A quick surge in bitcoin (BTC) early Tuesday afternoon lifted the price above $44,000 on some crypto exchanges, including Coinbase, for the first time since early April 2022 as the largest crypto extended its rally supported by declining interest rates and anticipation for a spot bitcoin exchange-traded fund in the U.S.
The CoinDesk Bitcoin Index XBX, which gathers pricing data from multiple exchanges, rose from below $42,000 earlier in the day to hit a session high of $43,868. It's shed some of the gains since, retreating to around $43,500, still up nearly 5% over the past 24 hours.
The volatile action liquidated $73 million of leveraged bitcoin derivatives trading positions, predominantly shorts betting on lower prices, Glassnode data shows.
The bitcoin rally is supported by a confluence of growing institutional investor interest and anticipation of an imminent regulatory approval for listing spot-based BTC ETFs in the U.S., simplifying access to the asset for traditional players, Joel Kruger, market strategist at LMAX Group, said in an email.
Read more: BlackRock, Bitwise File Updated Applications for Spot Bitcoin ETF
Kruger said BTC's upward price momentum has a clear path ahead until the area between $48,000 and $53,000, based on technical price levels – notably highs hit in March 2022 and September 2021.
"There is a nice zone between those two levels with very little in the way of any meaningful resistance between the current price and that March 2022 high," Kruger explained.
