Big Friday Crypto Selloff Pulls Bitcoin (BTC) Below $70K

Ideas about lower U.S. interest rates were foiled again and a plunge in shares of speculative favorite GameStop soured the mood in crypto.

Bitcoin (BTC) slid below the key psychological level of $70,000 on Friday as broader markets reacted negatively to data showing U.S. employment growth was much stronger than expected in May.

BTC was recently trading at $69,000, down 2.5% over the past 24 hours. Seventh-ranked crypto EOS (EOS) led the sell-off among major coins, dropping 10% over the same time frame.

The CoinDesk 20 index, which tracks the performance of the top 20 digital assets by market capitalization, fell 5% over the past 24 hours, largely driven by the declines in EOS and other altcoins.

Bitcoin began to lose steam on Friday morning after the government's employment report came in far stronger than expected. Officials said 272,000 jobs were added last month, while economists had forecast an increase of only 195,000.

The reading is also much higher than the 210,000 jobs added in April, which had been the best performance since March 2021. Friday's report showed the unemployment rate fell to 3.5%, down from 3.6% in April and below the 3.7% that had been anticipated.

The strong jobs number appeared to dash hopes for an imminent interest rate cut by the Federal Reserve, sending interest rates and the dollar sharply higher.

The selloff in bitcoin and other digital assets picked up steam several hours later as Keith Gill, the retail trader who became known as "Roaring Kitty" during the meme-coin mania of 2021, held a hotly anticipated YouTube livestream for the first time in several years.

Gill, who played a key role in rallying traders behind dogecoin (DOGE) and GameStop (GME) stock last year, discussed his hopes that GameStop management will be able to transform the company into something of great value in coming years.

Trading legend Roaring Kitty returns to YouTube after disappearing from the platform last year. (YouTube)

Trading legend Roaring Kitty returns to YouTube after disappearing from the platform last year. (YouTube)

Trading legend Roaring Kitty returns to YouTube after disappearing from the platform last year. (YouTube)

Those comments, however, appeared to disappoint some traders who had been hoping for some sort of big announcement from Gill, who is credited with helping to spark the meme-coin craze.

Already lower on the day, GME shares fell further during Gill's broadcast, now off 40% for the session. The GME meme coin is down 50% from highs reached earlier on Friday.

A check of other meme coins showed dogecoin (DOGE) was recently trading down 8% over the past 24 hours, shiba inu (SHIB) was down 10%, and pepecoin (PEPE) was lower by 15%.

In the meantime, bitcoin bulls might be left scratching their heads at what might be needed for a true upside breakout. The spot ETFs on Thursday completed an 18th-consecutive day of inflows, a steak not even accomplished during the frenzied price increases of February and March.

Over that 18-day streak, the ETFs accumulated more than 56K bitcoins, according to HODL Capital, or nearly 7x the amount of bitcoin mined during that period.