I noticed something interesting in bitcoin’s movement last Monday. It rose nearly 5% to touch $69,000, but looking more closely, it seems it was more due to short liquidations than genuine demand in the bitcoin spot market.

Mark Connors, who analyzes these moves, says everything points to a short squeeze. Basically, traders who had bet on a decline were forced to close positions when prices rose. That created artificial momentum. In addition, there was a shift in spot bitcoin ETF flows that also helped. The macroeconomic move in those days triggered a broad repositioning across the markets.

What caught my attention is that open interest grew 6% in 24 hours while the price only rose 3.8%. That screams leverage, not real spot buying. If you look at the liquidation maps, there are huge concentrations around $65,000 and above $70,000. That means that without stronger spot demand, this bounce could collapse quickly.

Connors is cautious, and he’s right. He says this is not a signal of a reversal back to $100,000. The key resistance levels are still above, and without real buyers maintaining pressure on the spot price, everything could fall apart as quickly as it started. The derivatives market is very tight right now. A break above $70,000 would liquidate about $90 million in shorts, which could push prices toward $72,000—but that also depends on whether there is real spot buying behind it.