Bitcoin surged 8.7% on Wednesday to an intraday high of $69,749, its steepest one-day move since March 4 and its highest price since June 1. The token was last changing hands around $69,328, up 7.40% on the day, as a wave of forced short covering amplified an already sharp move higher.
The rally erased weeks of bearish positioning almost overnight. On Myriad's "BTC next move" prediction market, which wagers on Bitcoin pumping to $84,000 versus dumping to $55,000, odds that had sat near 70% in favor of the $55,000 dump flipped to a near coin toss — 51.9% on the $55,000 outcome against 48.1% on $84,000.
What Triggered the Move
Three catalysts landed in close succession. The U.S. Treasury announced it would at least double the size of its long-end liquidity support buybacks, from a $2 billion cap to at least $4 billion per operation on 10-to-20-year and 20-to-30-year securities, starting September 9 and running through the rest of the refunding quarter. That landed alongside a White House meeting between crypto executives and regulators and a fresh SEC proposal easing registration rules for digital-asset offerings.
Related: Bitcoin, Ethereum Jump as $1.44B in Crypto Shorts Get Liquidated
Shorts Get Run Over
The move triggered $1.14 billion in short-position liquidations across crypto within a single hour, with Bitcoin accounting for $677.64 million of that total, according to Decrypt's tracking. The damage was even larger over the full 24-hour window: data from Coinglass showed more than $2.16 billion in short positions liquidated in a day, with BTC shorts alone responsible for roughly $1.20 billion and more than 148,000 traders caught on the wrong side of the trade. Ethereum climbed back above $2,000 and Solana rose 6.4% as the squeeze spread across the broader market.
Crypto Stocks Follow
Equities tied to the sector moved in tandem. Strategy gained nearly 12%, Coinbase rose 9%, and Circle and BitMine each added roughly 9% to 10%. On the charts, Bitcoin's next resistance sits at $70,284 with $73,245 as a further target, while $68,000 has emerged as the support level that would need to hold to keep the rally intact.
