Live updates: Bitcoin holds above $81,000 as markets calm, oil continues to gain

The U.S.-listed spot bitcoin ETF suffered $635 million in outflows during yesterday’s panicky action, according to Farside Investors. That’s the largest daily outflow since June 25.

While the contrarian take might be, “fantastic, the leveraged, fast-money types were flushed out, and now we’re poised to move higher,” history suggests otherwise.

According to Farside, bitcoin has tended to perform poorly in the days and weeks following outsized outflows. For instances of outflows greater than $300 million (there have been 22 such days prior to yesterday), bitcoin, on average, was significantly lower 7, 30, and 90 days later.

The caveat, of course, is that history is quite limited, given the ETFs have been around for less than three years, and is also likely skewed by the bear market begun in October 2025.

Bitcoin dipped to about $81,000 late Thursday and has since spent the day boxed in a range of less than $1,000, trading near $81,500 early Friday. After a week of $3,000 swings, it’s the calmest stretch bitcoin has had in days.

It’s down 0.4% over 24 hours and still sits below $82,500, the support it lost on Thursday.

Altcoins were mixed. BNB was the standout, up nearly 2% to about $745, and DOGE added about 1%. XMR gave back part of Thursday’s jump, falling 7% to about $607, and ZEC lost nearly 4% to about $1,200. HYPE, XRP, ether and SOL slipped about 1% or less, with ether just under $2,400, according to CoinDesk data.

Stocks found their footing too. Nasdaq 100 futures were little changed after the index’s worst day since June, and an ETF tracking chipmakers edged higher before the open. Meta kept falling, while SpaceX climbed on reports that it plans to become a wireless carrier.

Oil is the worry. Brent crude touched its highest level since early May, which complicates the inflation outlook heading into the Fed’s Oct. 27–28 meeting. Treasuries gave back some of Thursday’s haven rally, which had pushed the 10-year yield down by the most in more than a year. Gold and the dollar were flat.