Bitcoin moved back above $65,000 for the first time since Aug. 10, while on-chain demand metrics improved sharply even as broader macro conditions stayed hostile. U.S. risk assets remained under pressure from a surge in long-dated Treasury yields, with the 30-year yield briefly reaching 5.34%, and BTC showed a temporary divergence from traditional risk markets.
This market note was jointly produced by PANews and BIT美股. BIT美股 says it offers access to more than 10,000 U.S. main-board stocks and ETFs, supports stablecoin deposits and withdrawals as well as U.S. dollar wire transfers, and includes shareholder rights, dividends and voting rights.
Support sits at $62,000-$63,000 while resistance holds near the 50-month EMA
Most traders are focused on the $62,000-$63,000 range as the key support area for Bitcoin. If that zone breaks, price could drop toward $60,000-$61,000 to sweep liquidity.
On the upside, resistance is concentrated near the 50-month exponential moving average around $65,400, along with the neckline area of a possible inverse head-and-shoulders pattern. Analyst Aksel Kibar said that if the pattern is confirmed, the rebound target could reach $76,000. If it fails, Bitcoin could fall to $53,000.
CryptoQuant says apparent spot demand is close to turning positive
According to on-chain research firm CryptoQuant, Bitcoin’s 30-day apparent spot demand has recovered from negative 206,000 BTC on July 23 to negative 5,000 BTC, bringing it close to the threshold for its first move back into positive territory since Feb. 26.
CryptoQuant said that historically, once spot demand flips from negative to positive, BTC has posted a median gain of 18.1% over the following 60 days, with a 78% hit rate. VanEck also said Bitcoin may be approaching the end of its current correction.
VanEck’s model shows that eight of its 12 capitulation indicators have already been triggered, and Bitcoin is now in the 11th month of its correction. In the three non-2011 cycles cited by the firm, the average span from top to bottom was about 12.7 months, making September through November an important window for accumulation in this cycle. VanEck also said capitulation signals have not shown a stable excess-return edge over the following 90 or 180 days, and that renewed capital demand remains the more important confirmation to watch.
Put premiums stay elevated even as leverage is being cleared out
Options markets are still showing a bearish tilt. Put premiums remain well above call premiums, though open interest and funding rates suggest leverage is gradually being flushed from the system.
BIT said historical data shows that in bear markets, Bitcoin has traded about 40% below its long-term market average. If that pattern repeats, the price could fall to about $45,500. From current levels, that implies roughly 20% downside and about 60% upside, improving the risk-reward profile. Even so, macro pressure could still force another leg lower, and the real test is whether spot demand can turn positive and hold above the cost base.
The next two events that matter most for BTC, according to the note, are whether the Federal Reserve minutes come across as hawkish and whether the U.S. 20-year Treasury auction goes smoothly. If the bond market keeps rattling investors, Bitcoin could retest the area around $63,000. If rate pressure eases, it may try again for the $66,000-$70,000 range.
Crypto market items for the day
- Ethereum is scheduled to conduct the Glamsterdam upgrade fork on the Platåberget testnet on Aug. 20.
- KAITO is set to unlock about 32.6 million tokens worth roughly $11.5 million.
- LayerZero (ZRO) is set to unlock about 25.72 million tokens worth roughly $19.62 million.
- Upbit’s 24-hour volume ranking was BTC, XRP, ETH, LA and DOS.
- Spot Bitcoin ETFs recorded $189 million in net inflows.
- Spot Ether ETFs recorded $71.468 million in net inflows.
- Among the top 100 tokens by market cap, the biggest gainers were BTW up 85.3%, HEX up 28.4%, PUMP up 6.9%, CAKE up 5.9% and INJ up 5%.
U.S. index futures were mixed, while SK hynix tried to steady memory sentiment
Futures on the three major U.S. stock indexes moved in different directions. Dow futures rose 0.06%, Nasdaq 100 futures slipped 0.04%, and S&P 500 futures added 0.02%.
According to BIT’s overnight trading data, SK hynix drew the most attention. Its U.S. overnight line rose more than 4% after the company announced a 40 trillion won stock buyback, with the repurchased shares to be retired to improve shareholder returns. The move offered short-term support to memory names: the DRAM memory ETF rose 1.51%, Micron Technology edged up 0.21%, and Sandisk fell 0.59%.
