Bitcoin slides back under $80,000 in Asian trading as a Samsung miss rattles tech and the Fed's hawkish hold sinks in

Bitcoin's two-day recovery ran out late Wednesday. The coin dropped from above $81,700 to about $79,800 as trading opened in Asia on Thursday, according to a CoinDesk report timestamped 11:32 p.m. ET, reversing a two-day rebound. Ether was about $2,300, XRP at $1.29 and solana just under $100, per CoinDesk's price data.

The trigger was not crypto news. Samsung Electronics shares fell more than 5% after its semiconductor division reported operating profit of 106.5 trillion won for the three months to September, short of the 108.5 trillion won analysts expected, CoinDesk said. South Korea's Kospi fell more than 2% and Nasdaq-linked futures lost 1.4%, and the risk aversion spread to crypto. About $356 million of crypto futures positions were liquidated over 24 hours, including $94 million in bitcoin futures and $72 million in ether futures.

The Fed added to the mood. It held rates at 3.75% to 4% on Wednesday, but Chair Kevin Warsh said price pressures remain too high, and CME FedWatch showed an 86% chance of a December hike on Wednesday afternoon, per CoinDesk's live blog, which also noted that Coinbase reports third-quarter results on Thursday. Hours earlier the picture had looked calmer: as of early evening, The Motley Fool had bitcoin at about $81,220, up about 0.5% on the day.