Bitcoin jumps 6% in two hours as Treasury eases bond market

Bitcoin rose from about $65,400 to nearly $68,600 between 14:45 and 16:45 UTC Wednesday, based on price data pulled directly from CoinGecko. The 24-hour gain reached 5.9%, with the coin trading as high as $68,982 and as low as $64,124 over that window. Most of the move happened fast: bitcoin held near $67,100 at 15:25 and traded above $68,500 by 15:40, a jump of roughly 2.9% in 15 minutes.

The trigger landed hours earlier. The US Treasury Department, led by Secretary Scott Bessent, announced Wednesday it would at least double the size of its buyback operations for longer-dated government debt, from $2 billion to at least $4 billion per operation, covering the 10-to-20-year and 20-to-30-year segments starting September 9. The 10-year Treasury yield fell 6 basis points to 4.647% and the 30-year fell 9 basis points to 5.196% on the news, easing broader financial conditions and lifting stocks, gold, and bitcoin together.

“This increase in buyback operation sizes reflects Treasury's desire to provide greater liquidity support in longer-dated nominal sectors where there is consistent strong sponsorship from market participants, as evidenced by the significant volume of high-quality offers Treasury routinely receives in longer-dated buyback operations.”

— US Treasury Department, official statement, August 19, 2026

Krishna Guha, head of global policy and central bank strategy at Evercore ISI, said the move could crowd in buyers who had been sitting on the sidelines after the earlier run-up in yields, while discouraging traders from betting heavily against long-dated bonds going forward. He was careful to note the limits of the intervention, too: it does little to change the underlying need to finance both a wave of corporate debt tied to AI infrastructure spending and large government deficits.

• Bitcoin two-hour move (14:45 to 16:45 UTC): about $65,400 to $68,600
• 24-hour range: $64,124 low to $68,982 high
• 24-hour price change: +5.9%
• Treasury buyback increase: $2 billion to at least $4 billion per operation, effective September 9
• Same-day ether move: up 9.4%, outpacing bitcoin's gain

Bitcoin's move came on top of a separate catalyst crypto markets had already been digesting. The SEC's Regulation Crypto Assets proposal, unveiled earlier Tuesday, gave token issuers a clearer path to raising money without full registration, and traders appear to be pricing that clarity in alongside the Treasury move. The rally also marks a sharp reversal from earlier this month, when bitcoin sat stuck near $63,000 amid ETF outflows and uncertainty over the Clarity Act's timeline. Bitcoin's market cap stood at $1.38 trillion as of the latest CoinGecko snapshot, with 24-hour trading volume near $31.4 billion, well above its recent daily average.

The rally sits on top of a mixed flow picture. Spot bitcoin ETFs posted their largest weekly outflow in six weeks heading into Wednesday, even as on-chain data tracked roughly $2.9 billion in fresh whale accumulation over the prior 60 days. That split suggests large long-term holders kept buying through the ETF selling, and Wednesday's two-hour spike looks less like a single new group of buyers showing up and more like existing demand meeting a sudden drop in yields and a friendlier regulatory signal at the same time. Bitcoin still trades well below its all-time high near $126,080, set last October, so Wednesday's move closes part of that gap without erasing it.

Nothing here should be taken as financial advice — just information to consider.