Coinciding with Bitcoin’s rally, the BTC supply on exchanges continues to remain below the Sept. 4 monthly peak. Exchanges have shed over 40,000 Bitcoin since that monthly peak.

The market perceives coins leaving crypto exchanges as a bullish signal, given traders withdraw their BTC typically when they want to hold it in self-custody long-term.

With Bitcoin continuing to leave exchanges, liquidations tend to have a strong impact on price. In the past 24-hours alone, over $21.5 million BTC shorts have been liquidated with over $17.4 million in shorts being liquidated in a 12-hour timeframe.

After U.S. Court of Appeals Circuit Judge Neomi Rao sided with Grayscale Bitcoin Trust (GBTC) in its case against the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) on Aug. 29, many large institutions filed for ETFs. Despite this ruling, Gary Gensler remained defiant, refusing to say Bitcoin is a commodity while giving testimony to Congress on Sept. 27 in which he again admitted that BTC is not a security.

The recent growing institutional interest in Bitcoin from companies like BlackRock and Fidelity Investments. While both institutions had BTC spot ETF approvals delayed on Sept. 2, the $1.5 trillion asset manager Franklin Templeton filed with the SEC for a spot Bitcoin ETF on Sept. 12.

To date, the SEC has refused to approve a spot Bitcoin ETF, despite numerous applicants including BlackRock, Fidelity, Cathie Wood’s ARK and 21Shares which has filed for approval three times.

BlackRock is the world’s largest asset manager with over $8.5 trillion in assets under management. The firm will also utilize Coinbase to custody the BTC in the trust according to the filing with the SEC.

The SEC had an Oct. 16 deadline for deciding on the next round of ETFs but preemptively pushed back the deadline on Sept. 25 ahead of Gensler’s testimony.

https://cointelegraph.com/news/why-is-bitcoin-price-up-today