Bitcoin rallies back above $70,000 as Iran calls Trump a liar over claims of “productive talks”

Trump kept pushing the idea that the U.S. is close to some kind of deal with Iran, even as Tehran publicly rejected his version of events and said no talks happened at all.

In a phone call with CNBC, Trump allegedly said the U.S. was serious about getting a deal done with Iran.

Later on Monday morning, he doubled down in comments to reporters in Palm Beach, Florida, saying the two sides had already held strong talks and made major progress, including on the issue of Iran never getting a nuclear weapon.

Trump also said his son-in-law Jared Kushner and U.S. envoy Steve Witkoff took part in talks on Sunday evening with what he described as a top Iranian figure.

He said both sides want an agreement and suggested another conversation could happen later that day, likely by phone, because travel is difficult right now. He also said an in-person meeting could happen very soon.

He made it clear the next five days matter. Trump said that if the pause in strikes holds up and things go well, both sides could end up settling the conflict. He also said Israel would likely be pleased with the progress so far.

At the same time, he tied that possible deal directly to the Strait of Hormuz. Trump said the waterway could reopen very soon if this process works.

When he was asked who would control it, he floated the idea of some kind of joint control involving himself and Iran’s supreme leadership, and linked that to what he called a very serious form of regime change.

Money was still coming into crypto investment products last week, but the pace cooled off fast once the Fed meeting hit and markets turned jumpy again.

The week started strong. In the first two days alone, inflows reached $635 million. Then the mood flipped. After the FOMC meeting, investors pulled out $405 million, though the pressure eased quite a bit by Friday. Even with that swing, total net inflows for the week still came in at $230 million.

The U.S. led with $153 million in inflows. Germany brought in $30.2 million, and Switzerland added $27.5 million. What stands out is that every region still ended the week positive, even with the sell-off and all the cross-market chaos.

Bitcoin pulled in the most cash by far, with $219 million in inflows. At the same time, products that bet against Bitcoin still saw $6 million come in, which tells you the market is still split right down the middle. Some traders are still buying the dip, while others are still leaning hard into more downside.

Solana kept drawing demand too. It took in $17 million last week, marking its seventh straight week of inflows and bringing that run to $136 million in total.

Ethereum went the other way, with $27.5 million in outflows, ending a three-week streak of inflows. Chainlink added $4.6 million, while Hyperliquid saw $4.5 million come in.

Under the surface, positioning stayed tense. Open interest stood at $103.48 billion, up 1.44%. Liquidations hit $793.66 million, a jump of 123.81%. The average RSI was 48.35, which still reads neutral.

The Altcoin Season Index sat at 53, also neutral. Bitcoin dominance rose 0.59% to 58.44%, while Bitcoin exchange balance fell by 7.67K to 2.46 million. The Fear & Greed Index dropped to 9, which is deep in extreme fear.

Then the market got another shock. About $265 million worth of crypto shorts were wiped out in just 15 minutes after President Donald Trump said he had a productive talk with Iran about ending the war.

After that, spot gold recovered and traded roughly 2% lower, though it had earlier crashed as much as 8.8% in early London trading, adding to the brutal losses already seen since the war started.

Then came the pushback. Iran flatly rejected Donald’s version of events. Iranian officials said there had been no direct or indirect contact with him.

They said he was trying to buy time in the war, claimed he backed away from strikes on power plants after Iran’s firm warning, called his comments psychological warfare, and said Hormuz would not return to pre-war conditions as long as that psychological warfare continued.

Bitcoin bounced after U.S. President Donald Trump said he would delay strikes on Iranian energy plants and other energy infrastructure for five days, giving markets a break after the earlier wave of panic selling.

After that comment, Bitcoin rose alongside Treasuries and U.S. stock futures. The biggest cryptocurrency climbed as much as 4.8% and was trading around $70,800 as of 7:20 a.m. in New York.

The relief move was not limited to Bitcoin. Smaller tokens moved higher too, with Ether and Solana joining the rebound as risk appetite came back into the market.

The broader crypto board showed that shift clearly. BTC traded at $70,878.8, up 3.71%. Its derivatives volume stood at $72.13 billion, up 65.24%.

Market capitalization was $1.42 trillion, while spot volume came in at $47.65 billion, up 2.94%. Other listed flow metrics showed gains of 2.64%, with liquidations at $247 million.

ETH traded at $2,173.55, up 4.76%. Derivatives volume was $57.48 billion, up 60.92%. Market cap stood at $263.17 billion, spot volume was $29.44 billion, up 4.72%, another flow metric rose 6.07%, and liquidations reached $183.28 million.

SOL changed hands at $90.74, up 4.21%. Derivatives volume was $12.38 billion, up 45.46%. Market cap came in at $52.07 billion, spot volume was $5.17 billion, up 7.35%, another trading metric added 6.38%, and liquidations were $20.83 million.

