A year ago today bitcoin printed the highest price it has ever traded at: $126,296 on Coinbase on Monday 6 October 2025, with the day closing at $124,720. This morning it trades near $85,300. That is about 32% below the peak on the day’s close, while the Nasdaq Composite crossed 31,000 for the first time on 2 October (per StockTwits’ market wrap) and Chair Warsh’s Fed has just begun its first rate-hiking cycle since 2023. Equities have kept going. Bitcoin has not. This piece lays out, with the numbers, what changed in twelve months — and what it does and does not tell us.
The one-year scoreboard
Start with the facts that are not in dispute. The table compares the close of 6 October 2025 with the close of 5 October 2026, the latest complete daily candle. Bitcoin figures are Coinbase Exchange daily data; yields are the U.S. Treasury’s official constant-maturity series (October 2025, October 2026).
| Mon 6 Oct 2025 | Mon 5 Oct 2026 | Change | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Bitcoin, daily close (Coinbase) | $124,720 | $85,749 | −31.2% |
| Bitcoin vs the 6 Oct 2025 intraday high of $126,296 | — | $85,749 | −32.1% |
| U.S. 2-year Treasury yield (CMT) | 3.60% | 4.84% | +124 bp |
| U.S. 10-year Treasury yield (CMT) | 4.18% | 5.31% | +113 bp |
| U.S. 30-year Treasury yield (CMT) | 4.76% | 5.66% | +90 bp |
Note the third row: Coinbase’s intraday high that day was $126,296, a little above the $126,198.07 that Yahoo Finance uses as the all-time high, because indices and exchanges record the peak differently. Either way the gap is about 32%. The yield rows are the striking ones. Over the same twelve months the 2-year yield rose 124 basis points and the 10-year 113 basis points, so the discount rate that investors apply to every long-dated asset — bitcoin included — is more than a full percentage point higher.
The path down, and most of the way back
The drawdown did not stop at 32%. Bitcoin fell to a 2026 low of $57,717.55 on 1 July — 54.3% below the peak — and its lowest daily close of the year was $58,524 on 30 June. This desk covered the halfway point in our July analysis of the 50% drawdown and the policy backdrop in why the Fed, not ETFs, drove the 2026 drawdown. From that low to Monday’s close the price has risen 48.6%, and the highest daily close of 2026 remains $96,955 on 14 January. Bitcoin began the year at $87,498 (the 2025 close); it is now 2.0% below that, so year-to-date it has been a round trip.
A caution about figures in circulation. Yahoo Finance’s 5 October market note lists bitcoin’s “year-to-date change” as −29.3% (Yahoo Finance). On Coinbase’s numbers the year-to-date change is about −2%, while the twelve-month change (the 5 October 2025 close of $123,521 to $85,749) is −30.6%, much closer to the figure Yahoo printed. When a source labels a figure “year-to-date”, check the start date before using it.
Two sessions explain the whole September recovery
Bitcoin traded as low as $74,888 on 15 September, the day the Senate vote failed, and $74,912 on 16 September, the day the Fed raised rates; from the 16 September close it has gained 12.6%. But the path was not a steady climb. 24/7 Wall St. reported that two days — 18 and 21 September — delivered nearly $10,000 of the $10,450 gain (24/7 Wall St., 23 September). This desk’s own arithmetic on Coinbase closes goes slightly further, because the 16 September close ($76,145) is the right starting point for what has happened since:
| Window | Bitcoin close-to-close | Share of the net move |
|---|---|---|
| Fri 18 Sep ($76,349 → $80,875) | +$4,526 | 47% |
| Mon 21 Sep ($81,160 → $86,595) | +$5,435 | 57% |
| The other 17 sessions, 17 Sep to 5 Oct, combined | −$358 | −4% |
| Net, 16 Sep close ($76,145) to 5 Oct close ($85,749) | +$9,604 | 100% |
Those two sessions contributed 104% of the net gain; all the other days together lost $358. The catalysts were concentrated too. On 21 September U.S. spot bitcoin ETFs took in roughly $999 million, the largest single day since October 2025, and the seven-session inflow streak that began on 17 September totalled about $2.98 billion (Digital Today); 24/7 Wall St. reported more than $800 million of crypto liquidations, mostly shorts, in the 24 hours leading into the move. That is the signature of a short squeeze meeting a genuine buyer, and our guide to short squeezes explains how to recognise one. A rally that is two days wide is fragile, which fits what has happened since: bitcoin has not closed higher than the 21 September close in the 14 sessions that followed.
Bitcoin up, yields up — an unusual pairing
It is tempting to say that higher rates explain bitcoin’s year, and the scoreboard supports that over twelve months. The last three weeks tell a more complicated story. Between the close on 15 September, the day before the hike, and the close on 5 October, bitcoin rose 13.4% (from $75,584 to $85,749). Over the same period the 2-year Treasury yield rose from 4.67% to 4.84% and the 10-year from 5.00% to 5.31% (Treasury, September). Bitcoin and yields rose together.
