BTC Price Holds Steady as Trump Labels Iran Leader ‘Easy Target’

By Francisco Rodrigues (All times ET unless indicated otherwise)

Bitcoin (BTC) is hovering a smidgen under $105,000 having dropped just 1.4% in the past 24 hours as crypto markets balanced the Israel-Iran war with regulatory progress in the U.S.

Tensions in the Middle East are heightening after President Donald Trump called for Iran’s “unconditional surrender” after saying the country’s leader was an “easy target.” Corporate bitcoin buying, however, is underpinning demand, and Senate approval of U.S. stablecoin legislation is seen as a win for the industry.

Trump’s words helped raise the perceived odds of the U.S. entering the conflict to 62% on prediction market Polymarket , up from around 50% a day ago. The perceived odds of U.S. military action against Iran before August are at 73%.

“Despite escalating tensions in the Middle East, BTC is yet to show signs of full-blown panic,” analysts at crypto hedge fund QCP Capital wrote. “BTC’s resilient price action appears underpinned by continued institutional accumulation.”

That accumulation is partly driven by corporate bitcoin treasuries. Strategy, for one, has added over 10,000 BTC with funds from the STRD preferred stock offering, and The Blockchain Group said it added 182 BTC this week. Bitcoin rewards firm Fold has secured a $250 million facility to spend on bitcoin, while Mercury Fintech is planning on raising $800 million for a bitcoin treasury.

“The market seems to have rediscovered its footing, particularly after BTC held above the key psychological threshold of $100k despite the initial shock,” QCP’s analysts said. “Crucially, Friday’s modest 3% pullback paled in comparison to April last year, when BTC fell more than 8% amid similar Iran-Israel turmoil.”

Deribit’s BTC Volatility Index (DVOL) is currently around 40.86, down from over 62 in early April.

The Senate’s approval of the Guiding and Establishing National Innovation for U.S. Stablecoins (GENIUS) Act, the first major piece of crypto legislation to clear the chamber, sends a clear message: U.S. lawmakers are increasingly open to formalizing rules for the industry. Markets interpreted the move as a structural win.

Traders will be watching today’s interest-rate decision from the Federal Reserve for any surprises. According to the CME’s FedWatch tool, markets are nearly certain rates are going to remain unchanged.

That amplifies any fallout from the Iran-Israel conflict, which has now entered the crypto space. The Iranian crypto exchange Nobitex was hacked by a group thought to be linked to Israel just a day after the same group targeted the state-owned Bank Sepah. And in the wider sphere, Iran closing the Strait of Hormuz, a crucial shipping lane, or the U.S. intervening would likely lead to a risk asset sell-off.

“It’s wise to reserve judgement until the U.S. open, where most price discovery has been occurring,” said Jake O., an OTC trader at Wintermute. Stay alert!

What to Watch

• Crypto
  • June 18: At about 9:28 p.m. IoTeX L1 v2.2.0 hard fork will activate at block 36,893,881. The fork will halve block time to 2.5s and launch System Staking v3.
  • June 18: Shares of Purpose Investments’ “Purpose XRP ETF” are expected to start trading on the Toronto Stock Exchange. The ETF will offer Canadian dollar–hedged, Canadian dollar unhedged and U.S. dollar units under the tickers XRPP, XRPP.B and XRPP.U, respectively.
  • June 18: Evolve Funds Group launches Evolve XRP ETF on the Toronto Stock Exchange under tickers XRP (CAD) and XRP.U (USD), offering direct physical XRP exposure without derivatives or currency hedging.
  • June 18, 2025: 3iQ launches the 3iQ XRP ETF on the Toronto Stock Exchange under tickers XRPQ (CAD) and XRPQ.U (USD), debuting with a 0% management fee for six months.
  • June 20: Proof-of-stake blockchain BlackCoin (BLK) activates SegWit on mainnet, improving security and performance. Nodes must be upgraded to release v26.2.0 before this date. Wallets from 13.2 can be used in 26.2.x.
• Macro
  • June 18, 8:30 a.m.: U.S. Department of Labor releases unemployment insurance data for the week ended June 14.
    • Initial Jobless Claims Est. 245K vs. Prev. 248K
  • June 18, 2 p.m.: Federal Reserve announces its interest-rate decision. Rates expected to be held at 4.25%-4.50%. Chair Jerome Powell’s press conference follows at 2:30 p.m.
  • June 18, 5:30 p.m.: Brazil’s central bank, Banco Central do Brasil, announces its interest-rate decision.
    • Selic Rate Est. 14.75% vs. Prev. 14.75%
  • June 19, 7 a.m.: Bank of England (BoE) announces its interest-rate decision.
    • Bank Rate Est. 4.25% vs. Prev. 4.25%
  • June 19, 3 p.m.: Argentina’s National Institute of Statistics and Censuses releases Q1 employment data.
    • Unemployment Rate Prev. 6.4%
• Earnings (Estimates based on FactSet data)
  • June 23 (TBC): HIVE Digital Technologies (HIVE), post-market, $-0.12

Token Events

• Governance votes & calls
• Unlocks
  • June 18: Fasttoken (FTN) to unlock 4.65% of its circulating supply worth $88.80 million.
  • June 30: Optimism (OP) to unlock 1.83% of its circulating supply worth $17.34 million.
  • July 1: Sui (SUI) to unlock 1.3% of its circulating supply worth $120.99 million.
  • July 2: Ethena (ENA) to unlock 0.67% of its circulating supply worth $11.23 million.
• Token Launches
  • June 18: Fartcoin (FART) listed on Binance.US.
  • June 26: Coinbase to delist Helium Mobile (MOBILE), Render (RNDR), Ribbon Finance (RBN) and Synapse (SYN).

