Bitcoin is trading in a tight battle around the $82,000-$83,000 range, with PANews and BIT saying that zone now sits at the center of the market’s short-term tug-of-war. BTC was hovering near $83,000 in the report, well off its Sept. 21 high above $87,400, as traders focused on whether buyers could keep the current support area intact.
The report tied the latest pullback to rising U.S. Treasury yields. The 10-year yield climbed to about 5.26%, while the 30-year yield briefly moved above 5.60%, a multi-year high. As risk-free returns become more attractive again, bitcoin, technology shares and gold are all facing renewed valuation pressure.
$82,000 emerges as the key support zone
On the monthly chart, BTC has risen for three straight months, including a gain of about 6% in September. Even so, the asset remains stuck between its 15-month moving average near $85,000 and its 50-month moving average near $58,000. PANews said the market is still looking to October with some optimism after what it described as a historically “green September.”
Crypto analyst Scott Melker said bitcoin rose more than 40% in the third quarter and could be on track for its strongest quarter since the fourth quarter of 2024. He also said U.S. spot bitcoin exchange-traded funds recorded about $6.4 billion in net inflows this quarter, providing a major driver for BTC’s rebound from below $60,000 to above $86,000.
In options markets, traders have been building bullish positions above $90,000, with strong interest at the $95,000 and $100,000 strike levels. Many traders see $82,000-$83,000 as the market’s near-term lifeline. The report noted that this area had marked the top in May and has now turned into a floor buyers are trying to defend.
Jeff Anderson, head of U.S. operations at STS Digital, said $82,000 is the main level to watch. If bitcoin breaks it decisively, the price could slide into the upper $70,000 range. He also said long-term concerns over U.S. inflation and government debt remain supportive for bitcoin, meaning deeper pullbacks should still find support. Lacie Zhang, a researcher at Bitget Wallet, also identified the $81,500-$83,000 area as the range that will decide whether market structure remains healthy. An analyst at Nexo placed the warning line below $80,000 and said a rebound on renewed volume from current levels could still send BTC back above $90,000.
On-chain data point to weaker demand
The report said on-chain indicators have started to cool despite the broader uptrend. CryptoQuant’s bull score is close to a full 90, which still confirms the trend after bitcoin moved above its 365-day moving average, but demand has weakened.
Spot demand has shrunk by about 170,000 BTC over the past 30 days. Speculative futures demand dropped far more sharply, falling from roughly 164,000 BTC on Sept. 14 to about 16,000 BTC on Sept. 29, a decline of around 90% in 15 days. Julio Moreno, head of research at CryptoQuant, said it becomes harder for a rally to keep extending when spot demand is shrinking and futures growth stalls. The report also said long-term holders are heavily concentrated in the $84,000-$85,000 band, creating thick overhead resistance.
Core PCE and payrolls are the next catalysts
In the short run, the report said the market is watching U.S. core PCE inflation data and the nonfarm payrolls report that follows. A hotter inflation reading could push yields even higher and send BTC back to test support at $82,000 or even $80,000. If inflation cools, the next upside targets would be $85,000-$87,000, with a possible run at $90,000 after that.
Key crypto items for the day
- Cross-chain protocol Router Protocol will fully shut down on Sept. 30.
- Trepa, a prediction app in the Solana ecosystem, will end service on Sept. 30.
- Bitget plans to restore withdrawals in phases starting Sept. 30, beginning with USDT-related stablecoins on Ethereum, BSC, Solana and Tron.
- Polygon Chain staking rewards are expected to rise to 7.7% starting Oct. 1.
- Kamino (KMNO) will unlock about 229 million tokens on Sept. 30, worth about $10.8 million.
- Collector Crypt (CARDS) will unlock about 59.26 million tokens on Sept. 30, worth about $10.7 million.
- EigenCloud (EIGEN) will unlock about 36.82 million tokens on Oct. 1, worth about $10.3 million.
- Sui (SUI) will unlock about 13.26 million tokens on Oct. 1, worth about $16.7 million.
- DoubleZero (2Z) will unlock about 1.66 billion tokens on Oct. 2, worth about $114 million.
- Ethena (ENA) will unlock about 40.63 million tokens on Oct. 2, worth about $11 million.
- Upbit’s top five tokens by 24-hour trading volume were XRP, SOON, BTC, ETH and 0G.
- U.S. spot bitcoin ETFs posted $66.1947 million in net inflows, extending the streak to nine straight days.
- U.S. spot ether ETFs saw net outflows of $2.8086 million.
- Among the top 100 tokens by market capitalization, the biggest gainers were AKE at 14.3%, PUMP at 11.8%, QNT at 10.7%, NEAR at 6.4% and ASTER at 6.1%.
U.S. futures steady while AI hardware names stay firm
U.S. equity index futures were broadly stable during Asian trading hours, according to the report. Nasdaq 100 futures edged up about 0.1%, S&P 500 futures rose 0.2%, and Dow futures gained 0.37%. Sentiment was calmer than in the previous session, though still capped by high rates.
