Bitcoin (BTC), Ethereum (ETH), XRP, and others continued to fall despite U.S. President Donald Trump changing his stance on imposing 100% tariffs on Chinese imports.

On Oct. 16, in a conversation with Fox Business, Trump acknowledged the potential economic strain of imposing steep tariffs on Chinese imports. When asked about the combined effect of a proposed 100% tariff on top of existing duties, totaling 157%, Trump admitted, “It’s not sustainable.”

BARTIROMO: If you put that 100% tariff on top of what's in place already, you'd have a 157% tariff on China. What is that gonna do to the economy?

TRUMP: It's not sustainable, but that's what the number is. It's probably not. You know, it could stand. But they forced me to do… pic.twitter.com/7B9lznyW4o

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) October 17, 2025

Despite this, the downward trend in the broader crypto market, which began on Oct. 10, did not change.

The trend was triggered by Trump announcing his plans to impose 100% tariffs on all Chinese goods in Truth Social. Major cryptocurrencies nosedived, creating over $19 billion in liquidation in merely hours of the post going live. Binance, Coinbase, and other exchanges experienced heavy disruptions as panic spread among traders.

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As per Kraken, at the time of writing, BTC slipped 4.9% in 24 hours to around $104,900. ETH dropped 6.2% to $3,747, while Solana (SOL) was down by 7.2% and was trading at $178.82.

XRP was down by 5.9% to $2.26 and Dogecoin (DOGE) was trading 7.6% lower at $0.181.

This story was originally reported by TheStreet on Oct 17, 2025, where it first appeared in the Trading News & Analysis section. Add TheStreet as a Preferred Source by clicking here.