Bitcoin blows past $79,000 as Wall Street piles in

Bitcoin crossed $79,000 Friday after a week of heavy institutional buying, favorable economic signals, and a warmer tone toward crypto from Washington. If you’ve been hearing the buzz and wondering what’s behind it, here’s the short version: a lot of big money moved at once, and traders who bet against the rally got wiped out.

For readers who don’t follow crypto markets day to day, Bitcoin is the oldest and largest cryptocurrency. It can be bought directly or, since early 2024, through spot exchange-traded funds, or ETFs, which trade on regular stock exchanges. Those ETFs have become the main pipeline for institutional money flowing into Bitcoin.

More than $1 billion in ETF buying in two days

U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs pulled in roughly $517 million in net inflows on Aug. 19 and about $606 million on Aug. 20, Lacie Zhang, a research analyst at Bitget Wallet, told Decrypt. The funds had already attracted $853.5 million over five consecutive trading sessions earlier this month.

Julio Moreno of CoinShares said ETFs purchased roughly 7,500 Bitcoin in a single day, their highest daily level since April.

“The catalyst was the US Treasury announcement and Trump’s remarks about the US Gov. potentially buying Bitcoin. However, Bitcoin spot demand was already showing signs of growth days before.”