Informational only. This brief reports market data and publicly available news. It is not investment, trading, or financial advice, and it does not recommend buying, selling, or holding anything. The author is not responsible for any decision made using this information. Numbers are as of the 00:00 UTC daily close on August 24, 2026 (8 p.m. New York time) unless a different time is stated.
New to the indicators on this page? Every name in the tables links to the plain-English explanations in Bitcoin Indicators Explained: What Each One Measures and What Combinations Tell You.
At a glance
Signal board
| Indicator | Reading (Aug 24 close) | Zone | Change since Aug 23 | What this zone has historically meant |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Price vs 200-day SMA | $78,982 vs $69,087 (+14.3%) | Above | +12.6% → +14.3% | Price above the 200-day average is the most common definition of a long-term uptrend. The first close above it since Nov 2, 2025 came on Aug 19. |
| 50-day vs 200-day SMA | $65,461 vs $69,087 | 50-day below (death cross since Nov 16, 2025) | Gap narrowing | The 50-day would need to keep rising for weeks to cross back above. Both averages lag price by design. |
| Price vs 20-day SMA | +17.0% above ($67,510) | Stretched | +16.4% → +17.0% | Price this far above its 20-day average is unusual; historically it has resolved either by sideways trading while the average catches up, or by a pullback toward it. |
| RSI (14) | 82 | Overbought (above 70 since Aug 19; peaked at 86 on Aug 21) | 81 → 82 | In strong trends RSI can stay above 70 for weeks; in sideways markets readings this high have more often been followed by a cooling-off. |
| MACD (12, 26, 9) | 3,448 vs signal 1,772; histogram +1,676 | Bullish crossover on Aug 18; above zero since Aug 19 | Histogram +1,647 → +1,676 (still widening) | A widening histogram means momentum is still accelerating. Momentum usually peaks before price does. |
| Bollinger Bands (20, 2) | %B 1.00; band width 34% | Riding the upper band after a squeeze | Width 31% → 34% | Band width was 4.2% on Aug 15, the tightest since July 2025. A squeeze followed by a close outside the band has often started a multi-week expansion phase. |
| ADX (14) | 31 (+DI 48, −DI 10) | Trending (above 25), strengthening | 28 → 31 | Above 25 is generally read as a trending market; a rising ADX means the trend is strengthening. Direction comes from the DI lines (here, up). |
| ATR (14) | $2,265 (2.9% of price) | Expanding | $2,182 → $2,265; was $1,232 on Aug 16 | The average daily range has nearly doubled in eight days. Larger ranges mean larger moves in both directions on an ordinary day. |
| 30-day realized volatility | 43% annualized | Elevated | 43% → 43%; was 23% on Aug 18 | Volatility clusters: high-volatility days tend to be followed by more high-volatility days. |
| Volume vs 20-day average | 1.6× average (exchange feed) | Above average | 0.7× → 1.6× | Moves on above-average volume are generally treated as more credible than moves on thin volume. Sunday’s (Aug 23) volume was light. |
| US spot ETF net flows | +$1.92B for Aug 17–21; Fri +$307.5M; Mon not yet reported | Strong inflows | Best week since Oct 2025 | ETF inflows are spot demand from the brokerage channel. 2026 year-to-date flows are still −$2.91B. |
| Perpetual funding rate | +0.0089% per 8h (≈10% annualized) | Near the neutral baseline | — | Funding near 0.01% per 8h is the default rate; it says leveraged longs are not paying an unusual premium despite the rally. |
| Open interest / liquidations | OI ≈ $55.6B; short liquidations > $220M in the 24h to Aug 24 evening | Short squeeze | ≈$2.75B of BTC shorts liquidated Aug 19–21 | Rising price with heavy short liquidations means forced buying by traders who bet on a decline was a large part of the move. |
| Fear & Greed (alternative.me) | 73 | Greed | 66 → 73 (62 on Aug 20) | Readings above 75 are labeled “extreme greed.” Extremes have often clustered near turning points, with many exceptions. |
| Hashrate / difficulty | ≈920 EH/s; difficulty 125.81T after −1.31% on Aug 23 | Stable; next adjustment ≈ Sep 6 (est. −1.3%) | Hashprice +20% in 4 days to $38.29/PH/day (Aug 22) | Network security is unchanged; higher prices improved miner economics after a difficult summer. |
The 30-second read
Bitcoin closed Monday at $78,982, up 1.6%, after trading to $80,000 during the US session for the first time since May 15. The close caps a 22.5% gain over seven days and a 25.7% gain for August, which Cointelegraph reports is the strongest August since 2017. The move started on August 19, when President Trump hosted crypto executives at the White House and called on Congress to pass the CLARITY Act, and the Treasury announced it would at least double its planned buybacks of longer-term government debt. Roughly $2.75 billion of leveraged bets against Bitcoin were force-closed over the next three days (a “short squeeze”: traders who bet on falling prices are forced to buy back, which pushes prices higher). Trend indicators now point up while momentum and stretch indicators sit at levels rarely seen. The next scheduled events are Nvidia earnings and July inflation data on Wednesday, and Fed Chair Kevin Warsh’s first Jackson Hole speech on Friday morning.
