According to Woofun AI, the US Federal Reserve (Fed) kept its benchmark interest rate unchanged, a macro policy decision that directly reduced market uncertainty and, combined with strong performance in the semiconductor sector and continued inflows into spot Bitcoin ETFs, helped push Bitcoin's price back up to around $81,000.
Specific trading data shows that as of 8:04 AM on the 29th, the trading price of BTC on the South Korean digital asset exchange Upbit was 108.84 million Korean won, up 0.96% from the price at 9:00 AM the previous day. On the global exchange Binance, BTC's price rose 0.40% from 24 hours earlier, standing at $81,260. At the same time, ETH's price rose 0.23% to $2,358.54, while XRP's price fell 0.31% to $1.30.
Data compiled by Woofun AI shows that in the past 24 hours, approximately $57.53 million worth of Bitcoin positions were liquidated, of which $14.22 million were long positions, accounting for about 24.7%, while $43.31 million were short positions, accounting for 75.3%. Across the entire digital asset market, a total of approximately $258.57 million worth of positions were liquidated.
The price recovery was largely driven by a revival in investment sentiment toward tech stocks led by the semiconductor sector — the previous day, South Korea's KOSPI index surged 6.6%, and SK Hynix rose nearly 11% after reporting a sevenfold increase in profit. US Nasdaq 100 index futures also rose 0.5% at the time, indicating that the strong performance of South Korea's semiconductor sector is spreading to global tech stocks.
Capital inflows through spot Bitcoin ETFs also played a positive role in the price recovery: on the 27th, US spot Bitcoin ETFs saw another net inflow of $176 million, marking two consecutive days of inflows. Even as Bitcoin's price recently fell below $80,000 and underwent a correction, investment demand through ETFs continued.
In the derivatives market, although trading volume increased, new leveraged investments did not expand significantly. The 24-hour trading volume of digital asset futures grew 7.5% to $163.2 billion, while the number of open contracts rose only 1.3%. Open contracts refer to the scale of futures contracts that have not yet been closed, and their growth rate being lower than trading volume indicates that the number of newly opened positions was relatively limited. BTC and ETH showed similar trends: while BTC's price rose 2.3%, the number of open contracts actually fell 0.1%; although ETH's price rose 2.7%, the growth in open contracts was only 1.7%, indicating that even as prices rose, leveraged investments did not surge.
In the options market, investors' concerns about short-term downside risk eased somewhat. On the digital asset options trading platform Deribit, the "skew" indicator — which reflects the price difference between 1-period put and call options for BTC — dropped from about 10% a week earlier to below 1%. Put options are tools used to hedge against price declines, and a lower skew means reduced demand for downside protection. However, over the medium to long term, the market remains cautious. In 1-month, 3-month, and 6-month options, investors still favored buying put options, with the BTC put option expiring in 30 days with a strike price of $65,000 being the most actively traded in the past 24 hours. Although expectations for a short-term rebound have risen, many investors are still considering the possibility of further declines.
The main factors affecting BTC's price in the future will be the Fed's monetary policy and the market trend of tech stocks. The Fed kept its benchmark rate at the 3.75%–4.00% level at its Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) meeting on the 28th (local time), but did not rule out the possibility of further rate hikes. Fed Chair Kevin Warsh emphasized the strong growth momentum of the US economy and persistent inflation pressures at a press conference. Since the US GDP growth rate for the first half of this year has been revised up to 2.4% and third-quarter growth is expected to exceed 3%, the Fed is in a position to focus on controlling inflation. The market widely believes the Fed is likely to raise rates again in December. Oscar Munoz, head of US macro strategy at TD Securities (TD.US), said: "We still believe the Fed will raise rates in December," adding, "If it doesn't intend to raise rates further, there must be quite sufficient reasons."
As for the tech stock market, whether its upward trend can continue remains uncertain. Google's parent company Alphabet (GOOGL.US) reported earnings that fell short of market expectations, and its stock fell sharply in after-hours trading, while Microsoft (MSFT.US) rose on the back of solid cloud computing business results. Although BTC benefited from the strong performance of the semiconductor sector and ETF inflows to stage a rebound, sustaining this upward momentum will require support from the external environment. The market believes that whether US tech stocks can maintain their recent upward momentum and whether the Fed will raise rates further will both influence BTC's future price trajectory.
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