Bitcoin Surges Near $10,000, Destroying $20M In BitMEX Short Positions

Just five days out from the Bitcoin block reward halving, analysts are buying coins en-masse in preparation for more upside.

The cryptocurrency topped $9,750 just minutes ago for the first time since March, setting a new local high just shy of $9,800. With this, BTC is up 4% from ~$9,400 in the past 24 hours, outperforming altcoins like Ethereum and XRP.

This latest move may be small in percentage terms but analysts say it’s important from a technical standpoint. One trader, in fact, commented that once Bitcoin decisively clears past $9,500, he doesn’t see “much stopping us” until $10,500.

Due to the importance of the $9,500 resistance, millions were liquidated during this move.

According to Skew.com, a derivatives data tracker, approximately $23 million worth of BitMEX short positions (and some long positions) have been liquidated in the past four hours. This coincides with the move from the ~$9,400 region to $9,800.

This is notably a smaller bout of liquidations than previous moves, as short positions have largely been underleveraged since last week’s surge from $7,500 to $9,000.

Bitcoin Gets Massive Buy Recommendation

Although likely a coincidence, Bitcoin surged from $9,500 to $9,700 when the news was released that a top macro investor is buying cryptocurrency.

According to a prominent crypto trader with access to a Bloomberg Terminal, the outlet just reported that Paul Tudor Jones is buying Bitcoin futures, calling BTC the “fastest horse” in terms of investments.

Paul Tudor Jones is an American hedge fund manager known for making macro calls.

According to a note from the investor, he sees Bitcoin as a good hedge against the impending inflation that could be catalyzed by central bank money printing, noting how BTC looks similar to how gold did in the 1970s, prior to 15%-per-year inflation.

BBG: Paul Tudor Jones buys Bitcoin, says reminded of gold in the 70s pic.twitter.com/s5gmhDWqmb

— light (@lightcrypto) May 7, 2020

The Cryptocurrency Is Flashing Bullish SIgns

While there remain bears, the majority of analysts believe that Bitcoin is on track to rally in the short to medium term.

A top trader indicated yesterday that there’s a good chance BTC could hit $10,700 in the coming week. As to why the trader, who called Bitcoin’s 2018 bottom six months in advance, thinks this is the case, he explained:

“I might be wrong but something that’s been bugging me is how some of the stronger altcoins like ADA/USD ook mad bullish but ADA/BTC looks like trash, so I kind of feel BTC is going to go on a face melting move soon.”

This is backed up by technical trends. Per previous reports from NewsBTC, there is the following bullish confluence on the weekly:

• The Moving Average Convergence Divergence (MACD) has seen a bullish cross. As reported by NewsBTC, in 2017  the indicator flipped green at $2,000 to mark the start of a 1,000% rally to $20,000. And at the start of 2019, Bitcoin rallied 300% when the indicator trended green in January.
• The Parabolic Stop-And-Run indicator has printed a “buy.” As reported by NewsBTC, every time this signal was seen in the past five years, the cryptocurrency has seen “significant” upside, as put by Nunya Bizniz.
• Bitcoin has recently crossed above three key averages: the 50-week, 100-week, and 200-week simple moving averages.

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