Bitcoin Liquidations Spark Price Spike

BTC has improved its value by 11% over the past 24 hours, according to data from Asia trading. This increase has effectively erased all losses suffered over 10-12 March, 2023. Multiple reports say the price spike is due to Bitcoin liquidations emanating from betting on the decline of cryptocurrency prices after Silvergate Bank and other crypto-related financial institutions fell into crisis last week.

Overall, more than $100 million in BTC shorts (in trading, shorting refers to selling, while long means buying) were liquidated on 13 March. While this figure looks like a significant sum, it is nowhere near the 14 January Bitcoin liquidations, which saw around $500 million cleared from several crypto futures.

Cryptocurrency futures constitute an agreement between two parties to buy and sell an agreed amount of a particular crypto asset at a future price within a given timeframe.

Bitcoin liquidations lead to a year-high trading volume

As exchanges such as Binance, Bybit, Huobi, and OKX spread losses from the liquidations, interest in BTC rose as many traders saw a positive signal from the crypto market activity.

By the close of Monday, 13 March, BTC recorded a trading volume of approximately $49.5 billion, the year's high and the largest since November 2022.

Overall, the crypto economy has been on a rebound in 2023. As always, the first digital currency has made up for gains lost during 2022 when it was crippled by Russia/Ukraine crisis, rising interest rates which led to renewed interest in government bonds and bills, and, of course, the crash of TerraUSD (UST). As of 10:00 UTC, BTC was up 48% year-to-date (YTD).

Despite the ups and downs of the crypto market, analyst Freddie Max at Price Prediction.net foresees BTC climbing to an average price of $31,243, testing the smallest possible price of $30,356, and reaching the best possible price of $34,916 by the end of the year.