Bitcoin Wobbles Below $80,000 as Voters Head to the Polls and ETFs Bleed Cash

Bitcoin picked itself up off the floor — but it's still bruised. The top crypto slipped below $77,000 on October 30, then clawed back above $78,000 by Monday. Ethereum traced a similar bounce, climbing from $2,200 to about $2,287. The rebound, though, hasn't fixed what's broken underneath.

Institutional money is walking. US spot Bitcoin ETFs dumped $643.2 million on October 30 alone, erasing every inflow from the prior four trading sessions, and the week closed with roughly $202 million in net withdrawals. Bitcoin funds flipped from a $301.2 million inflow into a $202.4 million outflow. Ethereum vehicles bled even more steadily, with outflows widening from $220.7 million to $431.4 million across five straight losing days. The takeaway: buyers haven't been able to hold Bitcoin above $80,000.

There's a thin safety net below. Bitcoin's estimated on-chain average cost basis has risen to $74,800, leaving a slim gap between where prices sit now and what the typical holder paid. Meanwhile, Bitunix analysts spotted a $201 million leveraged Bitcoin short sitting on Hyperliquid as of October 29 — a hefty wager that things get worse before they get better.

The November 3 vote will decide control of Congress, and with it, the odds for the CLARITY Act, Washington's proposed crypto rulebook. The bill stalled in the Senate back in September, and it's already drawing pushback that cuts across party lines, so a shift in power doesn't guarantee a clear path forward.

Binance is still mopping up. After a record $6.3 billion hack, customers pulled a net $3.64 billion off the exchange. Binance says withdrawals are stabilizing and that roughly 95% of the stolen assets have been replaced using company resources.

October was ugly almost everywhere. Only two of the top 20 cryptocurrencies finished the month green: Monero at +9.99% and LEO at +4.07%. RAIN took the worst beating at -48.47%, followed by XLM at -25.12%. Bitcoin shed 7.30% and Ethereum dropped 16.04%. Now the question hanging over election week: can Bitcoin reclaim $80,000 and lure ETF buyers back, or does a slide below $77,000 drag that $74,800 cost basis back into the spotlight?