Quick Summary
- One year ago today, Bitcoin was sitting near its all-time high of about $126,200. Four days later, a single post from the White House erased more than $19 billion in a matter of hours.
- Coinglass counted it as the largest liquidation event in crypto history. Roughly $7 billion vanished in one hour. Reportedly over 1.6 million traders were hit.
- CoinDesk recorded Bitcoin plunging from about $122,000 to $105,000, with most of the damage done inside minutes.
- The slide did not stop there. Bitcoin ultimately bottomed near $58,600 on July 1.
- Today, on the one-year anniversary, Bitcoin trades around $82,700 – roughly a third below its record, and barely above the October low it printed last week.
- And per CryptoRank, traders went into this anniversary holding more borrowed money, not less. More than $1 billion was liquidated again this week, with Ethereum alone accounting for $356 million.
- Nothing was ever wrong with Bitcoin. Something was very wrong with everyone who borrowed money to buy it.
What Happened
On October 6, 2025, Bitcoin printed about $126,200 and the market treated leverage like a free lunch. Every dip was bought with borrowed money. Every “expert” on the timeline had a six-figure target and a chart to prove it.
Four days later, on October 10, President Trump announced a 100% tariff on Chinese goods. Crypto prices fell within hours. Exchanges did what exchanges always do when collateral evaporates: they closed the bets automatically. That is what a liquidation is. It is not a crash. It is the moment someone else decides when you sell.
The numbers were historic. Coinglass counted more than $19 billion in liquidations – its largest tally ever. About $7 billion disappeared in a single hour. Reportedly more than 1.6 million traders were wiped out. CoinDesk’s record of the session shows Bitcoin falling from roughly $122,000 to $105,000, with most of the move happening within minutes.
Then came the part nobody screenshots. The bottom was not $105,000. Bitcoin kept bleeding until it touched about $58,600 on July 1 – more than half off the high, nine months after the crash that was supposed to be the buying opportunity of the cycle.
Today, one year later, Bitcoin trades near $82,700. That is about 32% below the record. It is also almost exactly where it was on October 7 of this year, when another oil shock out of the Strait of Hormuz took it to $82,734. A year of headlines, a year of targets, and the price is back at the same number.
And what did the market learn? According to CryptoRank, traders walked into the 10/10 anniversary carrying more leverage than before. This week, another $1.19 billion in positions were liquidated, with Ethereum accounting for $356 million. The lesson was administered. It was not absorbed.
Why This Matters for Bitcoin
Here is the part the leverage crowd never says out loud: the Bitcoin network never noticed 10/10. No block was missed. No coin was lost. The difficulty adjusted and kept adjusting. Every single dollar destroyed that day was destroyed inside a promise that was never Bitcoin’s to keep.
A liquidated trader is not a Bitcoin holder. He is a customer of a platform that agreed to sell his position for him the moment his margin ran out. When Bitcoin fell, he did not get to decide whether to hold. The exchange decided for him, at the worst possible price, without asking.
The 10/10 crash gets filed under “black swan” because that framing is convenient. A black swan means nobody could have seen it coming. But the tariff announcement was public. The leverage was public. Open interest was at record highs, and the market was one headline away from a cascade – and everyone who needed to know that already knew it.
What made 10/10 catastrophic was not the tariff. It was the structure sitting on top of the price. Remove the leverage and a 100% tariff headline is a bad week. Keep the leverage and it is 1.6 million people learning in an hour that they never really owned anything.
This is the same reason we warned about the CFTC legalizing leveraged crypto trading for retail the moment Congress failed to pass the CLARITY Act. They did not legalize a new asset. They legalized the mechanism that keeps producing days like 10/10. And it is the same reason the October low that killed $550 million in one morning looked so familiar. It always looks familiar. It is the same story with a new headline.
The Love Is Bitcoin Takeaway
Stop treating leverage as a Bitcoin strategy. It is not a strategy. It is a countdown timer with someone else’s finger on the button.
If a 100% tariff headline can erase your stack in 60 minutes, you did not have a stack. You had a position, and someone else had the keys to it. The distinction is the whole game. A real Bitcoin holder’s worst day is measured in percentages of a chart he can ignore. A leveraged trader’s worst day is measured in a margin call he cannot refuse.
And notice who benefits when you borrow. Not you. The exchange collects fees on both sides. The liquidation engine gets paid either way. The only participant who needs the price to go up on a deadline is the one who borrowed.
One year on, the people who survived 10/10 are not the ones who predicted the bottom. They are the ones who had nothing to liquidate.
What Beginners Should Do Next
- Find out if you are actually holding Bitcoin. If your coins are on an exchange or in a lending product, you are not holding them. You are lending them to someone whose business model includes selling them without asking you.
- Close the margin. If you cannot sleep through a 40% drawdown, you are carrying more leverage than you can survive. A 40% drawdown is not a tail risk for Bitcoin. It is a Tuesday.
- Learn what self-custody actually means. Start with choosing a Bitcoin wallet, then move to the difference between ETF exposure and holding your own keys. Exposure is not ownership.
- Do not let a platform decide your exit. Set your own terms, or the liquidation engine will set them for you at the worst price of the year.
- Stack slowly, keep it boring, and never let a headline set your risk. The miners who stayed in got a 78% revenue raise while the leveraged crowd got liquidated. Boring won.
- If you are going to buy, buy from a platform that lets you take the coins out. We use Bull Bitcoin – non-custodial by design, and you can use the code LOVEISBITCOIN when you sign up. Then move the coins to your own wallet. That is the entire point.
FAQ
What was the 10/10 crash?
October 10, 2025. President Trump announced a 100% tariff on Chinese goods and crypto markets collapsed within hours. Coinglass counted more than $19 billion in liquidations, the largest in crypto history, with roughly $7 billion in a single hour and reportedly over 1.6 million traders hit.
How far did Bitcoin fall after 10/10?
Bitcoin went from a record near $126,200 into a prolonged decline and ultimately bottomed near $58,600 on July 1, 2026. A year later it trades around $82,700, roughly 32% below the record.
Was the 10/10 crash Bitcoin’s fault?
No. The network ran normally throughout. The losses happened inside leveraged positions on exchanges and trading platforms that automatically close user positions when margin runs out.
Why does leverage make a crash worse?
Leverage turns a price decline into forced selling. When collateral falls below a threshold, the platform closes the position automatically, which pushes the price down further, which triggers more closures. One headline becomes a cascade.
What is the lesson for self-custody holders?
That the people who survived 10/10 were the ones with nothing to liquidate. Holding your own keys removes you from the liquidation engine entirely. You cannot be forced to sell Bitcoin that a platform cannot reach.
Final Thoughts
One year ago today, a single post from the White House did in one hour what no hacker, no regulation and no ban ever managed: it emptied the accounts of 1.6 million people. And the market’s response has been to borrow more, stack higher, and call it conviction.
Bitcoin does not need your leverage. It never did. It has been producing blocks every ten minutes through every one of these crashes, indifferent to the people who keep mistaking a bet on Bitcoin for Bitcoin itself.
The anniversary is not a memorial. It is a warning that gets reissued every October, to an audience that keeps throwing the letter away.
So here is the question: Where were you on 10/10 – and are you levered right now?
If you want to own Bitcoin instead of renting a position in it, get started with Bull Bitcoin and use the code LOVEISBITCOIN. Then take the coins off the exchange. That is not a slogan. That is the whole difference between surviving the next 10/10 and being the reason for it.
ONE YEAR AGO TODAY, ONE POST ERASED $19 BILLION IN AN HOUR — AND THE SAME TRADERS JUST LEVERED UP AGAIN
