87%—that’s how far Bitcoin has rallied since the panicky $54K dip we nursed back in January. And today, despite literal missiles lighting up TV screens, the orange coin is flexing at $102,340. I know, wild.
Here’s What Actually Happened
Late last night—well, late for me in Lisbon—reports started rolling in that Iranian forces lobbed a handful of cruise and ballistic rockets toward two U.S. logistics hubs in the Gulf. I grabbed my phone ( reflex, can’t help it ) and opened FTX Markets first—old habits die hard—even though everyone knows Binance still owns most of the spot volume. Price was already bouncing. By the time I brewed coffee, BTC was back above the mythical six-figure line, up roughly 6.4% in less than three hours according to TradingView’s one-minute candles.
Look, geopolitical fear cycles and Bitcoin usually have a weird on-again, off-again relationship. 2020 airstrike? BTC tanked for a breath and then ripped. 2022 Ukraine invasion? Same story, just slower. So I wasn’t totally shocked, but I definitely expected more chop, especially with derivatives funding already stretched (+37% annualized on Bybit yesterday!).
Why Didn’t We Dump? My Half-Baked Theories
1. Tether bid wall — I noticed on Binance’s order book (thanks, TensorCharts) a fat 2,000 BTC bid cluster sitting at $98K. Either a market-maker didn’t feel like moving orders, or someone huge decided the dip was their chance to restock.
2. “Digital gold” meme still alive — Gold spiked 1.8% on the same headlines. Maybe funds simply mirror-traded their yellow-rock thesis into BTC. Correlation coefficient with XAU has climbed to 0.41 this month per Kaiko, which is higher than we’ve seen since the SVB fiasco.
3. Spot ETF hangover effect — BlackRock’s IBIT has pulled in $14.6B in flows since January. Even when news turns ugly, that daily bid from advisors keeps trickling. I swear Larry Fink sleeps with a hardware wallet under his pillow.
Now Here’s the Interesting Part
I hopped on Crypto Twitter ( yeah, I’m still calling it that, sorry Elon ) and noticed almost zero panic. An on-chain analyst I trust—Willy Woo—posted a quick chart showing exchange outflows spiking to 32,000 BTC in 24 hours. Translation? People are yanking coins into cold storage, not gearing up to dump.
“War headlines are noise; structural demand is signal.” — Woo
That line hit me because it echoes something Glassnode highlighted last week: long-term holder supply just touched an all-time high of 14.9M BTC. Basically, the tourists have left the building, and the remaining holders are stubborn.
Okay, But What About Alts?
Funny enough, ETH/BTC slid 1.2% while I was writing. Risk-off rotation inside crypto still favors big-daddy BTC. SOL and AVAX got smacked ~3% each. It’s like everyone retreated to the king coin’s liquidity fortress. Can’t blame them— gas fees or not, Ethereum still feels like a beta play when missiles are in the air.
Why This Matters for Your Portfolio
If you’ve been waiting for a “macro flush” to buy cheaper sats, today’s resilience should at least make you question that plan. I’m not saying we don’t eventually mean-revert ( CME gap at $96K is taunting me ), but the bid is clearly aggressive. Remember: options open interest above $100K strike has ballooned to $5.3B, so every dollar above that level squeezes dealers a bit more.
On the flip side, funding is expensive. Binance hourly rate hit 0.024% earlier—annualize that and you’re paying ~210%. If you’re leveraging longs, congrats, you’re funding someone’s villa. Personally, I’m sticking to spot and a little delta-neutral basis trade using Deribit March futures ( currently +11% annualized ).
My Crystal Ball (Don’t Quote Me…Actually, Do)
I keep a simple checklist: macro ( rates, war, recession talk ), flows ( ETF + on-chain ), and technicals ( 200-week MA sits at $41K, way below us ). Two out of three look bulletproof right now. Unless the conflict escalates into something oil-market-breaking, I’m leaning $112K before the halving. Yeah, that’s only 10 weeks away. Put it on the fridge, we’ll see if I’m eating crow.
End of the day, Bitcoin just stared down real-world warfare and said, “Cute fireworks.” That alone should tell you something about where we are in this cycle.
