Bitcoin tore through $69,000 on Wednesday, climbing as much as 8.7% to an intraday high of $69,749. It was the sharpest one-day move since March 4 and the highest price the asset has reached since June 1. Traders had not seen a green candle of this size in more than five months.
The jump quickly changed the debate around where Bitcoin goes next. Charts pointed to one set of levels, while prediction markets showed a rapid repricing. Just 24 hours earlier, traders on Myriad, a prediction market operated by Decrypt’s parent company, were still positioned for more downside. By Wednesday, that view had shifted to something close to a coin flip.
Decrypt said the immediate trigger did not appear to come from inside crypto. The U.S. Treasury said Wednesday that it will at least double its long-bond buybacks, increasing the size from $2 billion to $4 billion per operation starting Sept. 9. That move pushed long-end yields lower and weakened the dollar. For risk assets such as crypto, those conditions are usually supportive: lower yields reduce the opportunity cost of holding a non-yielding asset like Bitcoin, and a weaker dollar can make dollar-priced assets cheaper for foreign buyers. The report noted that analysts have already dubbed the setup “QE Lite.”
The timing also overlapped with a White House meeting involving crypto executives and regulators, as well as a new SEC proposal that would ease registration rules for some digital-asset offerings. Together, those factors added to the momentum and the rally stretched quickly.
Shorts were forced out fast
According to CoinGlass’s liquidation panel, $1.14 billion in crypto shorts were wiped out in a single hour. Bitcoin alone accounted for $677.64 million of that total. Crypto-linked stocks joined the move higher, with Strategy up nearly 12%, Coinbase up 9%, and Circle and BitMine both gaining roughly 9% to 10% on the day.
Prediction markets rushed to reprice
The rally was not something prediction markets had fully priced in beforehand. On Myriad’s “BTC next move” market, traders were betting on whether Bitcoin would pump to $84,000 or dump to $55,000 first. Just days ago, roughly 70% of traders were leaning toward the $55,000 outcome.
By Wednesday afternoon, those odds had narrowed to almost even: 51.9% for $55,000 and 48.1% for $84,000.
The shift was not limited to Myriad. On Polymarket’s main 2026 Bitcoin price market, traders as of last week were pricing a 56% chance that BTC would touch $55,000 before year-end, while assigning only 51% odds to a move to $75,000.
On Kalshi, traders had also been cautious. They gave Bitcoin a 54% chance of clearing $67,500 in August and a 31% chance of reaching $70,000. Bitcoin moved through both of those thresholds on Wednesday.
Decrypt argued that the divide itself is the real story. Near-term predictors were caught off guard by a roughly 7% up day they had not priced in, while year-end markets barely moved. As more traders use prediction markets to hedge real positions, Myriad’s swing looked less like a fresh forecast and more like a snapshot of who got squeezed.
Chart levels in focus
The next key level on the chart sits at $70,284, the lower edge of a resistance band for Bitcoin. A daily close above that area would open room toward $73,245. If Bitcoin loses $68,000, it would fall back into the range that has contained price action since June.