Bitcoin's $70K Warning: Hayes Sees Unattractive CME Yield Driving Sell-Off

Bitcoin [BTC] has been on a rollercoaster ride in 2025, retesting its range-lows of $91k for the fourth time and extending its losses to 16% from its record high of $109.5K in January. While some analysts see this as a typical mid-bull run reset, others, like Arthur Hayes, Founder of BitMEX and CIO at crypto fund Maelstrom, warn that BTC's troubles could be far from over.

In a recent post on X (formerly Twitter), Hayes claimed that BTC could drop to $70K due to unattractive CME Futures 'yield', which could prompt unwinding by large funds. He shared a chart indicating that the current short-term U.S. treasuries were yielding 4.3%, but the BTC CME basis has declined post-U.S. elections, and the ETH CME trade offered comparatively outsized returns.

Last week, K33 Research analyst Vetle Lunde noted that the CME BTC Futures basis (monthly) had dropped to pre-bull market levels seen in late 2023. The Futures basis is the difference between the BTC Futures and spot index prices, with a high positive number suggesting bullish sentiment and a declining or negative number indicating muted or negative sentiment.

Bitfinex analysts linked BTC's woes to macro uncertainty, which affected the U.S. equity market as well. They noted that the downturn has been exacerbated by macro-driven uncertainty and Bitcoin's increasing correlation with traditional markets. The analysts added that the S&P 500's faltering dampened risk appetite across the board, including BTC.

Amid the fears and sell-off, Chris Burniske, a partner at crypto VC Placeholder, maintained that the pullback was a typical mid-bull run reset seen in 2021. He stated that in the middle of 2021, BTC drew down 56%, and the mid-bull reset we're going through isn't unprecedented.

From a fundamental perspective, BTC's overheated levels above 2 on the Market Value to Realized Value ratio (MVRV) indicate a similar pattern to the early 2024 local top. If history repeats, a cycle top could be observed if the MVRV