Bitcoin climbed as high as $86,332 on Monday, its highest level in eight months and a price the market has not seen since January. The move caught a wave of leveraged bets on the wrong side: CoinGlass recorded $877.31 million in crypto liquidations over the trailing 24 hours, with $740.79 million of that total coming from short positions caught by the rally.

With bullish sentiment returning to the crypto market, the question on most investors' minds is what happens next. The rally's next tests arrive fast: a meeting between Donald Trump and Xi Jinping on September 24, a PCE inflation reading on September 30, and the September jobs report on October 2.

The move in context

Monday's forming daily candlestick opened at $81,152 and closed with a gain of 4.98%, nearly matching the performance Bitcoin registered last week. The advance extended a bounce that began near $62,000 on August 17 and carried the asset back above $80,000 within a single month.

Even after that rebound and an aggressive short squeeze last week, Bitcoin remains a bit over 30% below its October 2025 record above $126,000, and its year-to-date loss has narrowed to under 3%. That leaves considerable ground between the current price and the highs.

Shorts fuel the move

Liquidations are the mechanical underside of leveraged trading: when a price move exhausts a trader's margin, the exchange force-closes the position automatically.

CoinGlass logged $877.31 million in liquidations across crypto markets over the trailing 24 hours, and $740.79 million of that—about 84%—came from short positions wiped out as the price of Bitcoin climbed. More than 126,000 accounts were liquidated in the period, and the single largest order was an $11.29 million BTC/USDT position on Binance, per CoinGlass data.

Bitcoin accounted for $491.48 million of the total tally, while Ethereum added $195.11 million. The pattern has become familiar during this rally: short sellers keep leaning against the trend, and every push higher forces them out of their positions, adding fuel to the move rather than capping it.

The macro tailwind

Falling oil prices did some of the heavy lifting. Brent crude has dropped for four straight sessions on hopes that Washington and Tehran can ease tensions around this week's United Nations General Assembly, taking pressure off inflation-sensitive assets broadly.

Traders are also positioning ahead of a planned meeting between Donald Trump and Xi Jinping on September 24, a summit markets typically watch for signals on the state of U.S.-China trade relations. Meanwhile, the 10-year Treasury yield has slipped back near 4.9% after touching its highest level since October 2023 earlier this month. Falling yields typically ease the opportunity cost of holding a non-yielding asset like Bitcoin, making it more attractive relative to bonds.

Bitwise Chief Investment Officer Matt Hougan told CNBC that the "crypto winter" is over and that markets could be entering the "strongest and longest-running bull market in crypto's history."

Not everyone agrees that framing has held up before. Bitcoin last traded above $85,000 during January's slide toward $77,000, and Standard Chartered called an earlier bottom "crypto spring" back in June, only for the market to slump again.

The next three weeks

The Relative Strength Index, which measures how hot markets are at a specific moment, shows that Bitcoin is currently overbought, with traders willing to pay more for the asset than its recent trend would naturally support. That reading, combined with the market's elevated volatility, points in the same direction: Bitcoin has moved a long way, fast, and is due at minimum a pause or a retest of the $79,071-to-$80,355 support zone before its next leg.

A weekly close back below that zone would undercut the bullish structure; holding above it keeps the path toward new highs intact.

Bitcoin is currently testing a resistance zone. A break above it could carry prices as far as $95,000—an additional gain of roughly 15%—before another major volume zone comes into view. Even so, with Bitcoin running this hot, caution may be advised. After a long and sustained crypto winter, moves of this kind can feel more natural than they would under other circumstances, and traders betting on continued upside see reasons to hold their positions.

Prediction market traders, for their part, are riding the wave of optimism. On Myriad, a prediction market developed by Decrypt's parent company Dastan, traders are currently pricing in 50% odds that Bitcoin hits $90,000 before the end of the month, and 28% odds it touches $92,500.

Bitcoin's next moves hinge on a data calendar it does not control. Trump and Xi are due to meet in New York on September 24. The Federal Reserve's preferred inflation gauge lands September 30, the September jobs report follows on October 2, and consumer price data arrives October 14.

Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this article are for informational purposes only and do not constitute financial, investment, or other advice.