Bitcoin suffered a sudden flash crash on Sunday night, losing over 3% within minutes. The selloff was triggered by a single whale who unloaded 24,000 BTC and redirected billions into Ethereum.
The global cryptocurrency market turned red overnight as Bitcoin slid from $114,790 to $110,680 in a matter of minutes. The move represented a sharp 3.58% decline within 15 minutes, catching traders off guard.
By Monday morning, panic spread across investor circles, with many searching for the reason behind the flash crash.
Within minutes, order books across major exchanges showed heavy slippage, pushing Bitcoin’s price sharply lower. While the selloff stemmed from a single entity, its sheer scale underscored how concentrated holdings can still drive global market direction.
Massive Shift Toward Ethereum
The whale’s activity was not limited to offloading Bitcoin. On-chain trackers show that the whale quickly rotated the funds into Ethereum. Reports indicate that roughly $2 billion worth of ETH was purchased, while another $1.3 billion was locked into staking contracts soon after.
Despite offloading thousands of Bitcoin, the whale still controls 152,874 BTC, a holding valued at more than $17 billion at current prices.
JUST IN: #Bitcoin flash crash today, which wiped out $310M in long positions, has been traced to a SINGLE Bitcoin whale dumping BTC for ETH.
The whale sold 24,000+ BTC, including coins that hadn’t moved in 5+ years, sending 12,000+ #BTC today alone to the Hyperunite trading… pic.twitter.com/h5jEt92Sys
— Jacob King (@JacobKinge) August 24, 2025
Market Panic Knocks Ethereum Off Fresh Highs
The whale-driven turmoil unfolded just as Ethereum set a new all-time high of $4,953. The milestone briefly fueled excitement across the crypto community, with ETH nearing the symbolic $5,000 mark for the first time.
Yet the celebration was short-lived. Panic rippled through the market after Bitcoin’s flash crash, and Ethereum quickly lost its footing.
Within hours, the price retreated 6.56% to $4,646, wiping away much of the fresh record. The sudden reversal highlighted how tightly linked Ethereum’s momentum remains to Bitcoin’s stability.
Even so, Ethereum continues to outperform on a weekly scale, standing about 9% higher over the past seven days.
Liquidations Wipe Out Thousands of Traders
The turbulence had a severe ripple effect across the crypto derivatives market. According to liquidation trackers, the sudden price swings erased $660 million in positions. In total, 141,308 traders were liquidated within hours of the event.
Bitcoin long positions faced the heaviest losses, with $236.4 million wiped out, while Ethereum longs lost $215.4 million. Smaller altcoins also saw liquidations, though to a lesser degree.
The bulk of the liquidations came from overleveraged long positions. Many traders had bet heavily on further gains. When prices fell sharply, stop-losses and forced liquidations cascaded across multiple exchanges, deepening the selloff.
As of publication, Bitcoin recovered slightly to $111,948, still 2.57% lower over the past 24 hours. As of press time, Ethereum is trading at $4,628, down 3.13% over the past 24 hours.