Crypto Longs Blown Out: $745M Vaporized in a Single Hour

Crypto futures traders got hit with a $745 million liquidation cascade in the hour ending 5:21 p.m. ET Sunday, according to tokenpost.com. Longs carried about 96% of the damage, meaning the overwhelming majority of traders caught in the blast were betting on prices to rise.

The breakdown: $715 million in long positions were closed out against $29.62 million in shorts, which together add up to the rounded $745 million figure. Over the 24 hours through the same snapshot, roughly 137,000 traders had positions liquidated.

Ether wore the heaviest bruises. ETH accounted for $343 million of the liquidations, $114 million more than Bitcoin's $229 million. The single biggest casualty was a $48.16 million position on Binance's ETH/USDT market.

Prices paint the picture of a rough session. On OKX at the same snapshot, Bitcoin was quoted at $74,643, down 1.52% over 24 hours and having dipped as low as $73,500 along the way. Ether traded at $2,132.80, down 4.52%, after touching a low of $2,063.29.

Both majors closed the 24-hour window in the red, and the lopsided long-versus-short split suggests plenty of leveraged bulls were positioned for upside right as the floor gave way. That's the classic setup for a cascade, where forced selling feeds on itself and accelerates the drop.