What happened in the last 24 hours
- Price path. BTC opened the UTC day at $77,729, dipped to $76,652 in Asian hours, climbed through the US morning, and printed $80,000 after the Wall Street open before easing into the close at $78,982 (Alpha Vantage daily candle; Cointelegraph reported the $80,000 touch as the first in 100 days).
- ETF flows. US spot Bitcoin ETFs took in $1.92 billion net for the week of August 17–21, their strongest week since October 2025, with BlackRock’s IBIT accounting for $1.33 billion of it (SoSoValue and Farside data via Cointelegraph). Spot Ether ETFs added roughly $700 million. Monday’s figure had not been published when this brief was written.
- Corporate treasuries. Strategy (MSTR) said it raised $2 billion by selling stock and created a $1.59 billion “USD cash” reserve; it holds 840,447 BTC at an average cost of $75,385 and has not bought Bitcoin since June (Cointelegraph, Decrypt). Strive bought 1,110 BTC for $81.5 million at an average of $73,409, taking its holdings to 21,356 BTC (Cointelegraph).
- Derivatives. More than $220 million of short positions were liquidated across crypto in the 24 hours around the $80,000 print (CoinGlass data via Cointelegraph). Aggregate perpetual funding was +0.0089% per 8 hours with open interest near $55.6 billion (CoinStats).
- Policy and regulation. The SEC’s 402-page “Regulation Crypto Assets” proposal, published August 18, is now the main live rule-making; the CLARITY Act is reported as on hold in the Senate (Motley Fool, Investing.com). Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent announced new sanctions on Iran Monday afternoon, and US–Canada trade talks broke down over the weekend (Yahoo Finance).
- Equities and rates. The S&P 500 and Nasdaq slipped Monday as chip stocks sold off (the Philadelphia Semiconductor Index was down 2.6% at midday; Nvidia −2%, Micron −5.8%), while the 30-year Treasury yield stayed above 5% (Spokesman-Review/Reuters). Friday’s closes: 10-year 4.73%, 30-year 5.27%, gold $4,732 (Yahoo Finance).
Price and trend
Bitcoin sits above all four of the moving averages this brief tracks: 14.3% above the 200-day ($69,087), 20.7% above the 50-day ($65,461), 19.5% above the 100-day ($66,105), and 17.0% above the 20-day ($67,510). The 50-day is still below the 200-day, so the “death cross” from November 16, 2025 is technically still in place; the two lines are $3,626 apart and the gap is closing by roughly $230 a day at the current pace. Before August 19, the last daily close above the 200-day average was on November 2, 2025.
The bigger picture: the close is 37.5% below the all-time high of $126,296 set on October 6, 2025, 9.7% below the 2025 year-end close of $87,498, and 35.0% above the June 30 low close of $58,524. The weekly candle that closed Sunday gained $14,893, which Decrypt describes as the largest weekly gain in dollar terms on record.
Levels being discussed (attributed)
| Level | Why it is being watched | Who cites it |
|---|---|---|
| $82,000 | Described as the next obstacle above $80,000; the May 10 close of $82,200 was the highest of the spring | Decrypt (Aug 24) |
| $80,000 | Round number and the first touch since May 15; called “an important upper boundary” | James Butterfill, CoinShares, via Yahoo Finance and Decrypt |
| $77,251 | The 50-week exponential moving average; Bitcoin’s weekly close above it is being treated as a test of whether this is more than a bear-market rally | Rekt Capital, via Cointelegraph (this brief’s calculation gives the same $77,251) |
| $76,700 | Center of a band of resting buy orders (“bid liquidity”) below price | CoinGlass data via Cointelegraph |
| $74,000–$76,000 | Near-term support zone in aggregated analysis | CoinStats (Aug 24) |
| $69,087 / $67,510 | 200-day and 20-day simple moving averages | This brief’s calculation |
Momentum and volatility
RSI(14) closed at 82, its sixth straight day above the 70 line that defines the overbought zone, after peaking at 86 on August 21. “Overbought” is a description of speed, not a verdict: it says the last two weeks contained far more up-days than down-days. In trending markets RSI has stayed above 70 for weeks at a time (18 consecutive days in November 2024, 25 in late 2023); in range-bound markets, readings above 75 have more often been followed by a pause or pullback. The MACD line crossed above its signal line on August 18 and above zero on August 19; the histogram widened again today (+1,676 vs +1,647), so by this measure momentum is still building rather than fading.
