Bitcoin climbed back above $77,500 on Wednesday as odds of a Federal Reserve rate hike in September slid to 62%, with XRP leading the major tokens higher and every major coin green over 24 hours.
XRP rose almost 3% to $1.36, BNB added nearly 2% to just under $692 and solana gained 2% to hold the $100 line. Tron rose about 1% to roughly 33 cents and hyperliquid’s HYPE was flat just above $82. Over the week, only zcash and hyperliquid were holding gains, a reminder that the bounce is broad but still shallow after a bruising month.
The move tracks a shift in rate expectations. Traders had pushed the probability of a September hike above two-thirds after hotter-than-expected US payrolls earlier this month, with the strong 162,000 print against a 56,000 forecast reviving fears that Chair Kevin Warsh’s hawkish turn at Jackson Hole would translate into action. Those odds have now eased to 62%, and prediction markets put the chance of at least one hike before the end of the year near 59%.
The Fed has not raised rates at all in 2026, which is what makes the current debate so tense for crypto. A central bank that spent the year on hold turning toward hikes, into a war-driven oil shock on top of that, is the exact combination that drained capital from digital assets in the first half of the year. Every tick lower in hike odds has therefore been bought by the market almost immediately, and Wednesday’s bounce across the majors fits that pattern precisely.
A golden cross with mixed history
Technicians are watching a separate signal: bitcoin’s 50-day moving average is closing in on its 200-day average from below. A decisive move through it would form a golden cross, the pattern widely read as confirmation that a long-term uptrend is forming.
The signal’s record in crypto is genuinely mixed. Since 2012, bitcoin has printed twelve golden crosses, and the average gain over the following three months was about 25%. But only three of those twelve crosses held for a full year, and those three averaged gains of roughly 250%. In other words, the pattern is either an early marker of a major bull run or noise, depending heavily on the macro backdrop that surrounds it.
This time the technical read has an unexpected ally: tether. USDT’s dominance rate, its share of the total crypto market value, is approaching a death cross of its own, with the 50-day average set to fall below the 200-day. Traders read a sustained decline in USDT dominance as a risk-on signal, because it means a larger share of the market’s value sits outside the dollar-pegged token and in volatile assets.
Because dominance is a ratio, it can also fall simply when risk assets rally faster than stablecoin supply grows. Still, the combination of a bitcoin golden cross forming and stablecoin share shrinking lines up with the momentum picture: money that sat out the August slide is rotating back into tokens rather than waiting in cash-like instruments.
War premium keeps the ceiling low
The macro overhang has not gone away. Brent crude jumped past $93 after US strikes on Iranian tankers, and bitcoin slipped about 1% as Treasury yields climbed toward 4.8%. A Fed that is still considering hiking into an oil shock is a Fed that keeps pressure on risk assets, and every dollar added to the war premium in crude tightens that screw.
Bitcoin has spent the week oscillating between roughly $76,500 and $80,000, and its August gain of 25% remains intact despite the chop. Ether held near $2,400, and the total market has stabilized enough that liquidations have cooled after the $202 million flush that followed the jobs report. Whether the golden cross confirms, and whether tether’s dominance roll-over confirms with it, will likely decide if that range breaks upward or if the next hot inflation print sends the pair back through the lows of the month.
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