Reading most crypto news headlines is depressing today. BTC USD briefly tagged a 15-month low under $73,000 before snapping back above $76,000, while ETH USD continued its rough week, sliding 25% and maybe closing to $2,000. This sets the depression in crypto news today as BTC USD moves like memes with thin liquidity.
Looking at the cleanest perspective, BTC and ETH are tracking weakness from Nasdaq as the total crypto market shed close to 15% the last 7 days. But is it all doom?
I didn’t want to lose 7% a year to inflation.
So I chose crypto and now lose 7% every week.
At least it’s faster. pic.twitter.com/7aN7b3PtuY
— Rekt Fencer (@rektfencer) December 12, 2025
President Trump has signed legislation to formally end the partial government shutdown, and this removed one layer of uncertainty, at least on paper, for now. We know crypto has been absorbing macro pressures. Remember, after Trump’s inauguration, Bitcoin initially climbed 15%, only to see risk assets tumble when tariffs triggered a sharp S&P 500 correction in early 2025. It’ macro, not Bitcoin itself.
However, Wall Street participation has changed the texture of this cycle too, making BTC USD less fragile than past drawdowns.
Forget Depressing Crypto News, Because BTC USD Shows Relative Strength Today
Despite the chaos filling crypto news feeds, BTC USD has quietly shown relative resilience today. Funding rates across major exchanges stayed positive, hinting at a mild bullish bias even during the dip. Bitcoin dominance slid toward 60%, a level that usually comes before altcoin rotations, but this cycle, capital largely boomeranged back.
People are bracing for more turbulence. Pentoshi floated a scenario where BTC USD revisits the $70,000–$74,000 range before rebounding into the mid $80,000s. So it’s not that bad if this scenario plays out. Just 4 years ago, Bitcoin fell by 80% on a bear market, and it’s more steady this time around.
Well. It’s not March yet. But think this 70-75k area is attractive for $btc
Got some first small bids hit
Might become active in this market again for the first time in awhile
—
Pentoshi mostly afk until march (@Pentosh1) February 2, 2026
Warnings are stacking up, though. Michael Burry said that a deeper BTC USD drop could cascade into forced selling across gold and silver, wiping out $1 billion in value. Supporting that concern, tokenized silver futures recently saw liquidations that dwarfed BTC and ETH vas USD.
michael burry sounds the alarm on bitcoin crash.
the actual “Big Short” guy. called 2008.
BTC broke support and “sickening scenarios” now in sight. 10% more downside puts companies like MicroStrategy in billions of losses, capital markets freeze up.
gold and silver hit ATH… pic.twitter.com/a0Wa73ZMUq
— Ryzm (@Goeun_6121) February 3, 2026
DISCOVER: 10+ Next Crypto to 100X In 2026
ETH USD Outlook. Bullish?
While BTC USD flexes relative strength, ETH crypto, today, tells a more uncomfortable story in most news headlines. Funding rates have turned mixed, with some exchanges flashing negative since the October 2025 crash. Ethereum continues to bleed against Bitcoin, touching ratios similar to those in 2016. Vitalik Buterin has weighed in, urging a rethink of ETH layer-2 strategy, framing it less as a hierarchy and more as a menu of user choices, especially as the mainnet keeps scaling and fees get lowered on every upgrade.
(source – Coinglass)
Tom Lee described BitMine’s reported $6 billion Ethereum loss as part of a long-term attempt to outperform ETH USD across cycles. Meanwhile, Trend Research, which held $1 billion worth of ETH via AAVE, is staring at losses north of $560 million. Recent deposits of nearly $368 million in ETH to Binance, with liquidation levels at around $1,800.
These tweets miss the point of an ethereum treasury:
– BitMine is designed to track the price of $ETH
– outperform over the cycle (think up ETH)
– crypto is in a downturn, so naturally ETH is down$BMNR will see “unrealized” losses on our holdings of ETH during these times:
-… https://t.co/VpoNjAnJdC— Thomas (Tom) Lee (not drummer) FSInsight.com (@fundstrat) February 3, 2026
Technically, ETH USD is clinging to the $2,200 zone, a Fibonacci 1.618 level, and an area known for thin historical liquidity. A reverse head-and-shoulders pattern is also forming and waiting for confirmation. But some of us counter that liquidation heatmaps show danger lurking below support, standing on a thin, cracking ice.
What’s next? For now, pray and hope for the best, but expect the worst. Winter might not be over, yet.
