Bitcoin is closing in on $70,000 again, and leveraged bears are paying the price.

The largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization touched an intraday high of $69,749 on Wednesday and was recently trading near $68,689, up 9.3% on the week from an open of $62,832, per Bitcoin price data on Bitstamp. CoinGlass's Total Liquidations panel shows $1.14 billion in short positions wiped out across the crypto market in the last hour, with Bitcoin alone accounting for $677.64 million of that hourly figure.

The rally lands hours ahead of a White House meeting between President Trump, crypto executives, and top regulators, as well as the release of the Federal Reserve's July meeting minutes — both due Wednesday.

Recovery extends

Wednesday's gain extends a recovery that has now pulled Bitcoin roughly 19% off the $57,735 swing low marked on the chart, though the price remains well below the record above $126,000 set in October 2025.

Shorts steamrolled

The rally is running over a pile of dead short positions. CoinGlass's Total Liquidations panel, a widely used tracker of crypto derivatives data, shows $1.14 billion in short bets wiped out across the crypto market in the last hour, out of $1.22 billion in total liquidations for the period. Bitcoin accounts for $677.64 million of that hourly figure on CoinGlass's heatmap, with Ethereum ($422.90 million) and Solana ($37.88 million) making up most of the rest.

A liquidation happens when an exchange force-closes a leveraged position because the trader's collateral can no longer cover the loss. A short is a bet that the price of a given asset will fall. When Bitcoin jumps instead, those shorts go underwater fast, and the exchange sells them off to limit the damage. The forced buy-backs push the price up further, which trips the next layer of shorts. That feedback loop is a short squeeze.

The hourly short-liquidation total already covers roughly 87% of the past 24 hours' short liquidations, which stand at $1.31 billion across 112,004 traders, CoinGlass data shows. The largest single order wiped out was a $32.18 million ETH position on Bitget. Traders who bet against these assets by borrowing and selling them are now being forced to buy back at a loss — a scramble that itself pushes prices higher.

Short squeezes have become a familiar pattern in 2026's choppy bear-market rallies. A similar setup played out in April, when Bitcoin's jump above $75,000 liquidated more than $600 million in a single day, most of it short positions caught flat-footed by a sudden risk-on shift.

Policy and macro backdrop

Wednesday's rally comes hours ahead of a White House meeting where President Trump is expected to sit down with SEC Chair Paul Atkins, CFTC Chair Michael Selig, and executives from Coinbase, Ripple, and Kalshi to discuss crypto market-structure rules — the long-running debate over how oversight of digital assets should be divided between the two agencies. The Federal Reserve's July meeting minutes are also due out later Wednesday, with traders paring back bets on a rate hike that had topped 80% odds earlier this year, according to prediction-market pricing.

Spot Bitcoin ETFs are helping too, turning net positive again this week after a stretch of outflows. The U.S.-listed funds, launched in January 2024, let investors track Bitcoin's price without holding the coin directly, and their weekly flows are widely watched as a gauge of institutional demand.

SkyBridge Capital's Anthony Scaramucci said the bounce shows Bitcoin's bear market is nearly done, arguing the asset's roughly 55% drawdown from its high is milder than in prior cycles.

The data tells a different story from the bear-market headlines. This is a clear Bitcoin bear market, and yet we've only had a 55% drop, whereas in other bear markets you've gotten a 75-80% drop. That's weirdly a good sign; it suggests many net buyers are already positioning… pic.twitter.com/wy7gtlmC4r

— Anthony Scaramucci (@Scaramucci), August 18, 2026

Bitcoin price: What the charts say

Bitcoin's weekly chart opened at $62,832 and is closing near $68,689, a candle stretching from $62,690 to $69,749. That puts price right against the golden pocket, a resistance zone the chart flags between $70,284 and $73,245 — the Fibonacci retracement band between the 61.8% and 65% levels of a prior swing that many traders treat as pivotal.

The movement is strong enough to put Bitcoin back on top of the average price of the last 200 days — the 200-day moving average, a widely followed long-term trend gauge — which is a relief in terms of bear pressure and keeps weekly bullish sentiment alive even if the coin remains bearish on shorter timeframes.

The level to watch is $70,284, the low edge of the golden pocket and the next concentration of short interest. A daily close above it opens room toward $73,245. Losing $68,000 on a daily close would put Bitcoin back inside the range that has capped it since June.

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