Conferences

The CoinDesk Policy & Regulation conference (formerly known as State of Crypto) is a one-day boutique event held in Washington on Sept. 10 that allows general counsels, compliance officers and regulatory executives to meet with public officials responsible for crypto legislation and regulatory oversight.

Token Talk

By Shaurya Malwa

• The Ink Foundation is introducing INK, a native token designed to bootstrap on-chain capital markets with a liquidity-first strategy, starting with a DeFi protocol built on Aave.
• INK will be airdropped to early users, with the foundation pledging measures to limit airdrop farming and maintain long-term alignment.
• The token has a fixed cap of 1 billion and won’t be subject to governance changes or emission tweaks — a move to avoid common dilution concerns.
• Governance of the Ink layer 2 remains separate from the INK token, differentiating it from other Superchain projects that often intertwine protocol and token governance.
• The first utility will be a native liquidity protocol for lending and trading, serving as a foundational DeFi building block on the Ink chain.
• INK will debut amid weak market conditions, with most 2024–25 L2 token launches underperforming as the hype subsides. Examples include Celestia, Linea, and Blast.
• Ink’s DeFi activity remains minimal, with just $7 million in TVL and under $100 in daily revenue — raising questions about product-market fit despite its “product-first” narrative.

Derivatives Positioning

• Perpetual funding rates for major coins are barely positive, indicating a renewed caution among traders.
• BTC and ETH futures basis on the CME remains steady at around 7% and 8%.
• Short-term options on Deribit show a bias for protective puts.
• Top five most traded BTC options on Deribit are all put options at strikes ranging from $90K to $100K, indicating heightened demand for downside protection.

Market Movements

• BTC is up 0.32% from 4 p.m. ET Tuesday at $104,736.41 (24hrs: -1.19%)
• ETH is up 0.59% at $2,526.50 (24hrs: -1.34%)
• CoinDesk 20 is down 0.17% at 3,005.42 (24hrs: -2.01%)
• Ether CESR Composite Staking Rate is up 6 bps at 3.02%
• BTC funding rate is at 0.0048% (5.2834% annualized) on Binance

• DXY is down 0.17% at 98.65
• Gold futures are down 0.19% at $3,400.40
• Silver futures are up 0.47% at $37.33
• Nikkei 225 closed up 0.90% at 38,885.15
• Hang Seng closed down 1.12% at 23,710.69
• FTSE is up 0.18% at 8,850.37
• Euro Stoxx 50 is up 0.11% at 5,294.25
• DJIA closed on Tuesday down 0.70% at 42,215.80
• S&P 500 closed down 0.84% at 5,982.72
• Nasdaq Composite closed down 0.91% at 19,521.09
• S&P/TSX Composite closed down 0.10% at 26,541.39
• S&P 40 Latin America closed down 0.92% at 2,618.36
• U.S. 10-Year Treasury rate is unchanged at 4.38%
• E-mini S&P 500 futures are up 0.32% at 6,004.00
• E-mini Nasdaq-100 futures are up 0.43% at 21,824.75
• E-mini Dow Jones Industrial Average Index are up 0.23% at 42,325.00

Bitcoin Stats

• BTC Dominance: 64.90% (0.13%)
• Ethereum to bitcoin ratio: 0.02403 (0.12%)
• Hashrate (seven-day moving average): 886 EH/s
• Hashprice (spot): $53.1
• Total Fees: 6.26 BTC / $662,109
• CME Futures Open Interest: 153,825 BTC
• BTC priced in gold: 30.6 oz
• BTC vs gold market cap: 8.68%

Technical Analysis

• Chainlink’s LINK token has dropped below the Ichimoku cloud, confirming renewed bearish momentum.
• The immediate support is at around $12.6, the early June low.
• If it drops below that, the price could slide to $10.

Crypto Equities

• Strategy (MSTR): closed on Tuesday at $375.18 (-1.85%), -0.32% at $373.99
• Coinbase Global (COIN): closed at $253.85 (-2.95%), +0.65% at $255.50
• Circle (CRCL): closed at $149.15 (-1.26%), +3.43% at $154.27
• Galaxy Digital Holdings (GLXY): closed at C$25.22 (-4.22%)
• MARA Holdings (MARA): closed at $14.67 (-4.24%), +0.48% at $14.74
• Riot Platforms (RIOT): closed at $9.66 (-5.01%), +0.31% at $9.69
• Core Scientific (CORZ): closed at $11.89 (-1.57%), -0.34% at $11.85
• CleanSpark (CLSK): closed at $8.90 (-7.48%), +0.79% at $8.97
• CoinShares Valkyrie Bitcoin Miners ETF (WGMI): closed at $18.68 (-5.18%)
• Semler Scientific (SMLR): closed at $28.53 (-6.52%), +4.66% at $29.86
• Exodus Movement (EXOD): closed at $30.01 (-8.39%)

ETF Flows

Spot BTC ETFs

• Daily net flows: $216.5 million
• Cumulative net flows: $46.24 billion
• Total BTC holdings ~1.22 million

Spot ETH ETFs

• Daily net flows: $11.1 million
• Cumulative net flows: $3.91 billion
• Total ETH holdings ~3.97 million

Source: Farside Investors

Overnight Flows

Chart of the Day

• The Dollar Index, which tracks the U.S. currency’s value against major peers, looks set to cross above its downtrend line.
• A breakout could weigh on risk assets, including bitcoin.

While You Were Sleeping

In the Ether