Bitcoin continued its rally on Friday, putting the token on track for its best weekly gain in more than three years.
The original cryptocurrency jumped as much as 9.4% and traded around $78,000 as of 6:22 a.m. in New York. It has advanced roughly 24% this week, a gain that, if sustained, would be the biggest on that basis since March 2023.
Market exuberance returned to cryptocurrencies when US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent announced Wednesday the department would at least double the size of its long-dated bond buybacks, triggering an upswing that forced traders to liquidate billions in short positions. The same day, President Donald Trump met with crypto industry leaders, further adding to optimism.
"The real driver was the US Treasury doubling long-dated bond buybacks, which pulled long yields lower and lifted risk appetite broadly," said Rachael Lucas, an analyst at BTC Markets. "Nothing has rewritten Bitcoin's long-term case, but nothing's rewritten its volatility either."
ALSO READ: Bitcoin Breaks $70,000 Hurdle: What Is Trump's Clarity Act That Refuels Crypto Optimism?
A short squeeze continues to be a major driver of rising Bitcoin prices, according to Adam Morgan McCarthy, lead researcher at LO:TECH, a London-based digital-asset liquidity and market data firm. Over $2 billion in bearish Bitcoin bets in the perpetual futures market have been liquidated since Aug. 19, according to Coinglass data.
"Gold carries this week's real macro signal: it rallied cleanly on the Treasury doubling its bond-buying operations, with none of the forced buying that inflated Bitcoin's price," McCarthy said. "If you're looking for where investors are actually hedging against currency and inflation risk this week, gold shows it, and Bitcoin doesn't."
Trump's meeting, which included executives from firms such as Coinbase Global Inc. and Payward Inc., was taken as a positive signal about the administration's commitment to crypto. Trump urged the Senate to pass the Clarity Act, a crypto market structure bill that's stalled over disagreements concerning ethics provisions. The bill failed to come to a vote before the Senate's August recess.
Institutional buyers returned to the market this week, with the US-listed spot Bitcoin exchange-traded funds on track for their largest weekly inflows since January. The 13 ETFs have added more than $1 billion so far this week, further fueling the bullish mood in crypto.
"For the first time this year there is now a risk my end year forecast (of USD100k) is too low," wrote Geoffrey Kendrick, global head of digital-assets research at Standard Chartered Plc, in a note to clients.
"Trump's crypto meeting, Clarity Act momentum, and positive ETF inflows added sentiment on top, but they weren't the whole story," said Lucas.
In another sign of life, large holders of the token known as Bitcoin whales recently added roughly $2.75 billion worth of the token in 60 days, according to CryptoQuant.
Bitcoin remains well off its peak above $126,000 last October, which came just ahead of a sharp selloff that took it as low as $58,642 at the end of June.
ALSO READ : 49 Crypto Currency Exchanges Registered With FIU During 2024-25 Fiscal: Report
Essential Business Intelligence, Sharp Market Insights, Practical Personal Finance Advice, Daily Fuel, Gold and Silver Prices and Latest Stories — On NDTV Profit.