Volatility has changed regime. The 14-day ATR, a measure of the average daily trading range, went from $1,232 on August 16 to $2,265 today, so a normal day now covers about 2.9% of price. Thirty-day realized volatility is 43% annualized, up from 23% a week ago. Bollinger band width, which was 4.2% on August 15 (the narrowest since July 2025), is now 34%. Price closed at or above the upper band for the sixth consecutive day (five closes above it, today’s exactly at it, %B 1.00). Traders call this “walking the band”; it typically continues until a close back inside the band with narrowing width.
Flows and positioning
The spot-ETF channel turned from a headwind into a source of demand this month. The August 19 inflow of $517 million was the largest single day since early May, and August 20 topped it at $606 million. Two caveats appear in the same reports: 2026 year-to-date net flows remain negative at −$2.91 billion (Cointelegraph), and Decrypt calculates that of the $23 billion increase in Bitcoin and Ether ETF assets last week, only about $2.6 billion was new money; the rest was existing holdings rising in value.
On the derivatives side, the combination of a sharply higher price, roughly $2.75 billion of Bitcoin short liquidations between August 19 and 21 (about $1 billion of it in a single hour on August 19, per Investing.com), and a funding rate that is still near its neutral baseline describes a rally driven first by forced buying and then by spot demand, rather than by a build-up of leveraged long positions. Open interest near $55.6 billion is the figure to track from here: rising open interest alongside rising price would indicate new positions being opened; falling open interest alongside rising price would indicate more short covering.
On-chain and network
The network’s computing power is steady at roughly 920 EH/s on a seven-day average (Pickaxe, August 18), and mining difficulty adjusted down 1.31% to 125.81T on August 23, with the next adjustment estimated for September 6 at about −1.3% (CoinWarz). Hashprice, the daily revenue per unit of computing power, rose about 20% in four days to $38.29 per PH/s on August 22 (Bitcoin.com), reversing part of the squeeze on miner margins that followed June’s 10% difficulty drop. On holder behavior, CoinShares’ James Butterfill said large holders (“whales”) “had stopped selling and begun to accumulate again” (Yahoo Finance); no independent exchange-balance or MVRV figures for August 24 were available at the free tiers when this brief was written.
Sentiment
The alternative.me Fear & Greed Index printed 73 (“Greed”) for August 24, up from 66 the day before and 62 on August 20; CoinMarketCap’s separate index read 78 (CryptoRank). Of the 32 Bitcoin-tagged articles in the Alpha Vantage news feed published on August 24, the feed’s sentiment model scored 13 as bullish or somewhat bullish, 19 as neutral, and none as bearish.
Published views are split. Tim Sun of HashKey sees the market “forming a consensus around the bottom range,” and Stephen Wundke of Algoz calls the move “a textbook demonstration of supply illiquidity meeting a sudden demand shock” (Decrypt). Butterfill of CoinShares calls it “a macro story, not a crypto one,” notes whale accumulation, but does not expect a sustained breakout within the next 12 months (Yahoo Finance, Decrypt). Analyst Rekt Capital writes that if this is a bear-market relief rally, “Bitcoin could pullback as early as this week,” pointing to the 50-week EMA at $77,251 as the test (Cointelegraph). Bitget CEO Gracy Chen does not believe the rally is sustainable and has said she aims to add near $50,000 later this year or early next (Cointelegraph Magazine). Mark Cuban remains skeptical of a lasting revival (Zacks).
Macro and cross-asset
The catalyst most reports name is US fiscal and monetary policy rather than anything crypto-specific. The Treasury announced it would at least double planned buybacks of longer-dated debt; Secretary Bessent told CNBC the purchases “could be even larger than the $4 billion” announced and would be “done routinely” (CoinDesk). Buybacks inject cash into the bond market and are intended to hold down long-term yields. Bitcoin and gold rose together as the dollar softened, which Nansen’s Jake Kennis reads as “consistent with debasement and fiscal-credibility concerns” (Decrypt). Long yields nevertheless remain high: the 30-year Treasury closed Friday at 5.27% and stayed above 5% Monday, the 10-year at 4.73%.
