CoinDesk 20 Index: 3,615.62 -5.07%
Bitcoin (BTC): $97,255.52 -1.08%
Ether (ETH): $3,697.32 -3.39%
S&P 500: 6,052.85 -0.61%
Gold: $2,674.78 +0.45%
Nikkei 225: 39,367.58 0.53%

Bitcoin's bull-bear tug-of-war continues to rage, with prices recovering to over $97,000 from Monday's dip to $94,200. That slide was prompted by concern Google's new quantum-computing chip, Willow, could compromise BTC's security — a worry quickly dismissed by analysts. That leaves directional traders with little to do other than wait for the dust to settle before picking a side as prices remain locked in Thursday's indecisive trading range. BTC is trading less than 1.5% lower at around $97,300. The largest crypto asset has outperformed the broader digital asset market, which has fallen over 5%, as measured by the CoinDesk 20 Index.

Major tokens and midcaps registered one of their worst days in recent months with a sharp drop during early Asian hours on Tuesday. XRP, DOGE and ADA fell as much as 15% in the past 24 hours as selling pressure mounted in late U.S. hours and amplified in early Asian time. Ethereum's ETH and Solana’s SOL fell 7% while Tron's TRX reversed nearly all of last week’s gains with a 17% slide. The declines followed Google's announcement of benchmark tests on its new Willow quantum computing chip — which led to market concerns about what it meant for crypto privacy and wallet security.

November was a monumental month for the crypto market in terms of performance, activity, politics and sentiment, JPMorgan said in a research report Monday. The bank noted that the crypto ecosystem posted its best monthly return, with total market cap rising a record 45% to $3.3 trillion. Volumes across the crypto market more than doubled, with some digital assets witnessing even higher growth in trading activity, the report said. The U.S. spot ETPs the bank tracks also witnessed record monthly net sales, around $7.6 billion combined. Bitcoin ETPs grew in both size and trading volume and, while these products are not eating away at BTC spot trading volumes, the "ecosystem continues to trend increasingly concentrated around bitcoin," the authors wrote.

BlackRock's spot bitcoin ETF (IBIT) dropped on Tuesday as the overheated crypto market cooled, falling 5.3% to $54.73, the biggest single-day drop since early August, according to data source Investing.com.

While such pullbacks are typical in a bull market, Monday's losses are noteworthy because they came alongside Google's announcement of its Willow quantum-computing chip, which can solve in just five minutes a problem that would take the world's fastest supercomputers 10 septillion years to process.

Though it's unclear whether the quantum FUD drove BTC and IBIT lower, the damage seems to have been done, according to technical charts.

While IBIT clocked a new high on Friday, the 14-day relative strength index (RSI), hinted at a bearish divergence, a warning that the rally is running out of steam.

Monday's drop confirmed the bearish divergence, signaling deeper losses ahead, with support at $51.54, the Nov. 26 low. A move above Thursday's high of $59.16 is needed to invalidate that outlook.

- Omkar Godbole