Bitcoin Magazine
Bitcoin Price Trades Near $77,500 as Midterm Voting Begins
Bitcoin price traded near $77,500 on Tuesday morning as polls opened for the U.S. midterm elections, down about .6% on the day and roughly $30,000 below its price one year ago, according to Bitcoin Magazine Pro data.
The vote decides control of Congress and, with it, the fate of the CLARITY Act, the market structure bill that passed the House 294-134 in July 2025 and failed a Senate cloture vote 49-50 on Sept. 15.
Prediction markets on Kalshi give Democrats a 94% chance of taking the House and 74% for the Senate. A Democratic Senate would likely put Sen. Elizabeth Warren in line to chair the Banking Committee. If Congress does not act before the new session convenes on Jan. 3, the bill dies and must be reintroduced.
Crypto groups spent more than $200 million on the midterms, CNBC reported. Analysts at TD Cowen see a Democratic sweep as the most probable outcome and the least favorable one for the industry; a divided Congress, in their view, leaves room for a narrower deal.
A week of selling
The bitcoin price action into the vote has been one-directional. Bitcoin price opened November near $78,500 and has lost about $2,000 since. October closed down about 7%, the second straight October decline.
On Oct. 28, after a hawkish Federal Reserve hold and weak earnings from Alphabet and Samsung, the price fell below $80,000 for the first time in weeks, with about $356 million in leveraged positions liquidated.
The larger shock came the next day. On Oct. 29, attackers the FBI attributes to North Korea drained about $6.3 billion from Binance’s hot wallets, the largest crypto theft on record.
Bitcoin price held strong but fell about 4% on Friday and more than $1.3 billion in leveraged positions were liquidated. U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs shed $643.3 million that day, their largest single-day outflow since June 25, according to SoSoValue data. Another $399 million left on Monday.
Bitcoin recovered to $78,491 late Sunday before sliding again on Monday and Tuesday. Traders are watching support between $76,264 and $76,476, which lines up with the 200-day exponential moving average. Below that sits the September low of $74,967.
The 50-day EMA near $80,800 is the first resistance above.
The Crypto Fear & Greed Index read 37 on Monday, in “fear” territory.
Oil, Iran and a Fed that can hike
The macro backdrop offers little support. The Fed held rates at 3.75% to 4.00% on Oct. 28 by a 10-2 vote, with two officials dissenting in favor of a hike, after raising rates in September for the first time since July 2023.
Polymarket puts the odds of a December hike near 71%. September PCE inflation ran at 3.6% year over year and third-quarter GDP grew at a 3.4% annualized pace.
The 10-year Treasury yield touched 5.36% in early October, its highest since 2002, before easing to about 4.91% on Monday.
Energy sits at the center of the inflation picture. Brent crude fell 7.7% on Monday to $104.66 a barrel after Iran and the U.S. signaled openness to talks, its biggest one-day drop since July, CNBC reported.
The move reversed in part on Tuesday, with Brent back near $106.60 after reports of a U.S. strike on Iran’s Qeshm Island. Disruption around the Strait of Hormuz has kept crude above $100 and headline inflation elevated, which keeps the Fed on a tightening path.
Equities have added to the pressure. The Nasdaq fell 2.9% on Friday, its worst day since June, after results from Intel and Amazon raised questions about AI capital spending, and lost 5.3% in October. Bitcoin price has moved with technology stocks through the selloff rather than against them.
What comes next for bitcoin price
The calendar is full. The October jobs report lands Friday, with consensus near 65,000 after September’s 29,000. October CPI follows on Nov. 10 and the Fed’s next decision on Dec. 9. Binance’s next proof-of-reserves snapshot is due Wednesday.
Options markets are calm, with Deribit’s DVOL index near 36.5, a sign traders expect no large swings. Seasonality cuts the other way: Bitcoin price fell 36.6% in November 2018 and 16.2% in November 2022, the two most recent midterm years, both during bear markets.
This post Bitcoin Price Trades Near $77,500 as Midterm Voting Begins first appeared on Bitcoin Magazine and is written by Micah Zimmerman .
