or about 86%, and about 172,000 traders were affected. Roughly $595 million of the total came in the final 12 hours.
Bitcoin positions accounted for $181 million, ether $178 million and solana $60 million. Perpetual futures tied to SanDisk shares saw about $19.1 million of liquidations, slightly more than the $19.0 million in hyperliquid's HYPE token and the $18.8 million in XRP. Contracts tracking a triple-leveraged semiconductor fund lost about $7.2 million.
Chips On Crypto Venues
Perpetual futures are contracts with no expiry date, and several exchanges now list them on individual U.S. stocks. That means traders can hold leveraged positions on SanDisk or Micron in the same margin account as their bitcoin.
On Monday, SanDisk shares fell about 6% to $1,487.33 and Micron about 3.9%, as memory stocks dropped after China's largest DRAM maker described progress on a new chip design. When Seoul opened Tuesday morning and chip stocks there fell sharply, those stock-linked contracts were exposed to the same price shock as Korean equities, with crypto-style leverage on top.
The single largest liquidation was a bitcoin long of about $9.65 million on Binance, near $81,700.
The Sequence
Bitcoin's slide began before Asia opened. It drifted from about $82,500 at 5 p.m. Eastern on Monday to the $81,700s by 7 p.m. The low, $80,960, printed in the hour starting at 8 p.m. Eastern, which is 9 a.m. in Seoul, when the Korean market opened.
Then bitcoin turned. Its low came in the hour Seoul opened, the same hour the Kospi's trading curb was triggered, and it closed the next hour near $82,200 while Korean stocks kept falling. By 4:45 a.m. Eastern on Tuesday, bitcoin was near $83,660, about 3.3% above its low. Ether recovered from $2,419 to about $2,525.
In the four hours after the main wave, about $74 million more was liquidated, and 79% of that came from bets on falling prices.
Market Implications
One reading is that this was a leverage reset and little more. Long positions built over the weekend ahead of Wednesday's inflation data were cleared at the first sign of stress in Asia, and the rebound was helped by short sellers being forced to buy.
A second reading is that bitcoin showed relative strength. It bottomed as Korea opened and rose while the Kospi fell more than 5%, and lower oil prices and a softer dollar overnight gave risk assets some support.
A third point stands apart from either reading. Equity perpetuals are now large enough to rank alongside top tokens in liquidation tables, which gives chip-stock volatility a direct path into crypto margin accounts.
What To Watch
Wednesday's U.S. consumer-price report is the next test of leveraged positioning. Daily flows into U.S. spot bitcoin funds will show whether the overnight rebound attracts new buyers or only reflects positions being closed.