DISCOVER:
- 16+ New and Upcoming Binance Listings in 2026
- 99Bitcoins’ Q4 2025 State of Crypto Market Report
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What is XAUT? The Tokenized Gold Rush Hitting $5,000 an Ounce
What is XAUT? Tether Gold (XAUT) gives crypto users a way to buy real gold without touching a vault key. Each XAUT token represents ownership of one fine troy ounce of physical gold on the London Good Delivery bar, but it trades with the speed and ease of a stablecoin.
Gold demand climbed through 2025, and tokenized gold followed. On-chain data shows XAUT supply backed by roughly 246,000 ounces of gold, stored in Swiss vaults, as interest in real-world assets moved on-chain.
With gold spot prices shattering the $5,000 ceiling and silver rallying over 140% in the last year, the “boring” metal markets are suddenly witnessing crypto-like volatility.
Read our full coverage here.
Ethereum Dust Attacks Spike After Fusaka Upgrade, Data Shows
If Ethereum is to be a world computer, consistent with its original vision, then it must be cheap to transact on. Remember the CryptoKitties boom of early 2018? Well, that was the first major stress test, and Ethereum failed.
Over the years, developers have been hard at work optimizing the network and balancing performance with gas fees. They have been largely successful. Ethereum is performant, and gas fees on the mainnet are attractively low. All this is thanks to the explosion of layer-2 alternatives like Base and Arbitrum, rerouting transactions from the mainnet.
But here’s the problem: cheap gas fees are now incentivizing “dust” attacks. New data shows tiny “dust” stablecoin transfers on Ethereum tripled after the Fusaka upgrade, even as the Ethereum price stayed muted.
Read the full story here.
Elon Musk Hints Dogecoin Could Fly to the Moon in 2027
Elon Musk just put Dogecoin back on the map after reigniting the long-delayed DOGE-1 space mission, saying SpaceX may put a “literal Dogecoin on the literal moon” as soon as next year, sparking a lot of chatter around the leading meme coin.
Worryingly for the DOGE community, the meme coin barely moved on Elon’s X post, spiking just +1.5% to above $0.10 in the hour after his comment as traders reacted quickly. That momentum has already seemingly been lost as Dogecoin is down -0.3% in the past 24 hours but still holding just above the key $0.10 level.
While this fits a familiar pattern in which Elon Musk’s space and AI ambitions keep pulling meme coins like Dogecoin back into the spotlight, long gone are the days when a mere mention of DOGE on the SpaceX founder’s social media would cause a double-digit percentage price surge.
Read our full coverage here.
Will Bitcoin Accumulation Phase Depend on US Credit Markets?
At current market conditions, crypto and Bitcoin traders are high on “hopium.” The thing is, there is nothing they can do. The Bitcoin price appears to be heading in one direction only: southward. Before last week, when real cracks began to emerge, there was confidence that the BTC USD price would hold above $80,000 and track higher.
However, looking at prevailing market conditions, it is evident that bears are unyielding. If the 2021 highs are lost, fear could set in and drag the entire market with it. Already, even top meme coins are bleeding value first, while some of the best cryptos to buy print red, extending losses from Q4 2025 lows.
There are multiple triggers that may explain the sell-off of February 3, which saw the BTC USD price drop below $73,000, forcing prices below November lows. Fears of a “hawkish” year are one factor, but at the moment, eyes are on the fragile US credit markets, specifically, the ICE BofA US Corporate Option-Adjusted Spread, which tracks that fear.
Read more about it here.
Vitalik Says Ethereum’s L2 Plan Is Broken as ETH USD Slips -2%
Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin said the network needs “a new path,” openly walking back Ethereum’s long-standing reliance on Layer-2 networks for scaling. Vitalik’s comments came as ETH USD slid a further -2% overnight to $2,270, with the total crypto market cap slipping back below $2.7 trillion.
This comes at a time when most Ethereum activity lives off the main chain, raising a simple question: Did scaling drift too far? Ethereum has spent years pushing transactions onto L2s to cut fees and congestion.
That strategy worked on cost, but it also created trade-offs around control and trust. Now, the project’s original architect says those trade-offs are too big to ignore. Another talking point for Ethereum is yesterday’s (February 3) ETF flows, which saw BlackRock buy $42.9M ETH, marking a green day for the products.
Talking of L2s, while Ethereum is saturated with them, there still isn’t one for Bitcoin, until now. Bitcoin Hyper (HYPER) is one of the hottest crypto presales in recent memory, having raised over $31M to date. Stick around until the end to find out why HYPER is a must-buy for 2026.
Read the full story here.
The post Crypto News Today, February 4: Down Again, Thanks Crypto! BTC USD Fell to $72K Before The Snapping Back, ETH 25% Down in A Week appeared first on 99Bitcoins.
