Election Encore: Bitcoin’s $80K Glow-Up Vanishes as $1B Liquidations Crash the Party

Bitcoin ($BTC) fell below $76,000 on Thursday, November 5, 2026, erasing its post-midterm rally above $80,000 as a technology-stock rout spread across risk assets. The token reached $75,463, its lowest level since Sept. 16, and was later near $75,570 on Friday after touching $74,780.91, the lowest intraday reading since August 21, 77 days earlier. Ethereum ($ETH) fell as much as 7.6% to $2,239, while Solana dropped 5.9%.

Wall Street led the retreat. The Nasdaq Composite fell 5.52% to 24,315, its worst session in 19 months, and entered correction territory, more than 10% below its October 6 record. The S&P 500 lost 4.36%, erasing roughly $3 trillion in market value, while the Dow shed 1,833 points. The iShares Semiconductor ETF fell more than 12%, its worst day since March 2020. Micron lost 17.5%, AMD 17.3%, Marvell 16.4%, and Nvidia 9.3%, while the Magnificent Seven shed roughly $1 trillion in value.

Concerns over AI infrastructure and spending intensified after Democrats won both chambers of Congress and gubernatorial races in Texas, Georgia, and Ohio. Texas governor-elect Gina Hinojosa pledged a moratorium on new construction and an end to subsidies for big developers; Georgia governor-elect Keisha Lance Bottoms promised a temporary statewide pause to study the effect on electricity bills; and Ohio governor-elect Amy Acton wants new projects blocked unless developers pay all their own utility costs. UBS estimates potential pauses could threaten 30% of planned U.S. data-center capacity additions in 2028. “We suspect there is going to be some scrutiny on this aggressive AI buildout,” Swissquote senior analyst Ipek Ozkardeskaya told Reuters. “Tech needs to adjust and focus on a slower pace of this AI rollout,” Dan Ives told Fortune.

Crypto followed stocks lower as leveraged positions were forcibly closed. CoinGlass reported $1.05 billion liquidated over the preceding 24 hours, including $930.04 million in longs and $124.69 million in shorts. Bitcoin accounted for $267.20 million, with 88.9% from long positions, while Ethereum recorded $167.14 million, 81.1% of it long. Earlier figures showed $1.08 billion liquidated in 24 hours across 209,826 traders, with longs responsible for $956 million and shorts for $130.78 million. Binance represented 44.3% of liquidations. One trader lost 201 $BTC, worth $15.6 million, through eight successive liquidations, while the largest single closure was a $10.94 million ETH long on Binance.

U.S. spot Bitcoin and Ether ETFs recorded approximately $530 million in combined net outflows on Thursday, reversing the previous session’s $128 million inflow. Fidelity’s FBTC lost approximately $200 million after attracting roughly $237 million on Wednesday, while BlackRock’s IBIT shed $105 million, extending its withdrawal streak to five sessions and to roughly $1.04 billion since October 30. Grayscale’s GBTC lost $49.9 million and Franklin Templeton’s EZBC shed $32.9 million; no fund in Farside’s table recorded positive net flows. The Crypto Fear & Greed Index stood at 28 out of 100 on Friday, compared with 50 a day earlier, 73 last month, and 34 during Wednesday’s decline. Bitcoin was trading below its 50-day EMA near $79,756 and 200-day EMA around $76,497, with the November 30 debt repayment window remaining in focus after wallets linked to Trump Media transferred 4,259 $BTC, worth roughly $342 million, to Crypto.com. No sale has been confirmed.