Most of the altcoins in the broad-market CoinDesk 20 Index fared worse, with Ethereum's ether (ETH} tumbling 6% and, aptos APT) and render (RNDR) each sliding 5%. The CoinDesk 20 itself was down 2.8%. Bitcoin's market dominance, which measures the largest crypto's share of the total crypto market capitalization, rose to a fresh three-year high of 60.2%, TradingView data shows.

The price declines happened alongside a big slide in U.S. stocks, the Nasdaq and the S&P 500 were 2.3% and 1.5% lower, respectively, early in the session, with tech giants Meta (META) and Microsoft (MSFT) dragging the indexes down after disappointing earnings reports.

Digital asset-linked stocks also suffered losses. Crypto exchange Coinbase's (COIN) shares declined 7% after missing earnings targets, while Robinhood (HOOD) tumbled 13%. Bitcoin miners including MARA Digital (MARA), Riot Platforms (RIOT) and Cleanspark (CLSK) tumbled 5%-10%.

MicroStrategy (MSTR), which on Wednesday announced a $42 billion capital raise plan to buy more bitcoin, outperformed, dipping just 2.5%.

Geoffrey Kendrick, head of research of digital assets at Standard Chartered, noted in a morning report that there's a risk of position unwinding ahead of the U.S. election due next week. A dip, however, would be a temporary setback, he said, with prices poised to rise following the election regardless of the results.

The report said a Republican sweep would provide the most bullish scenario for digital assets, with the bank setting a year-end bitcoin price target of $125,000 and altcoins including solana (SOL) standing to benefit from a friendlier regulatory environment.

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Krisztian Sandor

Krisztian Sandor recently graduated from NYU's business and economic reporter program as a Fulbright fellow and worked with Reuters and Forbes previously. Originally from Budapest, Hungary, he is now based in New York. He holds BTC and ETH.