The Fed’s target range is 3.50–3.75%. After July payrolls fell by 23,000 against an expected 85,000 gain and July CPI printed 3.4%, futures markets price a 38.4% probability of a rate hike at the September 16 meeting and 61.6% for no change (CME FedWatch via Decrypt); a month ago the hike probability was above 80%. Kevin Warsh delivers his first Jackson Hole keynote as Fed chair on Friday at about 10 a.m. ET; the symposium’s theme this year is “Financial Innovation: Implications for Payments and Policy,” the first to center on digital payments (TechTimes). Bitcoin dominance is 59.2% of a $2.60 trillion crypto market; Ether trades near $2,500 after a 31% week, and Decrypt notes the ETH/BTC ratio printed a golden cross.
Calendar: the week ahead
| Date (ET) | Event | Why Bitcoin traders watch it |
|---|---|---|
| Tue, Aug 25 | Richmond Fed manufacturing index; Intuit earnings; US spot ETF flow report for Monday | First read on whether ETF demand carried into the new week |
| Wed, Aug 26 | Q2 GDP second estimate (consensus 1.5%); July PCE inflation (core consensus +0.2% m/m); durable goods; Nvidia earnings after the close | PCE is the Fed’s preferred inflation gauge and feeds the September hike-or-hold debate; Nvidia sets the tone for risk appetite in tech |
| Thu, Aug 27 | Weekly jobless claims; Jackson Hole symposium opens (Aug 27–29) | Labor data after the weak July payrolls |
| Fri, Aug 28, ~10 a.m. | Fed Chair Warsh keynote at Jackson Hole; preliminary annual payroll benchmark revision | First policy signal from the new chair; 69% of fund managers surveyed by Bank of America expect a neutral tone (TechTimes) |
| Sun, Sep 6 (est.) | Next Bitcoin difficulty adjustment (≈ −1.3%) | Miner economics |
| Wed, Sep 16 | FOMC rate decision | Markets currently price a 38% chance of a hike |
Reading the combination
Three groups of indicators currently agree and one does not. The trend group (price above the 200-day, ADX 31 and rising, MACD above zero with a widening histogram) describes an established, strengthening uptrend. The flow group (a record dollar-value weekly candle, $1.92 billion of weekly ETF inflows, above-average volume, near-neutral funding) describes demand that has so far come from spot buyers and short covering rather than from leveraged longs. The stretch group (RSI 82, price 17% above its 20-day average, six closes at or above the upper Bollinger Band, Fear & Greed 73) describes a move that is unusually extended relative to its own recent history. Historically, “strong trend plus extended” has resolved in one of two ways: a sideways consolidation in which the averages catch up to price, or a sharp pullback toward the 20-day average; the indicators do not say which, and this week’s calendar (PCE, Nvidia, Warsh) supplies the kind of events that have decided it in the past. The closest parallel in this dataset is November 22, 2024, when RSI was also 82 and price was 16.9% above its 20-day average: over the following two months price ranged between $92,000 and $106,200 on daily closes while the averages caught up. The 50-day/200-day death cross remaining in place is the one trend measure still pointing the other way, and it will take weeks to resolve either way.
Learn the indicators: every reading above is explained, with charts and the combinations traders watch, in Bitcoin Indicators Explained.
Sources
Price, volume and all technical indicators: Alpha Vantage BTC/USD daily series (00:00 UTC candles), computed by the author. Fear & Greed: alternative.me; CoinMarketCap index via CryptoRank. ETF flows: Farside Investors and SoSoValue via TFTC and Cointelegraph; Decrypt on new money vs. price gains. Derivatives: CoinStats; Cointelegraph on the $80,000 print and liquidations; CoinDesk live updates, Aug 20; Investing.com on the White House meeting and liquidations. Network: Pickaxe, CoinWarz, Bitcoin.com. Corporate: Cointelegraph on Strategy, Cointelegraph on Strive, Decrypt Morning Minute. Macro and analyst views: Yahoo Finance, Aug 24; Decrypt on $80,000 and Jackson Hole; Decrypt on the dollar; TechTimes on Jackson Hole 2026; Cointelegraph Magazine on Bitget’s CEO; Motley Fool on the CLARITY Act and SEC rule; Yahoo Finance market recap; Spokesman-Review/Reuters on Monday’s session. Calendar: Newsquawk, IG. Dominance: tv-hub.
Disclaimer. This post is published for general informational and educational purposes only. It is not investment, financial, trading, tax, or legal advice, and nothing in it should be read as a recommendation or solicitation to buy, sell, or hold Bitcoin or any other asset. Indicators describe past and present data; they do not predict future prices. Figures are drawn from third-party sources believed to be reliable but not guaranteed, and may be revised. The author holds no responsibility for any loss or decision arising from the use of this content. Cryptocurrency prices are highly volatile; anyone considering a trade should do their own research and consult a licensed financial professional.