Bitcoin rallied sharply after the U.S. Treasury announced it would double the size of its longer-dated bond buybacks, briefly touching $70,000 for the first time since June before settling slightly lower in early Thursday trading.
In after-hours trading Wednesday, the cryptocurrency jumped from around $64,000 to as high as $70,000. By early Thursday, bitcoin was changing hands at $69,931.49, up about 1%. The move marked its steepest one-day climb since March, with prices rising from a low of $64,124 to above $69,000.
The rally was part of a broad cryptocurrency advance. Ether surged 18% to above $2,250 in Asian trading, while Solana gained more than 10%, XRP rose 10% and Dogecoin added nearly 8%.
The U.S. Treasury said it was expanding its buyback program for longer-dated securities from $2 billion to $4 billion per operation to improve liquidity in the government bond market. Falling Treasury yields helped ease pressure across financial markets and encouraged investors to rotate into riskier assets, including cryptocurrencies.
The upswing also received a boost from President Donald Trump’s call for Congress to advance the Digital Asset Market Clarity Act, which would establish a regulatory framework for the cryptocurrency industry.
Forced buying by traders who had bet on lower prices amplified the advance. More than $1 billion in short positions were liquidated within about an hour during the sharpest part of the move, according to market data. Trader ChangHwan Kim posted on X that bitcoin broke above $68,000 and then $69,000, with approximately $1.29 billion in shorts liquidated in a single hour.
Crypto-linked equities rallied as well, with Coinbase up 10%, Strategy up 13% and Circle up 10%. Trader bit_golder noted that $298 million in ETF inflows reversed a three-day outflow streak, lifting bitcoin back to $68,565.
On August 20, bitcoin held near $69,000 in early trading, extending the rally into a second day. The advance marked a reversal from earlier August, when inflation concerns, government borrowing costs and uncertainty over the Federal Reserve’s rate path weighed on demand for volatile assets.
Geoff Kendrick, head of digital assets research at Standard Chartered, said investors should position for a move to $100,000 by the end of 2026. He called the Treasury buyback expansion “exactly the type of thing Bitcoin loves.” The bank had earlier cut its year-end target from $150,000 to $100,000 and pushed its $500,000 forecast from 2028 to 2030.
However, minutes from the Federal Reserve’s latest meeting leaned hawkish. The central bank held rates at 3.50%-3.75% on a 9-3 vote, with Cleveland Fed’s Beth Hammack, Minneapolis Fed’s Neel Kashkari and Dallas Fed’s Lorie Logan dissenting in favor of a hike. They cited concerns that AI-driven demand could entrench inflation.
Some traders cautioned that the $68,000 to $70,000 zone is thick with retail long positions, raising the risk of a liquidity grab. Kendrick flagged $65,500 as the level that needs to hold to confirm a low is in place.
