Crypto didn’t get much breathing room on January 30. Prices swung hard, political news added to the noise, and several big company updates landed the same day.
Market Selloff Sparks Wave of Liquidations
As prices fell, leveraged trades started getting wiped out. By the end of the 24-hour stretch, liquidations across the market were sitting near $1.7 billion. The total crypto market cap slid about 6%, and the damage was heavily concentrated in long positions.
Bitcoin traders took the biggest hit, with liquidations near $768 million, followed by about $417 million in Ethereum positions. The fast drop left many bullish bets exposed, and once liquidations started, they snowballed. Hyperliquid, Bybit, and Binance ended up processing a large share of those forced trades.
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Bitcoin briefly touched two-month lows near $80.8K, while Ethereum dipped under $2.7K before modest rebounds. Crypto wasn’t alone in the selloff. Equities had a rough session and gold didn’t offer much shelter either, a sign investors were generally stepping back from risk. The Crypto Fear & Greed Index reflected that move, sliding to 16, its weakest reading this year.
Trump Nominates Kevin Warsh for Fed Chair — Crypto Takes Notice
U.S. President Donald Trump announced plans to nominate Kevin Warsh as the next chair of the Federal Reserve, escalating his long-running clash with current chair Jerome Powell over interest rates.
Warsh, a former Fed governor and Stanford lecturer, has previously described Bitcoin as an asset that can help signal when policymakers are making mistakes. While he has questioned its usefulness as a payment tool, he has also compared it to gold as a potential store of value. He has additionally expressed interest in the concept of a U.S. digital dollar, while warning about privacy risks tied to central bank digital currencies.
Markets are paying attention because a change in Fed leadership that leans toward lower rates could be a positive for risk assets, including crypto. In the past, easier monetary policy has generally meant more liquidity in the system, which tends to help digital assets.
Binance to Move $1B SAFU Fund Into Bitcoin
Binance revealed plans to convert its $1 billion Secure Asset Fund for Users (SAFU) entirely from stablecoins into Bitcoin over the next month.
The SAFU fund, originally established after a 2019 hack, serves as an emergency reserve to protect users in extreme situations. Binance said it will maintain the fund’s value at $1 billion, topping it back up if Bitcoin’s price drops and the balance falls below $800 million.
The decision follows growing calls from parts of the community for more transparency and a clearer commitment to Bitcoin. Holding the reserve in BTC links the fund more closely to overall market conditions and reflects Binance’s long-term view on Bitcoin’s role as a reserve asset.
Kraken-Linked SPAC Raises $345M for Crypto Deals
A blank-check company tied to crypto exchange Kraken raised $345 million in an upsized IPO on Nasdaq under the ticker KRAQU.
KRAK Acquisition Corp. says it’s looking to merge with a business in the digital asset space, with a focus on areas like payments infrastructure, tokenization, and compliance tools. The company hasn’t started formal negotiations yet, but it pointed to the increasing crossover between decentralized finance and traditional finance as a major area of interest.
Kraken’s involvement is expected to provide deal flow, industry expertise, and regulatory insight, even though the exchange is not contractually obligated to support a specific transaction. The raise adds to signs that public-market structures are still being used to channel capital into crypto infrastructure.
Bit Digital Exits Bitcoin Mining to Focus on ETH and AI
Bit Digital announced it plans to shut down its Bitcoin mining operations, marking a major strategic shift for the Nasdaq-listed firm.
The company said it no longer sees Bitcoin mining as the best way to use its capital compared with other parts of the business. It now plans to focus on Ethereum-related infrastructure, staking, and artificial intelligence operations. Bit Digital had already begun pivoting after Ethereum’s shift away from proof-of-work and has increasingly positioned itself at the intersection of crypto and AI computing.
The move also reflects a wider shift in the mining sector. Instead of expanding hash power at all costs, some publicly listed miners are choosing to put money into businesses they believe could generate stronger returns over time than traditional Bitcoin mining.
What This Means for Crypto Users and Markets
The events of January 30 were a reminder that crypto doesn’t move on just one narrative. Market structure, politics, and company decisions all pulled attention at once, making for a day where sentiment and direction changed quickly. On one side, macro and geopolitical stress triggered massive liquidations and a surge in fear. On the other, institutional and corporate moves, from Binance’s Bitcoin reserve shift to a Kraken-linked SPAC, point to continued long-term infrastructure building.
At the same time, political developments around the Federal Reserve remind markets that monetary policy still plays a huge role in crypto’s direction. Even as short-term price action turns volatile, the bigger picture shows an industry still evolving through finance, policy, and technology all at once.
