Bitcoin (BTC) dipped below $67,000 at Tuesday’s Wall Street open as risk assets responded to new geopolitical pressures.
Key points:
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Bitcoin joins stocks in a geopolitics-driven sell-off to the start the US TradFi trading week.
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Bid liquidity gets crunched with the BTC price range still firmly in place.
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Strategy adding to its BTC stack failed to offer any relief for Bitcoin bulls.
Tension in Iran keeps Bitcoin under pressure
Data from TradingView showed daily BTC price losses of more than 3.8% on Bitstamp.
Bitcoin and altcoins joined US stocks in a sell-off to start the week’s first US trading session thanks to market nerves over naval drills by Iran in the Strait of Hormuz — a key oil route.
Talks between the US and Iran, which the latter described as “serious and constructive,” concluded around the same time.
The S&P 500 and Nasdaq Composite Index were down by up to 1.25% at the time of writing, while gold dropped to lows of $4,842 per ounce.
Analyzing exchange liquidity conditions on the day, X commentary account Exitpump was among those eyeing a sweep of range lows for BTC/USD next.
“Really huge bids are still sitting there in the spot orderbooks around 60K level,” it noted on data from both Binance and Coinbase.
Data from monitoring resource CoinGlass showed price slicing through nearby bid liquidity during the drop.
The day prior, liquidity games formed the main source of volatility on Bitcoin, with both longs and shorts in the firing line.
“Nothing special on $BTC,” crypto trader, analyst and entrepreneur Michaël van de Poppe summarized.
“It’s stuck in a range and simply consolidating, through which it’s a waiting game until volatility slows down and the expansion is about to game.”
Investor O’Leary repeats Bitcoin quantum worries
News that Strategy, the company with the world’s largest Bitcoin corporate treasury, had bought nearly 2,500 BTC over the past week, failed to impact the mood.
Related: $75K or bearish ‘regime shift?’ Five things to know in Bitcoin this week
As confirmed by CEO Michael Saylor, Strategy’s total holdings rose to 717,131 BTC, with its average cost basis at just over $76,000.
At the same time, onchain data tracked potential outflows from the US spot Bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs).
BlackRock just deposited another 1,701 $BTC($115.2M) and 22,661 $ETH($44.5M) to Coinbase Prime.https://t.co/qmuDIrP9my pic.twitter.com/AxoghUGpf8
— Lookonchain (@lookonchain) February 17, 2026
At the weekend, Shark Tank cohost and venture capitalist Kevin O’Leary told mainstream media that the threat of quantum computing cracking Bitcoin’s security model was keeping institutions away.
“I’m still long this, but there’s a new concern floating around for 10% of the people out there: quantum, the idea that a quantum computer can break the chain,” he said in an interview on FOX News.
O’Leary said that potential exposure was being capped at 3% of institutional portfolios as a result.
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