Most U.S. stocks were still in downtrends, though. Nvidia fell 0.17%, AMD dropped 0.78%, Nebius lost 1.76%, and Marvell Technology declined 1.06%.
Bond stress overwhelmed the AI trade and pushed investors toward defense
The main story in U.S. markets overnight was not equities but bonds. The 30-year U.S. Treasury yield touched 5.338% intraday, its highest level since 2007, while the 10-year yield approached 4.75%. Long-dated yields in France, Germany, the U.K. and Japan also moved higher, lifting the global cost of capital at the same time.
AI shares became the center of the selloff, with the Philadelphia Semiconductor Index down about 5%. Investors questioned whether AI capital spending was shifting from a growth narrative to a debt narrative. Goldman Sachs data showed AI-related bond supply this year has reached $489 billion, exceeding the full-year 2025 level. At the same time, OpenAI’s second-quarter operating loss widened to $12.3 billion, and Anthropic’s annualized revenue run rate came in below market expectations, adding to worries about the mismatch between high spending and slower payoff periods.
Memory shares, one of the more rate-sensitive links in AI server expansion, led the declines. Micron fell about 7%, Seagate dropped more than 9%, and SK hynix ADR lost more than 9%. Optical communications and AI cloud companies faced even harsher valuation resets: Applied Optoelectronics fell about 15%, Coherent dropped more than 12%, and CoreWeave also slid more than 12%. BIT said business models that depend heavily on continuous financing can see their valuation sensitivity move sharply in reverse when long-term yields surge.
Meta fell 4.45% as it faced a joint lawsuit from 29 states. Apple, by contrast, was treated as a defensive technology name because it has not been deeply drawn into the AI data-center capital spending race, and its stock rose 1.45%. Microsoft, Google and Amazon were relatively stable.
The note said the core of the current bond-market volatility lies in the U.S. fiscal deficit outlook for the coming decade. It cited a measure showing that nearly $1 out of every $5 in U.S. government revenue is now going to interest payments, forcing the market to reassess the intrinsic value of richly valued technology stocks.
Crypto-linked stocks and miners were also hit
BIT美股 data showed broad declines across crypto-linked equities. Coinbase fell 2.87%, Robinhood dropped 4.9%, Strategy lost 5.28%, and Circle fell 3.83%.
Mining shares were weaker still. Cipher Digital plunged 13%, TeraWulf lost 11.25%, Hut 8 dropped 8.23%, MARA fell 7.77%, and IREN declined 6.46%. CleanSpark, Canaan, Rior and Bitdeer were down around 5% to 5%. VanEck said it still sees long-term value in some miners pivoting toward AI data centers, but higher rates, data-center scrutiny and doubts around AI capital spending are likely to cap the group in the short term.
Asia sold off as chip stocks became the center of pressure
High global bond yields, along with oil-price and inflation concerns, hit Asian risk assets directly. South Korea’s KOSPI closed down 5.80%, led lower by chip names. SK hynix fell about 10% and Samsung Electronics lost nearly 8%. That came despite strong first-half revenue and profit growth among Korean main-board companies, with semiconductor leaders making a large contribution.
Japan also opened lower and kept falling through the session. The Nikkei 225 closed down 3.16%, and the Topix fell 2%. SoftBank Group, Tokyo Electron and memory-chip maker Kioxia all saw heavy profit-taking, with major technology names pressured by both valuations and bond-market swings.
Mainland Chinese equities also weakened throughout the day. The Shanghai Composite fell about 2.4%, the Shenzhen Component dropped about 5%, the ChiNext Index lost more than 6%, and the STAR 50 at one point was down nearly 7%. More than 5,000 stocks across the market fell. Robotics, computing hardware, semiconductors and MLCC-related names were hit hard, while coal and parts of shipping and banking held up better.
