New York, January 21, 2026, 14:04 EST — Regular session
Bitcoin (BTC) slipped on Wednesday and stayed below $90,000 in U.S. trading. The cryptocurrency was down 1.1% at $88,466 by 2:04 p.m. EST, after swinging between $87,304 and $90,379.
The slide keeps crypto tied to a wider risk-off move that hit stocks and long-dated bonds this week. President Donald Trump’s threat of new tariffs on a group of European countries unless a deal was reached for the U.S. to purchase Greenland helped trigger Wall Street’s biggest one-day drop in three months on Tuesday, and bitcoin fell more than 3%. 1
Bond-market stress has also been a live wire. A sharp selloff in Japanese government bonds pushed the benchmark 10-year yield up 8.5 basis points in two days, prompting opposition leader Yuichiro Tamaki to call the moves “abnormal” and urge officials to “respond decisively”. 2
$90,000 has “proven to be a critical level” for bitcoin in recent weeks, said Karim Dandashy, an over-the-counter trader at crypto trading firm Flowdesk. Shiliang Tang, managing partner of Monarq Asset Management, said the drop “mirrors a broader exodus from risk assets” driven by tariff headlines and Greenland tensions. 3
Corporate demand hasn’t been enough to put a floor under prices. Strategy said it bought about $2.13 billion of bitcoin over the eight days through Jan. 19, a regulatory filing showed, taking holdings to 709,715 coins. “Strategy is still buying Bitcoin because stopping would be as much a signal to the market as purchasing more,” said Nic Puckrin, an analyst and co-founder of Coin Bureau. 4
At the World Economic Forum in Davos, SkyBridge Capital founder Anthony Scaramucci said the pullback looked more like noise than a turn in the long-term story. “This is more of a timing issue than a direction issue,” he said. Bitcoin is about 28% off its October 2025 record above $126,000, after a volatile run last year. 5
Investors have also watched flows in U.S.-listed spot bitcoin exchange-traded funds, which hold bitcoin and trade like stocks. Data from BitcoinTreasuries.com showed a net $189.5 million outflow on Jan. 19, after a $654.7 million inflow on Jan. 14. 6
Ether fell 2.1% to $2,928, and traded between $2,873 and $3,014 on the day.
In crypto markets, policy hopes have cooled after a key U.S. crypto regulation bill was delayed, Investing.com reported. It said geopolitical frictions and a jump in global bond yields have been pulling money toward safe havens, especially gold. 7
But the trade can turn quickly. If yields spike again or tariff threats become action, bitcoin can drop through technical levels and force fast selling as leveraged positions get cut.
Traders now look ahead to the Federal Reserve’s two-day policy meeting on Jan. 27-28 and the chair’s press conference on Jan. 28. Rate expectations have been doing a lot of the heavy lifting across markets, and crypto has been caught in the crosswinds. 8
