Fed held rates as Bitcoin fell below $71,000

The Federal Open Market Committee maintained the federal funds target range at 3.5%–3.75% on March 18, 2026, as officials raised their inflation outlook and digital-asset markets extended a broad retreat. Bitcoin traded at $71,600 immediately after the 2:00 p.m. EDT announcement and fell below $71,000 later in the session, according to contemporaneous publisher price data.

The decision itself was expected. The more important signal for risk markets was that persistent inflation and uncertainty surrounding energy supplies left the Federal Reserve unwilling to commit to faster easing. For crypto investors, that preserved a relatively restrictive cost-of-capital environment at a moment when bitcoin was already losing momentum.

Inflation complicated the policy path

The FOMC said economic activity continued to expand at a solid pace, while job gains remained low and inflation was still somewhat elevated. Eleven officials supported holding the target range. Stephen Miran dissented in favor of a quarter-percentage-point reduction.

The accompanying Summary of Economic Projections raised the median forecast for 2026 personal-consumption-expenditures inflation to 2.7%, measured from the fourth quarter of 2025 through the fourth quarter of 2026. The comparable December 2025 projection had been 2.4%. The median core PCE projection rose to 2.7% from 2.5% on the same fourth-quarter-to-fourth-quarter basis.

Officials nevertheless retained a median projected year-end 2026 federal funds rate of 3.4%, unchanged from December. That projection represented the midpoint of each participant’s individually assessed appropriate rate and was neither a binding decision nor a guaranteed rate path.

Chair Jerome Powell said estimates based on available consumer-price and other data indicated that total PCE prices had increased 2.8% over the 12 months ending in February 2026, while core PCE had increased 3.0%. He attributed part of the pressure to goods prices affected by tariffs and said higher energy prices associated with Middle East supply disruptions would lift near-term inflation. Powell also emphasized that the duration and economic consequences remained uncertain.

Bitcoin’s decline began before the statement

CoinDesk reported bitcoin at $71,600 in the moments after the decision, down nearly 4% during the session. By 4:26 p.m. EDT, The Block reported that bitcoin had fallen about 5% to below $71,000 after briefly reaching $76,000 on March 17.

The Block’s price data also showed ether, solana and dogecoin down between 5% and 6%, while its GMCI 30 index of large crypto assets was approximately 5% lower. Its estimate placed the reduction in total cryptocurrency market value at more than $100 billion over the 24 hours ending near its publication time.

Those figures are venue- and publisher-dependent snapshots, not official daily settlements or calculations from a single consolidated cryptocurrency tape. Crypto trades continuously across exchanges, so prices and percentage changes vary with the selected venue, index methodology, currency pair and cutoff time.

The chronology also limits the causal conclusion: much of bitcoin’s decline occurred before the FOMC announcement. The record supports saying the sell-off accompanied the decision and continued as markets processed the projections and Powell’s remarks. It does not establish that the rate hold alone caused the entire move.

Why the macro signal mattered

Bitcoin’s reaction illustrated how strongly digital-asset valuations remained connected to dollar liquidity, interest-rate expectations and the broader appetite for risk. Holding rates steady was not a crypto-specific policy action, but a delayed or reduced easing cycle could increase the relative appeal of cash and interest-bearing instruments while tightening financing conditions for leveraged positions and digital-asset companies.

The March 18 evidence therefore showed a market repricing around inflation and policy uncertainty, not a change to Bitcoin’s protocol or supply schedule. The FOMC had not promised its next move, and the session’s losses did not determine the market’s subsequent direction.