bitcoin and ethereum led the cryptocurrency liquidations as more than 54,000 traders saw their leveraged positions eliminated and the total market capitalization approached $2.1 trillion.
CoinGlass reported that over $145 million was liquidated from the crypto market in 24 hours across all exchanges. As most traders anticipated lower prices, $91 million of these trades were recorded as short positions.
However, the total cryptocurrency market capitalization rose 1.2% by CoinGecko and settled bearish bets. A $4 million bitcoin (btc) position in a USDT pair generated the largest liquidation order. The operation was carried out on Binance, the largest cryptocurrency exchange.
Traders also lost at least $70 million combined between btc and ethereum (eth) in long and short punts.
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bitcoin and ethereum rise
btc and eth, the top cryptocurrencies by market capitalization, have seen bullish price trends in the past week. The tokens have gained 3% and 11% in the last seven days amid bullish market sentiment.
bitcoin ETF approvals by the US SEC on January 10 appear to be a major driving force in bitcoin's rally as it is priced at $51,800 and has a market capitalization of over $1 trillion , making btc the 10th largest asset in the world. There is also anticipation surrounding the bitcoin halving, which is expected in April.
Some believe that the halving, which halves new block rewards, and btc purchases for spot bitcoin ETFs will cause a supply crisis while demand increases. Leader hypothesis suggests this will spark a parabolic run for the largest cryptocurrency asset.
ethereum's current push revolves around a technological upgrade called Dencun. The developers have said that the modifications will introduce greater data availability for Layer 2 rollups through a blob function. This will allow L2s to add more data to each block, thus reducing transaction costs and strengthening scalability.
Dencun is scheduled to ship to the ethereum mainnet in mid-March following successful testing on three testnets: Goerli, Sepolia, and Holesky.