Other major tokens also moved up. XRP traded at $1.432, up 3.20%. DOGE rose 3.35% to $0.09408. BNB gained 3.08% to $647.51. BCH added 2.70% to $479.53. SUI climbed 3.37% to $0.9515. HYPE rose 1.24% to $38.39.

At the same time, Brent crude went the other way. The global benchmark dropped more than 14% to $96 a barrel before trimming part of that fall, which fits the idea that markets were quickly pricing out some of the immediate war-risk premium after Trump’s delay.

Even XAU stayed weak on the board. It traded at $4,406.16, down 1.66%. Its derivatives volume was $8.81 billion, up a massive 2,042.43%, while market cap was listed at $573.99 million and one of its tracked volume metrics was down 24.77%.

The bond market is breaking one of the usual rules of panic.

When war risk rises, government debt often catches a bid because investors want somewhere defensive to park money. That is not what this market is doing. Instead, the Iran war has fed fears of stagflation, and that has pushed borrowing costs higher while prices across markets stay under pressure.

So far in March, more than $2.5 trillion has been wiped from the value of global bonds. That puts the market on track for its worst monthly loss in more than three years.

The drop is still smaller than the roughly $11.5 trillion already erased from global equities, but that is not really the point. What makes this stand out is that debt has been falling during a geopolitical shock, when it would normally be expected to hold up better.

A Bloomberg index tracking government, corporate and securitized debt shows the total market value of that universe has fallen to $74.4 trillion from almost $77 trillion at the end of February.

If that holds, it would be the biggest monthly decline since September 2022, when the Federal Reserve was still deep in its aggressive rate-hiking cycle. In percentage terms, the index is down 3.1% this month.

In the United States, Treasury yields have climbed to their highest levels in months after a third straight week of bond losses. The move reflects growing bets that the Fed may have to keep tightening to deal with inflation pressure tied to the war and the wider commodity shock.

The same pressure is showing up across Asia. Government bond yields have moved higher in India, Japan, and South Korea.

In Australia, the 10-year yield rose on Monday to its highest level since 2011. In New Zealand, the 10-year yield is now at its highest level since May 2024.

European markets look set to open sharply lower after Asia’s sell-off ripped through the start of the new trading week and kept pressure on global sentiment as the Iran war escalated again.

In early pricing from IG, the FTSE 100 in London was seen opening 1% lower. Germany’s DAX was called down 1.5%, France’s CAC 40 was also seen falling 1.4%, and Italy’s FTSE MIB was on track to open 1.5% lower.

The damage was not limited to equities. Gold had already suffered its worst week since September 2011, falling almost 10% last week alone. In the spot market, gold has now dropped roughly 25% since hitting a record high of $5,594.92 an ounce at the end of January.

Silver kept sliding too. Spot silver was down 8.3% at $62.24, which put it at a year-to-date low and nearly half of the $117 level it reached on February 28, when the Iran war began. In futures trading, silver was down even more, falling 11.7% on Monday to $61.66.

Other precious metals were hit as well. Platinum futures plunged 10.6% to $1,760.90, while palladium fell 6.7% to $1,347.50.

Bitcoin has once again crashed all the below $68,000 as investors reacted to the latest escalation around Iran, with Donald Trump’s deadline for Iran to reopen the Strait of Hormuz now just 17 hours away.

Gold followed Bitcoin’s lead and dropped straight into a bear market, now down 22% from its record high, while gold and silver erased a combined $2 trillion in market value in just three hours.

One possible explanation for the crash is that a large player is being liquidated. But the bigger issue may be the steady climb in the 10-year Treasury yield, which has reached 4.40% after rising 45 basis points in just three weeks.

Higher yields are starting to pressure multiple asset classes at once. Add in headline fatigue and pockets of illiquidity, and price gaps in both directions are getting bigger.

By Monday, the pressure was visible across global markets. U.S. stock futures fell after Washington’s latest warning to Iran, coming after the major U.S. indexes had already logged a fourth straight weekly decline. Dow futures fell 0.44%, S&P 500 futures lost 0.58%, and Nasdaq-100 futures dropped 0.69%.

Crude was also swinging sharply. Brent reversed earlier losses and rose 0.88% to $111 a barrel as of press time, while WTI gained 0.8% to $99 a barrel, per data from TradigView.

Over in Asia, we see the Japan’s Nikkei 225 has plunged by nearly 5%, while the Topix lost 4.4% and South Korea’s Kospi plunged more than 6% and its Kosdaq dropped nearly 5%. Trading was actually briefly suspended after Kospi 200 futures fell by more than 5%. Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 declined 2.4%, while Hong Kong’s Hang Seng and mainland China’s CSI 300 both fell nearly 2% at the open.