Crypto traders positioned for a decline lost about $2.74 billion over 24 hours, exceeding the short liquidations recorded during the October 2025 crash, which remains the market’s largest liquidation episode.
Nearly $2.7 billion in short positions were wiped out as Bitcoin pushed above $71,000, marking the biggest forced short-covering wave in data going back to 2021.
Overall crypto liquidations approached $3 billion across 172,108 traders, CoinGlass data showed. Shorts made up roughly 92% of the total, while long positions accounted for about $257 million, creating a more than 10-to-1 imbalance.
Liquidation occurs when an exchange automatically closes a leveraged position after losses reduce a trader’s margin below the required level, leaving insufficient funds to maintain the trade.
The scale of the move stands out when compared with October 2025. On Oct. 10, Bitcoin plunged after briefly setting a record above $126,000, triggering around $19 billion in liquidations within a single day. That remains the largest crypto deleveraging event on record, with approximately $2.47 billion coming from shorts.
Wednesday’s short liquidations were even larger than that figure, despite the absence of similarly heavy losses among long positions.
Bitcoin traded near $69,100 during Thursday’s Asian session, up almost 8% over 24 hours after briefly approaching $69,900. BTC has gained more than $5,700 from Wednesday’s low around $64,100, returning to levels last seen in early June.
The short squeeze unfolded quickly. Bitcoin shorts worth more than $1 billion were liquidated in about an hour, while total BTC short liquidations reached roughly $1.42 billion over the day.
Ether accounted for around $1.13 billion in liquidations, while Solana contributed approximately $104.67 million. The largest single position liquidated was a $48.8 million Bitcoin trade on Hyperliquid.
The record should be interpreted with some caution because liquidation data has reporting limitations. Binance restricted its liquidation reporting in April 2021, and CoinGlass only records one liquidation order per second from the exchange. Actual totals for Wednesday and historical periods could therefore be higher.
Bitcoin’s ability to hold above $71,000 through the European trading session could determine whether the rally has further room to run. A large short squeeze can remove much of the bearish positioning that helped fuel the advance, leaving a rally driven mainly by forced buying vulnerable to a pullback if fresh demand fails to emerge.
