Major coins are plummeting: Solana crashes 30%+ to ~$14, bitcoin drops 14%+ to below $17,000, a new low since November 2020, and ether drops 17%+ to ~$1,200
Context & Ripple Effects
This is day two of a two-day rout: the previous session saw Solana down 40%+ to under $17 and ether down 20%+ (Solana crashed 40%+ to under $17), and today extends the slide with bitcoin breaking below $17,000 for the first time since November 2020. It echoes the June 2022 washout, when the same three coins fell in lockstep and the total market cap dropped below $1 trillion (market cap fell below $1T).
First-order effects
- Solana holders bear the sharpest losses of the three majors, with the token crashing over 30% to around $14 after already losing 40%+ the day before.
- Bitcoin's drop below $17,000 wipes out more than two years of price appreciation, marking its lowest level since November 2020.
Second-order effects
- The selling does not stop here: within two weeks, coverage shows bitcoin sinking below $16K and ether to ~$1.1K, dragged by the FTX saga, a hacker offloading ether, and potential contagion (bitcoin sinks under $16K amid FTX contagion).
- Ether's decline compounds as hacked funds are actively sold into the market, adding forced supply on top of panic selling.
Third-order effects
- The recurring pattern — synchronized double-digit drops across bitcoin, ether, and Solana in both the June 2022 and November 2022 episodes — points to crypto behaving as one correlated risk-asset complex rather than three independent markets, so any macro or platform shock reprices all majors at once.
The trend: Crypto's major coins are consolidating into a single high-beta risk trade, where each macro or exchange-solvency shock produces simultaneous deep drawdowns across bitcoin, ether, and Solana.