The crypto market suffered a brutal start to June as a broad sell-off swept through major assets. OKX data showed Bitcoin falling to $66,500 while Ethereum breached the $1,900 level with an 8% decline in 24 hours, trading at $1,855. SOL stood at $73, with the downturn spreading across blue chips, altcoins, and crypto-linked equities.
This sell-off triggered the largest wave of leveraged liquidations since February 2025. Total crypto derivatives liquidations exceeded $1.7 billion over 24 hours, with long positions bearing the brunt. Bitcoin-related longs accounted for over $1.5 billion in forced closures. Ethereum's break below the $1,900 psychological level triggered cascading stop-losses and derivatives liquidations across Bitstamp, Binance, and other major exchanges, accelerating the downward momentum.
The move was not a simple spot-market correction. Data showed Bitcoin spot ETFs recorded a single-day net outflow of $483.8 million. On a longer timeframe, May saw a monthly net outflow of $2.3 billion, marking the largest such outflow since 2026 and the worst since November 2025. This starkly contrasts with March and April's net inflows of $1.32 billion and $1.97 billion respectively. The pace of institutional selling far exceeds what the price decline alone would explain. Macro-wise, the crypto market shows an 84% correlation with the Dow Jones Industrial Average, indicating a shared macro-level selling pressure.
Hyperliquid (HYPE) stood out with relative strength amid the market-wide slump. HYPE hit an all-time high of $75.51 on June 2 before retreating to $68 at press time. Despite an approximate 8% decline over the previous 24 hours, it maintained a roughly 15% gain over the past week. HYPE now holds a market cap of around $15.9 billion with $1.54 billion in 24-hour trading volume, ranking 10th among all global crypto assets.
Zcash Rallies Against the Trend, Leading Gains
Zcash (ZEC) emerged as the most dazzling contrarian performer during this period of market turmoil. ZEC posted a 24-hour gain exceeding 7%, hitting an intraday high of $628, briefly rising to 11th place by market capitalization with a total value above $11 billion. The core catalyst for this rally was confirmation in the ZEC Foundation's Q1 report that the SEC had closed its investigation without taking any enforcement action. For a privacy coin project long mired in regulatory uncertainty, this development was interpreted by the market as a major regulatory green light.
Viewed over a longer cycle, ZEC fell to a low of $185 in February 2026 before embarking on a sustained recovery, climbing to a high of $688 in May — a rally exceeding 270%. The number of shielded addresses on its network has grown from 1.47 million in 2024 to 5.11 million currently, reflecting continued growth in on-chain privacy demand. Crypto analyst Ali Martinez noted that a TD Sequential buy signal has been triggered on the 12-hour chart. If ZEC holds the $500 support level, the next target points toward $642. Additionally, governance voting for the Zcash network upgrade NU7 is expected to commence in June 2026.
