Longs Squeezed as Bitcoin Reverses, Open Interest Falls

Bitcoin's recent rally led to short sellers being squeezed last week, but by Sunday, the reversal was hitting leveraged longs. According to CoinGlass data, on August 23 around 07:00 UTC, $101.39 million of crypto long positions were liquidated over four hours, which is almost 86% of the window's total of $118.13 million. The 24-hour view put long liquidations at $250.57 million out of $339.73 million.

Bitcoin contributed $38.66 million to the four-hour long liquidations and $55.82 million over 24 hours. At the time, BTC traded near $76,088, down about 1.8% from the preceding day after approaching $80,000 during the earlier rally. Since then, Bitcoin has recovered slightly to near $77,300.

The positioning data shows a sharp change in who was being forced out. The open interest in Bitcoin futures fell by 2.65% over 24 hours to around $54.54 billion. Major perpetual funding rates were generally near the 0.01% baseline, and the aggregate account long-short ratio stood at 0.9238.

The washout was not limited to Bitcoin, with Binance accounting for $65.02 million of all crypto liquidations over four hours, including $58.64 million in longs. The largest single order shown over 24 hours was an $11.72 million ETHUSDT liquidation on Binance.

The earlier short squeeze carried several totals tied to different windows. CoinGlass reported that $3.07 billion in crypto shorts had been liquidated 'today' without defining exact start and end times. Farside Investors recorded five consecutive sessions of US spot Bitcoin ETF inflows through Friday, including $307.5 million on August 21.

The timing leaves long liquidations and thinner weekend spot support entangled. Evidence of the next crowded long trade would have to emerge in a later expansion of leverage, funding or both. Until then, the live data describes a cleanup of existing risk, with Monday's reopened ETF channel providing the next spot-demand test.