BIT’s overnight session data showed money still clustered in AI and semiconductor names. Micron rose 0.76%, Nvidia gained 0.50%, AMD added 0.24%, Meta rose 0.12%, Intel gained 0.41%, Tesla rose 0.52%, and SpaceX added 0.13%. The report described Micron’s after-hours earnings release as especially important because it will test the strength of AI memory demand directly.
Robinhood rose 2.91% in overnight trading and stood out among fintech and crypto-linked names.
Long yields keep climbing, STRC trades near par
In the previous U.S. session, the three main stock indexes closed slightly lower, with attention fixed on long-dated Treasury yields. The 30-year Treasury yield touched 5.621% intraday, its highest level since 2002, intensifying pressure on richly valued assets.
On the macro side, the U.S. Conference Board consumer confidence index fell to 81.9 in September, the lowest since 2014, while August JOLTS job openings fell to a five-month low. Dovish remarks from New York Fed President John Williams pulled the implied probability of an October rate hike down from around 70% to about 50%, but fiscal worries and corporate bond supply still left the long end without much buying support. Crude oil fell sharply after the U.S. said it would release as many as 40 million barrels from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve and transport flows in the Middle East recovered, with WTI down more than 3% to around $89.
Even with broad indexes under pressure, AI hardware and infrastructure shares were strong. The Philadelphia Semiconductor Index rose 1.32% to its highest level since mid-July. Oracle climbed 3.91%, Corning rose 4.70%, Lumentum gained 5.66%, and Bloom Energy jumped 10.80%. Boeing added 1.78% after winning a U.S. Navy fighter contract. SpaceX rose 2.59% after Starship successfully entered Earth orbit, and the report said Anthropic disclosed a computing agreement with SpaceX worth as much as $84.5 billion.
Crypto-linked equities were weaker overall. BIT data showed Strategy down 1.57%, Coinbase off 0.92%, Robinhood lower by 0.21%, and Circle down 2.45%. STRC rose 0.46% to 99.56, trading near par. The report said Strategy Executive Chairman Michael Saylor proposed switching dividend payments on billions of dollars of preferred stock to a daily schedule, with annualized yields on the related securities reaching as high as 12%. It also said the company has repurchased more than $1 billion of STRC, but has not issued new STRC since May, and that the shareholder vote will end on Oct. 28.
Among miners, Iris Energy fell 0.81%, Cipher Mining dropped 1.37%, TeraWulf slipped 0.20%, Marathon Digital lost 0.99%, Riot Platforms fell 1.06%, Bitdeer dropped 1.18%, CleanSpark fell 0.22%, American Bitcoin lost 1.36%, and Canaan declined 0.32%. Hut 8 was the only one in the group that rose, gaining 0.16%.
Asia: Japan rallies on AI, South Korea lags, Hong Kong and mainland China rotate
Japan outperformed while South Korea weakened. The Nikkei 225 closed up 1.94% and moved back above 66,000, while South Korea’s KOSPI reversed lower and finished down 0.48%. The report said a roughly 1.3% rise in the Philadelphia Semiconductor Index had lifted Japanese semiconductor and AI sentiment, while Korean stocks were hit by joint quarter-end selling from foreign and institutional investors. Foreign investors were net sellers of KRW 166 billion, and institutions sold KRW 283 billion.
In Japan, Tokyo Electron rose more than 4%, SoftBank Group gained 5.93%, Sumco added 4.93%, Renesas rose more than 2%, Kioxia gained 2.15%, and Advantest contributed about 280 points to the Nikkei. Expectations for higher Japanese bond yields also supported bank shares including Mizuho and Mitsubishi UFJ.
In South Korea, SK Hynix rose 3.21% early before giving back gains, Samsung Electronics turned lower after a 1.01% rise, Hyundai Motor fell 1.43%, EcoPro gained 2.66%, and HPSP rose 3.61%. Korea’s expected tax revenue increased 28% year over year to KRW 478.6 trillion, with chip profits, special dividends and stock-trading revenue beating expectations. The Bank of Korea plans to buy 1 ton of gold in December, and spot gold briefly rebounded to $4,200, according to the report.
In Hong Kong, the Hang Seng Index rose 0.37%, the Hang Seng Tech Index added 0.1%, and the China Enterprises Index gained 0.5%. Overseas developments in AI drug discovery and biosecurity boosted healthcare shares, while mortgage-interest subsidies and Guangzhou’s rules on existing-home sales drove a V-shaped rebound in property names.
Biotech and pharma names were strong. CanSino Biologics rose more than 17%, GenScript Biotech gained more than 8% and pushed its market value above HK$100 billion, Insilico Medicine rose 7.13%, Hengrui Medicine gained 5.66%, and CSPC Pharmaceutical added 5.54%. Gold miners recovered, with Shandong Gold up 5.02% and Chifeng Gold up 5.55%.