This is a fact about three weeks, not a law. What it does show is that the relationship the market leans on — weaker data, lower yields, higher bitcoin — is not what happened on Friday. Payrolls missed by roughly 60,000 jobs and the 10-year closed 4 basis points higher (5.24% to 5.28%), while bitcoin touched $87,249 intraday but finished the day down 0.4% at $84,505, and Monday it fell another 0.9%. The cleaner link, for now, is between bitcoin and Fed hike probability: CME FedWatch’s odds of an October hike fell from 70.9% to 19.4% in a week, as Yahoo Finance reported — and bitcoin is up roughly 4% over that week on Ted Pillows’ count (weekly report). We cover the data behind that move in today’s news piece on the jobs report.
Joe Consorti’s 1 October video, above, frames the Fed’s treatment of inflation as consequential for bitcoin. We include it as one analyst’s perspective; this desk has not audited its claims.
What the Nasdaq record does and does not mean
The divergence with equities is real but easy to over-read. The Nasdaq Composite’s record on 2 October came on a 1.6% gain the day of the jobs report, with the Dow up 400 points and the S&P 500 up 0.9% (StockTwits). Equities rallied on a report BlackRock’s Jeffrey Rosenberg called “dovish”. Bitcoin’s reaction was weaker: a high of $87,249 on Friday, a lower close, and a stall on Monday as the 10-year pushed to 5.31%. Without a like-for-like twelve-month return series for the Nasdaq, this desk is not going to put a number on the gap, and we would be sceptical of anyone who does so from a chart alone.
What we can say is narrower and checkable. Bitcoin set its record with the 10-year at 4.18%; it trades about 32% below that record with the 10-year at 5.31%. On the Treasury’s series the first close above 5% since at least October 2023 — by this desk’s 11 September record of the 4.95% high — came on 16 September (5.01%), the day of the hike. Two endpoints are not a path, and one cycle is not proof of cause, but the sequence is worth stating plainly.
The Coin Bureau video above was published on 10 October 2025, four days after the peak, and is included here as a time capsule: it asks the question that a year of data now answers in part. Bitcoin closed that day at about $112,980 on Coinbase; it trades roughly 24% below that level now.
The levels that matter from here
The technical picture is compressed. The 21 September intraday high of $87,397 is the ceiling traders are watching; Ted Pillows lists resistance at $86,700, $87,570 and $89,768 and support at $85,000, $83,700 and $82,500. A close above $87,570 or below $83,700 would take bitcoin out of the range it has held since 21 September. On the daily chart, the 50-day moving average sits near $79,500 and the 100- and 200-day averages are within $60 of each other near $71,500; our moving-average guide explains why that matters.
What would change this picture
- A second close above $87,570. That would break the pattern of failing at the same price and would mean the two-day September rally has been joined by a third, broader leg.
- A weak 10-year auction on Wednesday. If the 10-year yield pushes well beyond 5.31%, the twelve-month pattern of rising yields would be reasserting itself against bitcoin.
- Wednesday’s FOMC minutes and the 14 October CPI. Both feed the 29 October decision; hike odds at 19% leave room to move in either direction.
- ETF flows. The September rally was fed by $2.98 billion in seven sessions. The week to 2 October brought $241.1 million by Ted Pillows’ count. A return of large inflows would matter more than any single price level.
A year after the top, the data say three things. Bitcoin has recovered about 49% from its 2026 low but remains about 32% below its peak. The recovery has been narrow — two sessions — and the macro backdrop has become tighter, not looser. And the price now sits in a range with well-marked edges. Whichever way it leaves, the move will tell us more than the anniversary does.
Sources: Coinbase Exchange daily candles; U.S. Treasury; Yahoo Finance, 5 October 2026; 24/7 Wall St., 23 September 2026; Digital Today ETF flow report; Ted Pillows, 5 October 2026; TFTC ETF tracker.
Method: bitcoin prices, daily highs, lows and closes in this article are Coinbase Exchange BTC-USD daily candles (UTC day), pulled by Bitcoin Mastery at about 06:10 UTC on Tuesday 6 October 2026; the 6 October candle is still open at that time, so every close quoted is the 5 October close unless stated. Treasury yields are the U.S. Treasury’s own daily par yield curve (constant-maturity) series. Third-party figures are attributed to their source and date, and where two sources disagree both are printed. Moving averages are simple averages of Coinbase daily closes and will differ slightly on other venues.
Disclaimer: This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute investment advice. Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies are volatile and you can lose some or all of the money you put in. Nothing here is a recommendation to buy, sell or hold bitcoin, any exchange-traded fund, any listed security or any other asset, and the technical levels, probabilities and scenarios discussed are descriptions of published data, not forecasts. Do your own research and consult a licensed financial advisor before making investment decisions.