Bitcoin Ends October Down 7.32%, Worst Since 2014, After Binance Hack
BTC fell 7.32% in October, its weakest for the month since 2014, as a $6.3 billion Binance hack and an AI-led market slide hit sentiment.
Bitcoin's "Uptober" seasonal pattern failed in 2026. According to Bitcoin.com News, BTC closed October down 7.32%, its weakest result for the month since 2014. BeInCrypto also put the loss at about 7%.
October 2025 ended lower as well, so this is a second straight red October. Bitcoin.com News says that hasn't happened since 2011 and 2012.
Binance hack drove the final-week selloff
Bitcoin.com News reports that BTC traded between $76,337 and $81,840 over the last seven days of the month. That is a range of $5,503, or roughly 6.7% of the weekly high. The outlet ties the sharpest selling to a reported Oct. 29 breach of Binance hot wallets, which it values at $6.3 billion.
Leveraged liquidations topped $1.5 billion in the first 24 hours, the outlet says. Binance pledged to cover customer losses from company resources and its Secure Asset Fund for Users. Blockchain investigators estimated about $3 billion of the stolen assets had been frozen.
Questions remain over the rest of the stolen funds and when withdrawals will be restored, according to Bitcoin.com News. It also reports that U.S. spot bitcoin ETFs saw roughly $643 million in net outflows on Oct. 30. BeInCrypto says bitcoin fell about 4% late Thursday, hours before a Friday selloff in the Nasdaq, in step with news of the hack.
AI worries and a broken oil-bond link
BeInCrypto places the month's weakness in a wider market context. It says the AI trade cracked, and oil futures rose while Treasury yields fell. That broke a correlation of about 80% between the two this year.
Jeffrey Rosenberg, a senior portfolio manager at BlackRock, told CNBC that markets now treat AI risk as more important than geopolitical risk. BeInCrypto summarizes his view this way: weakness in AI stocks is read as a warning for US growth, which pulled yields down even as oil climbed. The Magnificent Seven stocks retreated through October, and Google had its largest one-day drop on record, erasing about $500 billion in value.
Fed Chair Kevin Warsh disagreed, according to BeInCrypto. He said capital spending is broadening beyond narrow pockets, and he named rising oil as a factor in the Fed's inflation fight. The outlet adds that rate futures had pointed to a December hike by mid-October.
Seasonal data and levels to watch
The two outlets give different historical figures. Bitcoin.com News counts 11 positive Octobers out of 16 from 2010 through 2025, with an average gain of 26.1% and a median of 12.9%. BeInCrypto cites 10 gains in 13 Octobers, with a median near 15%. The sources don't explain the gap, which may come from the data sets used.
For early November, Bitcoin.com News says the $76,000 to $76,500 area is the key support zone. A decisive break below it could expose $75,000 and then $73,000. Reclaiming $78,000 to $80,000 would help the near-term picture, and the $81,840 weekly high is another hurdle.
Traders may also watch for updates on the Binance breach, including the stolen funds and the return of withdrawals. Other things to follow are ETF flows and whether the AI-related market weakness continues.
Sources
- Bitcoin’s ‘Uptober’ Goes Bust With Worst October Finish Since 2014 Bitcoin.com News
- Bitcoin Uptober Failed as Oil, Bonds and AI Broke Pattern: What Changed? BeInCrypto
Written with AI assistance from the sources above and checked against them. Not investment advice.