Property stocks were mixed. Sunac China fell 5.07%, Country Garden rose 3.68%, and both Zhongliang Holdings and CIFI Holdings gained more than 3%. China Vanke was down more than 10% at one point before closing lower by 0.71%. Semiconductor names remained under pressure, with Tianshu Zhixin down 6.81%, Montage Technology off 5.51%, Gigadevice lower by 4.46%, and Hua Hong Semiconductor down 3.00%. Airline shares gained ahead of China’s National Day holiday, with China Eastern up 4.99%. Ambilight Technology debuted on Hong Kong’s main board and surged 265.68% on its first trading day. Jinchuan International resumed trading and rose 25.00% after first-half profit attributable to shareholders increased about 7.7 times year over year to $47.816 million.
On the mainland, the Shanghai Composite rose 0.31%, the Shenzhen Component fell 0.11%, the ChiNext Index slipped 0.23%, and the STAR 50 lost 2.51%. Turnover reached CNY 1.45 trillion, and more than 2,800 stocks declined. Healthcare shares rallied sharply, with CanSino up the 20% daily limit and Tainuomai Bio and Menovo also hitting limit-up. Liquor stocks strengthened in afternoon trading, with Jinhui Liquor hitting limit-up. Semiconductors, electronic components, communications equipment and PCB names sold off, with Aohong Electronics and Xiehe Electronics closing limit-down.
Policy moves and the upcoming calendar
The report also laid out a dense schedule of policy developments and market events. China’s mortgage-interest subsidy program will take effect on Oct. 1. First-home buyers purchasing homes under 120 square meters and under CNY 1.5 million can receive a 1 percentage point annual subsidy for as long as five years, with loan support capped at CNY 1 million. The People’s Bank of China cut the PSL rate by 0.25 percentage point to 1.5%, expanded support to what the report called the “six networks,” raised the relending quota for technology innovation to CNY 1.4 trillion, and increased relending for agriculture and small businesses to CNY 4.85 trillion. CITIC Securities said home prices have reached a reasonable level, while CICC estimated the subsidy could support roughly CNY 1.8 trillion in loans each year and reduce interest payments by about CNY 18.2 billion annually. The Shanghai Composite fell 3.62% this month, while the ChiNext dropped 27.8% in the third quarter and the STAR 50 fell 30.7%, both their biggest quarterly declines on record.
The schedule highlighted in the report includes the following:
- On Sept. 30 at 20:30, the U.S. will release August personal income, consumer spending, core PCE and final second-quarter GDP. The report said the market expects August core PCE at about 0.3% month over month and 3.3% year over year.
- On Sept. 30 at 22:30, the U.S. will publish EIA crude inventory data.
- On Oct. 1, mainland China’s A-share market will close for the National Day holiday through Oct. 7. Hong Kong will be closed for one day on Oct. 1, and Stock Connect services are set to pause during the holiday and resume on Oct. 8.
- Japanese photoresist makers are reportedly planning a global 15% price increase starting immediately, with higher increases for high-end ArF and HBM immersion products. Power semiconductor makers in Taiwan are also preparing a third round of price hikes, possibly from October, with non-contract products rising 10%-15%.
- On Oct. 1 at 04:30, Micron will hold its Q4 earnings call. At 08:00, South Korea will release September trade data. At 20:30, the U.S. will publish initial jobless claims, Challenger layoff data, ISM manufacturing PMI and construction spending.
- The report also said SpaceX plans to carry out NASA’s Crew-13 mission, Google plans to launch a prototype satellite equipped with its self-developed TPU, and Tesla plans to unveil the next-generation “flying car” Roadster.
- On Oct. 2 at 20:30, the U.S. will release September nonfarm payrolls, unemployment and average hourly earnings. A Reuters survey cited in the report expects job growth to slow to around 100,000 from 162,000 in August.
- Tokyo CPI and South Korea CPI are also due that day, while Hong Kong trading resumes but southbound and northbound Stock Connect traffic remains suspended.
- On Oct. 4, OPEC+ will hold a meeting.
- On Oct. 5, CME’s planned launch of GPU computing-power futures was said to be delayed after the CFTC extended its review period by 45 days to Nov. 9. The report also said Intel will raise PC CPU prices by about 10% again.
- On Oct. 8, the Federal Reserve will publish minutes from its policy meeting, the U.S. will release weekly initial jobless claims for the week of Oct. 3, and TSMC will publish September revenue.
The report’s central takeaway was simple: bitcoin’s hold above or below $82,000, together with incoming U.S. inflation, labor-market and bond-yield data, will shape the market’s opening tone for the fourth quarter. The immediate upside resistance remains in the $85,000-$87,000 band, while $82,000 and then $80,000 are the support levels under the closest watch.