Tariff travails resurface, bitcoin holders prepare for declines

Crypto Daybook Americas Share Share this article Copy link X icon X (Twitter) LinkedIn Facebook Email Tariff travails resurface, bitcoin holders prepare for declines Your day-ahead look for Feb. 23, 2026 By Omkar Godbole | Edited by Sheldon Reback Feb 23, 2026, 12:15 p.m. Make us preferred on Google Bitcoin holders are taking out put options to protect against price declines. (Peggy_Marco/Pixabay modified by CoinDesk) What to know : You are viewing Crypto Daybook Americas, your morning briefing on what happened in the crypto markets overnight and what's expected during the coming day. Crypto Daybook Americas will kickstart your morning with comprehensive insights. If you're not already subscribed to the email, click here . You won't want to start your day without it. In this article BTC BTC $ 66,249.24 ◢ 2.49 % By Omkar Godbole (All times ET unless indicated otherwise) Tariff uncertainty is back to haunt markets, and it's no surprise bitcoin BTC $ 66,249.24 traders are chasing downside protection. STORY CONTINUES BELOW Don't miss another story. Subscribe to the Crypto Daybook Americas Newsletter today . See all newsletters Sign me up By signing up, you will receive emails about CoinDesk products and you agree to our terms & conditions and privacy policy . On Friday, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled against President Donald Trump's emergency tariffs from April last year. Within a few hours, Trump had announced fresh tariffs, invoking a law that allows an import levy of up to 15% for 150 days to address "international payment problems." That's confirmation the president still sees "tariffs" as the most beautiful word in the English dictionary. It also means trade-related uncertainty is here to stay, posing a headwind to risk assets, including bitcoin. Bitcoin traders reacted accordingly. Since Friday, put options at strike prices of $58,000, $60,000 and $62,000 have seen the largest increases in open interest, or the number of active contracts, on Deribit. This is a clear sign traders are positioning for declines. A put option protects against price losses. Bitcoin fell to a low of $64,481 early Monday after whipsawing around $66,000 over the weekend. The drop came amid reports of a whale, or large BTC holder, moving sizable amounts of bitcoin to an exchange, possibly for sale. Since then, the price has recovered to over $66,000. Ether (ETh) also recovered from Asian-session lows near $1,856 even as blockchain data pointed to faster sales by Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin. Trade tensions could dominate sentiment this week, with Nvidia's earnings potentially adding to market volatility. Analysts pinned hopes on the potential stabilisation of spot bitcoin ETF flows to support the market. "A flattening of outflows would suggest institutional selling is maturing. Continued contraction would reinforce the defensive regime," Timothy Misir, the head of research at BRN, said in an email. "For now, liquidity defines the environment. Supply persists. Conviction is thin. The market is waiting for either macro relief or structural demand to re-emerge," he said. In traditional markets, Goldman Sachs raised its fourth-quarter Brent crude oil forecast to $60 and WTI to $56 per barrel, citing lower-than-expected OECD stockpiles. Crude prices have been buoyant lately due to fears of full-blown military conflict between the U.S. and Iran. A sharp rise in oil prices could add to inflation worldwide and weigh on risk assets. Stay alert! Read more: For analysis of today's activity in altcoins and derivatives, see Crypto Markets Today What to Watch For a more comprehensive list of events this week, see CoinDesk's " Crypto Week Ahead ". Crypto Feb. 23: Alchemy Chain’s testnet is scheduled to go live. Macro Feb. 23, 8:00 a.m.: Fed Governor Christopher Waller gives a speech on the economic outlook at the National Association for Business Economics. Feb. 23, 10:00 a.m.: U.S. Dallas Fed Manufacturing Index for February (Prev. -1.2) Earnings (Estimates based on FactSet data) Nothing scheduled. Token Events For a more comprehensive list of events this week, see CoinDesk's " Crypto Week Ahead ". Governance votes & calls Feb. 23: DYdX Foundation to host its February analyst call. Feb. 23: Pudgy Penguins to host an Inner Igloo meeting on Discord . Uniswap DAO is voting to enable protocol fees across all V3 pools and eight layer-2 networks. Voting ends Feb. 23. ZKsync DAO is voting to allocate $4.1 million in ZK tokens for the 2026 Audit Reimbursement Program (ZARP v2) to fund forward-looking protocol security audits and retroactively reimburse eligible 2025 costs. Voting ends Feb. 23. Unlocks Nothing scheduled. Token Launches Nothing scheduled. Conferences For a more comprehensive list of events this week, see CoinDesk's " Crypto Week Ahead ". Day 1 of 4: Strategy World 2026 (Las Vegas) Day 1 of 2: NEARCON (San Francisco) Market Movements BTC is down 1.99% from 4 p.m. ET Friday at $66,466.38 (24hrs: -2.67%) ETH is down 2.75% at $1,920.06 (24hrs: -3.13%) CoinDesk 20 is down 2.7% at 1,913.13 (24hrs: -2.93%) Ether CESR Composite Staking Rate is down 3 bps at 2.76% BTC funding rate is at -0.0047% (-5.1531% annualized) on Binance DXY is down 0.14% at 97.66 Gold futures are up 2.03% at $5,184.10 Silver futures are up 5.41% at $86.79 Nikkei 225 closed down 1.12% at 56,825.70 Hang Seng closed up 2.53% at 27,081.91 FTSE is little changed at 10,682.09 Euro Stoxx 50 is down 0.07% at 6,127.32 DJIA closed on Friday up 0.47% at 49,625.97 S&P 500 closed up 0.69% at 6,909.51 Nasdaq Composite closed up 0.90% at 22,886.07 S&P/TSX Composite closed up 0.66% at 33,817.51 S&P 40 Latin America closed up 1.63% at 3,799.71 U.S. 10-Year Treasury rate is down 0.8 bps at 4.077% E-mini S&P 500 futures are down 0.25% at 6,905.75 E-mini Nasdaq-100 futures are down 0.41% at 24,965.50 E-mini Dow Jones Industrial Average Index futures are down 0.25% at 49,551.00 Bitcoin Stats BTC Dominance: 58.75% (-0.44%) Ether-bitcoin ratio: 0.02888 (-0.21%) Hashrate (seven-day moving average): 1,016 EH/s Hashprice (spot): $29.02 Total fees: 1.88 BTC / $127,386 CME Futures Open Interest: 119,015 BTC BTC priced in gold: 12.9 oz. BTC vs gold market cap: 4.44% Technical Analysis BTC's weekly chart. (TradingView) The chart shows bitcoin's weekly price swings in candlestick format. Long lower wicks on recent candles hint at seller fatigue: Sellers tried to hammer prices downward, but failed. This type of pattern after a notable selloff usually sets the stage for price bounces. Crypto Equities Coinbase Global (COIN): closed on Friday at $171.35 (+3.26%), -1.60% at $168.60 in pre-market Circle Internet (CRCL): closed at $63.02 (+1.78%), -1.05% at $62.36 Galaxy Digital (GLXY): closed at $21.20 (-1.99%), -1.84% at $20.81 Bullish (BLSH): closed at $31.77 (-1.85%), -0.66% at $31.56 MARA Holdings (MARA): closed at $7.97 (+0.13%), -1.63% at $7.84 Riot Platforms (RIOT): closed at $15.68 (-3.33%), -1.66% at $15.42 Core Scientific (CORZ): closed at $17.30 (-3.78%) CleanSpark (CLSK): closed at $9.65 (-1.73%), -1.45% at $9.51 CoinShares Valkyrie Bitcoin Miners ETF (WGMI): closed at $38.85 (-4.53%) Exodus Movement (EXOD): closed at $9.86 (-5.37%) Crypto Treasury Companies Strategy (MSTR): closed at $131.05 (+1.24%), -1.55% at $129.02 Strive (ASST): closed at $8.15 (+0.37%), -2.09% at $7.98 SharpLink Gaming (SBET): closed at $6.72 (-1.18%), -2.53% at $6.55 Upexi (UPXI): closed at $0.62 (-7.35%), +4.53% at $0.65 Lite Strategy (LITS): closed at $1.11 (+0.91%) ETF Flows Spot BTC ETFs Daily net flows: $88.1 million Cumulative net flows: $53.99 billion Total BTC holdings ~1.26 million Spot ETH ETFs Daily net flows: $0 million Cumulative net flows: $11.55 billion Total ETH holdings ~5.66 million Source: Farside Investors While You Were Sleeping EU set to freeze U.S. trade deal approval over Trump tariff risk (Bloomberg): The EU is poised to freeze the ratification process of its trade deal with the U.S. and is seeking more details from President Trump’s administration on its new tariff program. Bitcoin ETFs bleed $3.8 billion in historic five-week outflow streak (CoinDesk): Investors pulled nearly $3.8 billion from U.S.-listed spot bitcoin ETFs over five straight weeks, the longest outflow streak since February 2025. Last week alone saw $316 million vanish. U.S. tariff turmoil leaves Treasury markets dazed (Reuters): Far from being a source of relief, the Supreme Court's takedown of Trump's tariffs has infused new risks and uncertainties into trade policy, U.S. debt and the dollar. Crypto Daybook Americas More For You Bitcoin gains, is still 'signficantly undervalued,' Bitwise says. 'Extreme fear' dominates. By Francisco Rodrigues | Edited by Sheldon Reback Feb 20, 2026 Your day-ahead look for Feb. 20, 2026 What to know : You are viewing Crypto Daybook Americas, your morning briefing on what happened in the crypto markets overnight and what's expected during the coming day. Crypto Daybook Americas will kickstart your morning with comprehensive insights. If you're not already subscribed to the email, click here . You won't want to start your day without it. Read full story Latest Crypto News Overnight crypto rout reverses, bitcoin rebounds to $66,300 45 minutes ago Pre-market trading stabilizes as bitcoin reclaims $66,000, Saylor eyes 100th BTC purchase 1 hour ago Kucoin told to halt new EU business due to compliance staffing shortfalls 1 hour ago Bitcoin balances on Binance hit highest since November 2024: here's what it means 1 hour ago Ethereum founder Vitalik Buterin accelerates ether sales 1 hour ago Bitdeer sold all its bitcoin to fund its move into AI data centers 2 hours ago Top Stories Bitcoin ETFs bleed $3.8 billion in historic five-week outflow streak 7 hours ago To freeze or not to freeze: Satoshi and the $440 billion in bitcoin threatened by quantum computing 20 hours ago AI bot's tipping blunder hands $450,000 memecoin pile to X sad story poster 6 hours ago Small investors are buying bitcoin. For a rally to succeed, the whales need to join in. Feb 21, 2026 Blue Owl liquidity crisis has investors bracing for 2008-style fallout — it could mean bitcoin's next bull run Feb 21, 2026 In this article BTC BTC $ 66,249.24 ◢ 2.49 %