The past night proved extremely volatile for digital assets. Bitcoin made a powerful surge, triggering a wave of short position liquidations, and amid the overall optimism, important news emerged from key market players — from Polymarket to Curve DAO.

Market Dynamics: Bullish Momentum Gains Strength

Over the past 24 hours, the leading cryptocurrency demonstrated confident growth of 4.13%, rising from $77,200 to a local high near $81,800. At the time of analysis, BTC is consolidating around the $80,895 mark, indicating an attempt to establish a foothold above the psychologically important level. Ether is also keeping pace: gaining 4.33%, the asset is trading around $2,506, having managed to recover from $2,380.

In the top 25 by market capitalization, a synchronized "green" trend is observed. The growth leaders were Zcash (+15.62%), Uniswap (+9.99%), and Cardano (+6.79%). XRP strengthened by 5.72%. The only notable laggard among the majors was Monero, which lost 2.09%. In the top 100, Pons showed the best result (+32.16%), while Filecoin became the anti-leader, plunging by 5.74%.

Institutional Demand and Market Sentiment

The key growth driver was a significant inflow of capital into spot ETFs. Bitcoin funds attracted an impressive $730.87 million in a single day, while Ethereum products brought in $141.39 million. Solid inflows were also recorded in ETFs for Solana ($6.40 million) and XRP ($6.14 million). This signals the return of risk appetite among institutional investors.

The Fear and Greed Index surged to 74 points, returning to the "greed" zone. For comparison: just a month ago, the indicator stood at 27 points, reflecting extreme fear. The current dynamics indicate a radical shift in market participant sentiment.

The wave of growth led to massive liquidations: over the past day, positions of 96,304 traders were forcibly closed for a total of $537.28 million. The main blow fell on short sellers — $456.46 million versus $80.82 million in longs. The largest liquidation order of $5.26 million was executed on Binance for the BTCUSDT pair.

Industry News: New Products and Warnings

The prediction market platform Polymarket launched the Polymarket Perps service, offering perpetual contracts with leverage up to 20x. Trading is available for cryptocurrencies, stocks, commodities, and other assets, but the service is unavailable to US residents.

Meanwhile, Fidelity is urging caution against jumping to conclusions. Despite the August rally, the company's analysts warn that this is not proof of the end of the bear cycle. Some investors expect a reversal only by November 2026, relying on the four-year cycle theory. Among the factors that could change the market's trajectory, they highlight the exit from the low-volatility period, regulatory clarity, and increased institutional activity.

The International Monetary Fund confirmed that El Salvador has not used state funds to purchase bitcoin since June 27, 2025. All accumulated coins came in the form of private donations, and the fund does not expect further reserve replenishment beyond documented amounts. The country may gain access to $140 million in additional financing after fulfilling agreed conditions.

In the DeFi sector, Curve DAO approved funding for the yRisk team, which will take over risk management for crvUSD and the Llamalend protocol. Notably, both yRisk participants are lead developers of the Resupply protocol, which lost approximately $9.6 million in a hack in June 2025. During the vote, the proposal was supported by holders of 536.9 million veCRV, with no votes against.

My view: the overnight growth is more of a rebound within a sideways range than the start of a new sustainable trend. However, the inflow into ETFs and the return of the fear index to the greed zone indicate that institutional money is gradually returning to the market. The key level for confirming a trend reversal will be bitcoin establishing a foothold above $82,000.