Unitree’s debut surged while Hong Kong internet stocks stayed under pressure
Unitree Technology became the strongest narrative and the sharpest source of volatility in the A-share market. On its first trading day on the STAR Market, the stock opened up 629.44% at 1,100 yuan per share, and its market capitalization briefly reached 444.9 billion yuan. The gain later narrowed to 460%, with the share price around 845 yuan. Chairman Wang Xingxing’s stake was valued at more than 100 billion yuan, making him the richest person born in the 1990s, according to the note. Shunwei Capital founded by Lei Jun, Liang Wenfeng’s DeepSeek, and High-Flyer Quant were also cited as major beneficiaries. Nomura gave the company a buy rating and projected a 122% revenue compound annual growth rate from 2026 to 2028.
Yet the broader robotics sector sold off hard. Julun Intelligent, Wuzhou Xinchun and Qinchuan Machine Tool were among the stocks that hit limit down, showing how quickly trading rotated between enthusiasm for the sector leader and a pullback across the wider group.
In Hong Kong, the Hang Seng Index edged up 0.09% while the Hang Seng Tech Index fell 1.21%. Technology shares broadly weakened, with MINIMAX down about 8%, Baidu Group down about 11%, and China Unicom, Huahong and Cambridge Technology each off around 12%. Kuaishou reported second-quarter 2026 revenue of 35.54 billion yuan and adjusted net profit of 3.91 billion yuan, both above market expectations. Average monthly active users reached 800 million, above the expected 740 million. Its Kling AI product generated more than 850 million yuan in single-quarter revenue, up more than 200% year over year. Even with those results, risk-off sentiment still weighed heavily on Hong Kong internet names.
What markets are watching over the next three days
Wednesday, Aug. 19
- The Seoul AI Summit runs from Aug. 19 to Aug. 21, with participants including Google DeepMind, Google Cloud, Microsoft Research, Nvidia, LG AI Research and Hyundai Motor. Markets are watching for signals on large language models, AI cloud, autonomous driving, AI chips and enterprise applications.
- The World Robot Conference runs in Beijing from Aug. 19 to Aug. 23. Unitree, UBTech, SIASUN, Galaxy General and Tiangong are among the companies expected to showcase humanoid and industrial robotics solutions. Investors are watching for progress on mass production, order conversion and cost reductions.
- Earnings due include Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing, Kuaishou, Hengrui Medicine, ZTO Express, Kingsoft, Kingsoft Cloud and Weibo. The Kuaishou conference call is scheduled for 19:00.
Thursday, Aug. 20
- At 01:00, the U.S. Treasury will auction 20-year bonds. After sharp yield moves in recent 10-year and 30-year auctions, the bid-to-cover ratio and overseas demand in this sale are being treated as a major stress test for the bond market. Weak demand could push the 30-year yield through 5.35%.
- At 02:00, the Federal Reserve will release the minutes from its July monetary policy meeting. Markets will study the discussion around inflation, including energy-driven inflation, and any inclination among some officials toward further rate hikes.
- At 09:00, China will publish the one-year LPR. Markets are watching whether a cut follows weak July economic data.
- At 20:30, the U.S. initial jobless claims report will be released, adding to the market’s pricing of the Fed path after the earlier weak nonfarm payroll reading.
- Alibaba, Pop Mart, NetEase, Walmart, Ping An Insurance, China Telecom, AIA, Li Ning and Futu Holdings are among the companies scheduled to report. Alibaba’s conference call is set for 20:00.
Friday, Aug. 21
- At 07:30, Japan will release July core CPI. A higher-than-expected reading could raise expectations for a September rate hike by the Bank of Japan, while a softer result could ease pressure from the unwind of global carry trades.
- At 08:00, South Korea will release export data for the first 20 days of August. The previous reading showed 52.3% year-over-year growth, driven mainly by higher memory prices and AI chip exports. The data is being watched as an early signal for the global semiconductor cycle and AI capital spending.
- The second-quarter Hang Seng Index review results will be announced. CICC said Zijin Gold International, Zhipu and MINIMAX-W are among the leading candidates for possible inclusion.
- NYMEX September crude futures will roll to a new front month. The note said risks around Hormuz and expectations of U.S. sanctions on Iran could amplify near-month volatility.
- Earnings due include ZTE, Zijin Mining, Zhongji Innolight, Yangtze Optical Fibre and Cable, Beike and Sinopec.