Bitcoin (BTC) traded above $79,000 Monday morning Asia time as markets around East Asia opened to chaos and carnage as the global sell-off continued.

The CoinDesk 20 (CD20), a measure of the performance of the largest digital assets, is down 8%.

Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index is down over 8% during mid-morning trading, while Shanghai’s SSE Composite Index is down 7%, and the Taipei’s TAIEX is down 9%.

Major tech stocks across the region were some of the hardest hit. Alibaba shares in Hong Kong were down 12% while Tencent was down 9%. In Taipei, TSMC stocks dipped 10% in the first few minutes of trading, triggering the exchange’s price variation limit which halts trading in either direction.

TSMC’s correction comes as the White House says that semiconductors from Taiwan are exempt from tariffs, but the future of the CHIPS Act – which bankrolled the construction of semiconductor factories in the U.S. – is in question.

TSMC’s major correction on market open is likely foreshadowing of Nvidia’s open in the U.S. Some analysts say NVDA has become more volatile than BTC or ETH.

Elsewhere in crypto, Ethereum (ETH) is down 11% on-day, XRP is down 9%, and Solana’s SOL is down 10%.

Lending protocols Maker (MKR) and Aave (AAVE) were some of the worst performers on the market, down around 14% each.

Liquidation data from CoinGlass shows that in the last 12 hours around $675 million in long positions have been liquidated, compared to $123 million in shorts.

TRUMP, the Presidential meme coin, is down 13% according on CoinDesk data, putting it behind lending protocol majors as one of the market laggards.

«Decoupling» and «safe haven» began to be used late last week as bitcoin (BTC) held its own despite the continuing tumble in stock markets in response to President Trump’s sweeping tariffs against U.S. trading partners.

Bitcoin bulls, though, may have spoken too soon.

With stock trading closed for the weekend, fearful investors turned to the 24/7 crypto markets to place bearish bets. In late Sunday afternoon action, bitcoin was trading just above $79,000 down 5% from 24 hours earlier. As stock index futures began trading later Sunday with the Nasdaq 100 opening down 5% and S&P 500 4.5%, bitcoin fell as low as $78,400.

Other majors are faring far worse, among them ether (ETH), lower by 11% to $1,590 and solana (SOL), down 10% to $107.

The term «black monday» is trending on X — a reference to Monday October 19, 1987, when the Dow Jones Industrial Average lost nearly one quarter of its value in one session. Back then, the triggering event was the threat of a currency war by then Secretary of Treasury James Baker.

«If we launch economic nuclear war on every country in the world, business investment will grind to a halt, consumers will close their wallets and pocket books, and we will severely damage our reputation with the rest of the world that will take years and potentially decades to rehabilitate,» tweeted hedge fund billionaire Bill Ackman, who previously had been at least modestly supportive of President Trump. «The President has an opportunity on Monday to call a time out and have the time to execute on fixing an unfair tariff system,» he continued. «Alternatively, we are heading for a self-induced, economic nuclear winter, and we should start hunkering down.»

The 10-year Treasury yield is down 14 basis points from its Friday close at 3.85%.

Updated (22:05 UTC): Added early stock and bond market trading.

Cathie Wood’s ARK Investment Management took advantage of the $5.4 trillion U.S. equities market sell-off and purchased over 83,000 shares of Coinbase (COIN), increasing exposure to the crypto exchange even as prices dipped sharply across the board.

The total shares purchased were worth more than $13 million, taking Friday’s closing price for Coinbase.

According to ARK’s daily trading disclosure for April 4, Wood’s flagship ARK Innovation ETF (ARKK) bought nearly 55,000 Coinbase shares, with additional purchases coming from the ARK Next Generation Internet ETF (ARKW) and the ARK Fintech Innovation ETF (ARKF).

The timing is notable. Coinbase shares have slipped more than 12% during the market rout, while bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies showed resilience. The CoinDesk 20 (CD20) index dropped by 5.8% in the same period. The sell-off came after U.S. President Donald Trump unveiled his reciprocal tariffs against nearly every country in the world.

Read more: Bitcoin Begins to Decouple From Nasdaq as U.S. Stocks Crumble