Bitcoin (BTC) rose to nearly $103,000 to usher gains across the crypto market on Tuesday after breakthroughs from China’s DeepSeek led to a steep fall in U.S. indexes on Monday, prompted by concerns of overvaluations of its AI investments.
XRP led gains among crypto majors with a 12% surge, while Cardano’s ADA, BNB Chain’s BNB, Solana’s SOL and dogecoin (DOGE) zooming as much as 9%. Ether (ETH) gained 4.5%, while overall market capitalization rose 3%.
BTC rose nearly 4% in the past 24 hours, easing losses from Monday which saw over $1 billion in futures liquidations and an 8.5% decline in the broad-based CoinDesk 20 (CD20) at peak.
Large liquidation events often present a market buying opportunity, as CoinDesk noted on Monday, as they can signal an overstretched market that indicates a price correction has occurred, among other factors.
As such, TRUMP tokens were up 12% to lead gains among midcaps, or tokens below a $5 billion market cap.
Part of the gains in majors came as Tuttle Capital filed the first-ever 2x leveraged ETFs in the U.S. on Monday, proposing products that would return 200% of the daily price performance of nearly all major tokens, plus BONK, TRUMP and MELANIA.
Monday’s nosedive was largely attributed to breakthroughs from China’s DeepSeek, whose model was shown to outperform AI giant OpenAI’s, all while being built on a budget of $6 million and a fraction of the Graphics Processing Units (GPUs) that OpenAI uses (it recently closed a $6.6 billion round with a valuation of over $157 billion).
However, some traders state that DeepSeek’s breakthrough is among a bunch of factors that may impact bitcoin and crypto markets in the near term.
“Initial fears about DeepSeek presented a buying opportunity for crypto as the industry isn’t in direct confrontation with the Chinese AI firm,’ Nick Ruck, director at LVRG Research, told CoinDesk in a Telegram message. “Instead, founders of crypto projects that use AI can integrate DeepSeek’s open-sourced model into their projects for more efficiency and enhanced innovations.”
“However, there are still choppy waters ahead as this week is heavy with macro data releases from US agencies, including the FOMC, and earnings reports from major companies such as Apple, Meta, and ASML. We remain optimistic for Bitcoin in the long term, as policies are shaping up to be very beneficial for the crypto industry’s growth in the U.S. and abroad,” Ruck added.
Traders expect no indications of a rate cut at the two-day FOMC meeting scheduled for Jan. 28 to Jan. 29, which has typically impacted bitcoin prices as investors either prefer or move away from risk assets.
Meanwhile, Singapore-based QCP Capital provided astrological cues as part of a larger Tuesday market update.
“As we approach the Year of the Snake, the market’s twists and turns remind us of the wisdom, adaptability, and resilience this zodiac symbolizes – qualities that will be essential as we navigate 2025’s challenges and opportunities,” the firm said in a broadcast.
There may be truth to that gospel, as CoinDesk reported Monday. Bitcoin emerged highly profitable for bulls in 2024, the Chinese Year of the Dragon, while Hong Kong-based firms cautions “unpredictable twists” that eventually brings new highs — based on where “Rough Green” and “Brown Tree” snakes are in the lunar charts.
