Bitcoin traded near $71,200 on Thursday evening after sliding to a fresh session low around $71,000, according to Bitcoin Magazine Pro data. U.S. equities closed modestly lower and the 10-year Treasury yield held above 5%, with pressure intensifying after Nvidia said Chief Executive Jensen Huang had resigned.

The retreat began early. Bitcoin slipped below $72,000 before the opening bell and fell to roughly $71,150 shortly after 10 a.m. Eastern. A rebound attempt later faded, and the asset printed a new session low near $71,000 at around 6:23 p.m., its weakest level since Aug. 20. The price now stands approximately $30,400 below where bitcoin closed one year ago.

Stocks End Lower as Yields Weigh on Bitcoin

The Nasdaq Composite slipped 0.39% to 25,366.09, the S&P 500 lost 0.35% to 7,592.40, and the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 0.36% to 52,297.09, Reuters reported. Nvidia shares finished 4.3% lower at $166.19, off the day's lows, after the company announced that Huang had resigned as president, chief executive and board member, effective immediately, and that Chief Financial Officer Colette Kress had been named interim CEO.

Bitcoin-linked stocks had a tougher session. Strategy (MSTR) — which MSCI is removing from its USA Index at the Nov. 30 close, a type of deletion that typically requires funds tracking the index to exit the position — finished at $114.41, down 6.5%. Shares of BlackRock's iShares Bitcoin Trust (IBIT), a spot bitcoin exchange-traded fund that recorded $2 billion in outflows over nine consecutive days through Wednesday, closed at $40.36, down 4.5%.

The bond market drove much of the afternoon's selling. The 10-year Treasury yield rose about 12 basis points to 5.105% and touched 5.12%, its highest level since Oct. 21, after President Donald Trump said the United States does not need a deal with Iran, Reuters reported. The two-year yield, the tenor most closely tied to Federal Reserve expectations, climbed about 14 basis points to 4.867%. Brent crude settled 3.3% higher at $95.82 a barrel as attacks on Saudi energy infrastructure escalated.

Fed Hike Bets, a $404 Billion Deficit and a Busy Evening for Crypto

Elevated yields reflect a market that still expects the Fed to tighten policy again next month. Fed funds futures are pricing in 29 basis points of hikes for December, with a quarter-point move as the base case and only slim odds of a half-point step, Reuters reported. Rising rates increase the cost of holding an asset that pays no interest, a dynamic that has weighed on the bitcoin price all week.

The Treasury Department added a fiscal note after the close. The federal government ran a $404 billion deficit in October, the first month of fiscal 2027, per the Treasury Department — up 42% from $284 billion a year earlier, as receipts fell to $369 billion and outlays rose to $773 billion, a gap the government covers by issuing new Treasury debt. The figure was also boosted by the timing shift of some benefit payments that would normally have been made on Nov. 1, a Sunday, into October.

The evening also delivered a cluster of crypto headlines. The U.S. Justice Department said it has court authority to seize or restrain more than $1.2 billion in cryptocurrency stolen from Binance during October's North Korea-linked heist, part of a freeze that officials said halted about half the breach. In a separate announcement, Binance said it has fully covered the $6.34 billion in user losses using company funds.

Jane Street's quarterly 13F filing — the public disclosure large institutional investment managers must submit each quarter showing their U.S. equity holdings — showed the firm had raised its Strategy stake by 54% as of Sept. 30, though large options positions point to hedging rather than a straight bet. After the close, Gemini reported third-quarter revenue of $40.9 million, down 19%, as platform trading volume fell 73%; the company's net loss narrowed 63% to $58.6 million.

None of those announcements lifted bitcoin off its session lows. Friday's Producer Price Index, a gauge of inflation at the wholesale level, is the next inflation test, and Nvidia remains scheduled to report quarterly results on Nov. 17 under its interim leadership.

At the time of writing, bitcoin trades near $71,200.

This article first appeared on Bitcoin Magazine and was written by Micah Zimmerman.