The crypto market unraveled hard over the past 24 hours, triggering $1.68 billion in liquidations as leveraged bets were wiped out across major exchanges, according to CoinGlass data.
Roughly 267,370 traders were forced out of positions, with longs accounting for an overwhelming $1.56 billion, or nearly 93% of total liquidations.
Shorts made up just $118 million, indicative of how one-sided positioning had become before the move lower.
Bitcoin and ether led the damage. BTC alone saw about $780 million in liquidations, while ETH followed with more than $414 million, per liquidation heatmap data. The largest single hit was a $80.57 million BTC-USDT position on HTX, a reminder that even deep liquidity doesn’t protect oversized leverage when momentum flips.
(Coinglass)The pain was concentrated on perpetuals-heavy venues. Hyperliquid topped the list with $598 million in liquidations, over 94% of them long, reflecting how aggressively traders had leaned into upside bets. Bybit followed with $339 million, and Binance logged $181 million, with long exposure dominating across all three.
Liquidations occur when leveraged traders can no longer meet margin requirements and exchanges forcibly close positions to prevent further losses.
In fast markets, this becomes reflexive: forced selling pushes prices lower, which triggers more liquidations, feeding a cascade. That feedback loop is exactly what played out here.
For traders, liquidation data matters because it exposes where leverage was crowded and where risk has been flushed.
Heavy long liquidations often mark the clearing of speculative excess, resetting funding rates and open interest. That doesn’t mean a bottom is in — but it does mean weak hands are gone, and price action going forward is less distorted by forced flows.
The broader takeaway is that the move was not likely not driven by fresh bearish conviction but leverage breaking. When nearly everything on the board is long, the market doesn’t need bad news — it just needs gravity.
Source: https://www.coindesk.com/markets/2026/01/30/rollercoaster-bitcoin-price-moves-end-up-liquidating-usd1-7-billion-in-bullish-crypto-bets
