More than $190 billion has exited crypto markets over the past 12 hours, sending total capitalization tumbling over 7% to $3.36 trillion.

The crypto crash followed news reports that Israel had launched a missile attack on Iranian nuclear sites in a pre-emptive strike.

Israel has declared a state of emergency, saying the country expected counter-attacks “in the immediate future,” reported the BBC.

Meanwhile, Iranian media claims that residential areas in Tehran were hit and civilians were among those killed.

BREAKING: Iran says it will respond harshly against Israel and the US following tonights attacks.

Crypto Assets Crash

Liquidation data from Coinglass shows that there has been $1 billion in liquidations over the past 12 hours, and almost 250,000 traders were liquidated over the past 24 hours.

More than 90% of those positions were long, and the majority of them were in Bitcoin and Ethereum.

Bitcoin led the losses, tanking hard and fast in a $5,000 dump from an intraday high of $108,350 to bottom out at $103,000 during Asian trading on Friday morning.

The asset found support there and had reclaimed $104,000 at the time of writing, remaining within its six-week range-bound channel.

Ethereum prices crashed more than 9%, tumbling from $2,760 to bottom out at $2,470 in a matter of hours. The asset had crept back over $2,500, where solid support lies at the time of writing.

Altcoins suffered even more pain with Solana getting smashed 12% in a fall back to $140, Dogecoin dumping 10% in a dip to $0.17, and Cardano crashing 9.5% in a slide to $0.62.

Other altcoins deep in the red include Sui, Chainlink, Avalanche, Shiba Inu, and Hedera.

Nevertheless, losses were not so bad for BNB and Tron, which dipped a couple of percentage points.

Total crypto market cap is down 7.9% to $3.34T amid Middle East tensions.

Meme and Layer 2 categories saw the steepest declines, each falling over 12%.

View breakdown here:https://t.co/YqL9362eES pic.twitter.com/58V3Ob712L

Bullish Background Remains

Despite the geopolitical-driven drop, a bullish background prevails, so a rebound could be likely as Bitcoin and its brethren are often seen as safe havens during periods of turmoil.

As geopolitical conflicts rise, investors often flee to fiat-based sovereign debt for ‘safety’. This, of course, is ultimately a mistake, as inevitable money printing and monetary debasement soon follow. Smart investors will flee to assets that cannot be debased. The smartest will buy Bitcoin,” said former hedge fund manager James Lavish.

The pro-crypto narrative from the United States continues to strengthen with the Securities and Exchange Commission withdrawing a tranche of Gary Gensler-era rules on June 12. Additionally, the US and China struck a trade deal this week as tariff tensions eased.

However, benchmark Brent crude oil prices spiked by more than 8% and gold prices ticked up to $3,440 per ounce on the specter of all-out war.