Bitcoin slides to $68,000 as Anthropic IPO absorbs cash, history eyed

What happened

Bitcoin slipped to about $68,000 in overnight trading, its lowest price since August and more than 20% beneath where it traded in early October, according to Bitcoinist. The decline took the asset as low as $67,770, and liquidations across derivatives markets exceeded $1.6 billion, with roughly 89% of the closed positions on the long side.

U.Today, reporting a day later, put bitcoin at $65,450 at the time of publication, citing TradingView data, and said the price broke below $70,000 on Nov. 13 before dropping under $67,000 over the weekend. The two outlets described the same downward move but quoted different snapshots of the price at the times they published.

Rather than pointing to a problem inside the Bitcoin network, several market observers traced the selloff to the initial public offering of Anthropic, the company behind the Claude AI models. Anthropic has set a price range of $70 to $78 per share and plans to sell 825 million shares to raise about $64.4 billion, with pricing expected Nov. 18 and trading due to start Nov. 19 on Nasdaq under the ticker ANT.

Demand for the listing has been heavy: CoinDesk reported the order book was roughly six times oversubscribed, a figure cited by Bitcoinist. Seamus Rocca, chief executive of Xapo Bank, said investors appear to be liquidating assets such as bitcoin to fund their allocations, a dynamic he said also played out ahead of SpaceX's listing earlier this year. Fundstrat's Tom Lee, quoted by U.Today, similarly described the current drawdown as money temporarily rotating into the year's largest offerings.

Why it matters

The argument for optimism rests on what happens once the listing is done. When pricing finishes and allocations are filled, the selling pressure tied to raising cash should fade, and capital held on the sidelines could return to risk assets including crypto. Matt Cole of Strive noted that bitcoin lost 19% in the 50 days before the SpaceX IPO and has lost 18% in the comparable stretch before Anthropic's debut, and suggested a repeat could lift bitcoin toward $90,000 by late February. U.Today reported that U.S. markets saw further declines for 18 days after SpaceX began trading, after which bitcoin recovered and stood 28% above its listing-day close 100 days later.

Sentiment readings are also part of the case. Chris Sullivan of Hyperium Decimus pointed to extreme fear across crypto markets and short open interest now exceeding its August peak, a setup that can produce violent rallies when traders are forced to cover. Mark Connors of Risk Dimensions framed the move as broader deleveraging across the AI trade, noting metals fell alongside bitcoin as investors reduced risk exposure generally.

What the data shows

On the charts, Bitcoinist identified $70,000 as the first level bulls need to reclaim, with $76,000 next and the $80,000 area beyond that. To the downside, $67,770, the week's low, is the line to hold. The Anthropic deal terms place the offering near SpaceX's record $75 billion raise from this summer, and U.Today reported that at the top of the price range Anthropic would be valued at about $1.4 trillion, alongside a $26 billion private placement already arranged.

Background

The comparison with SpaceX has circulated widely. Binance founder Changpeng Zhao shared the two charts on X and described Cole's figures as an interesting analysis, according to U.Today, though some replies under the post blamed the bitcoin decline on selling by Binance rather than on the IPO calendar. Separately, Bitcoinist noted that Lightning Labs has launched payments aimed at AI agents, opening a use case for bitcoin in the same sector drawing investor attention.

What is still unclear

It is not settled whether the IPO explanation fully accounts for the move, given that the reports disagree on where bitcoin traded and that some market participants attribute the drop to exchange-related selling instead. Whether the post-listing recovery pattern repeats is also unknown; the SpaceX comparison is a historical analogy offered by analysts, not an established relationship.

What to watch

Traders will watch the Nov. 18 pricing and the Nov. 19 Nasdaq debut, along with whether bitcoin can hold above this week's low and reclaim $70,000. Bitcoinist also flagged MSCI's plan to remove Strategy from its global indexes, which could prompt selling in that company's shares, and stubborn inflation as continuing risks.

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