"Bitcoin surged past $68,000 and then broke above $69,000 in a powerful rally," the trader ChangHwan Kim posted on X. "Approximately $1.29 billion in short positions [were] liquidated within one hour."
Bitcoin ran from a $64,124 low to above $69,000 in hours, its steepest one-day climb since March.
"The same afternoon the US Treasury announced it will double its long bond buybacks," the trader timoassi posted on X.
Named Predictions
"Investors should now be positioning for a move [to] USD $100,000 by year-end 2026," said Geoff Kendrick, Standard Chartered's head of digital assets research.
He called the Treasury's move "exactly the type of thing Bitcoin loves."
Kendrick isn't calling a new top. Standard Chartered cut its year-end target from $150,000 to $100,000 in February, its second downward revision in three months, and pushed a $500,000 call from 2028 to 2030.
"When bad news stops moving the price, the sellers are exhausted," the trading account WOLF_Financial posted, framing it as a rule Bitwise's Matt Hougan watches for.
"Bitcoin Surges Above $68K–$69K on Treasury Buybacks," the markets account kyle_kim_tg summarized. "Standard Chartered analyst flagged potential path to $100K by year-end."
Why The Treasury Buyback Matters For Bitcoin
"$298 million of ETF inflows revers[ed] a three-day outflow streak," the trader bit_golder posted, putting bitcoin back at $68,565.
Treasury doubled its long-end buybacks to at least $4 billion per operation, running September 9 through November 4, in a market where liquidity was already thin.
"The biggest catalyst this week is still the FOMC minutes," the trader nelanontwtt posted two days earlier. "Any real shift in the language around further rate hikes... has the potential to move Bitcoin and the majors more than most of the other stuff combined."
The Fed Minutes Said Something Different
The minutes, once they landed, leaned hawkish. The Fed held rates at 3.50%-3.75% on a fractured 9-3 vote.
"Will we see a liquidity grab higher before the next leg down?" the chartist ZKChartAnalyst asked on X, flagging $68,000 to $70,000 as a zone thick with retail longs.
Cleveland's Beth Hammack, Minneapolis's Neel Kashkari and Dallas's Lorie Logan dissented for a hike, citing fears that AI-driven demand could entrench inflation.
"I'm expecting a dump to $62K first in the short term, before any major upside move," the trader DynamoXDD posted on X, echoing Forbes' Glassnode warning toward $58,500 just a day earlier.
What Watchers Say
"I've been bearish $BTC for a long time but todays Treasury announcement is a decent catalyst," the trader relentlessbid posted, adding that with volatility compressed and pessimism peaking, "there is a recipe for a proper suckers rally... but given the asymmetry it's just worth the risk." It's bitcoin's second squeeze in as many days.
Standard Chartered's $100,000 stays the most-cited bitcoin price prediction, versus YouTube's Bitcoin News Alerts $1 million call for 2031, best treated as entertainment.
What's Next
"Bitcoin is the trade," the analyst NaeemAslam23 posted on X after the move. "Holding above $68,000 keeps buyers in control."
"We saw this bounce for sell coming months ago. Nothing new. Btc is bearish," the trader _sol_moonboy countered on X.
Kendrick has flagged $65,500 as the level that needs to hold to confirm the low is in.