Top Reasons Why Bitcoin Price Rallied Above $121K Today; What Are Experts’ Insights for Midterm Targets?

After starting the first day of October 2025 in a bullish outlook, Bitcoin (BTC) price extended gains during the second day. The flagship coin surged nearly 3% during the past 24 hours to reach a range high of above $121k. 

As such, $135 million was liquidated from leveraged BTC traders, with around $117 million involving short positions. 

Major Reasons Why Bitcoin Price Surged Today

Rising Open Interest (OI)

According to market data analysis from CoinGlass, Bitcoin’s OI has rebounded in the last few days. At press time, BTC’s OI hovered around $86 billion, having surged from $77 billion last week. 

Historically, Bitcoin price has rallied on higher OI, and vice versa.

Technical Tailwinds

In the daily timeframe, BTC price has rallied above a major resistance range between $117k and $120k during the past two days. After a notable rebound from the daily 100 Moving Average Simple (SMA), BTC price has broken above a falling logarithmic resistance trend formed in the last two months.

According to crypto analyst Benjamin Cowen, the BTC price will continue to rally in the coming three months and potentially top out before the end of this year. 

High Institutional Demand

The demand for Bitcoin as a hedge against inflation has remained high in the recent past. On Wednesday, the U.S. spot BTC ETF issuers recorded a net cash inflow of about $675 million. 

Meanwhile, Metaplanet has led companies implementing Bitcoin treasury plans, after announcing a purchase of over 5k BTCs on Wednesday.

Macroeconomic Uncertainty 

Bitcoin price has also benefited from the ongoing macroeconomic uncertainty, especially after the U.S. government shutdown and the escalating tension between Russia and Ukraine. 

Investors have turned to a risk-on strategy to hedge against fiat inflation.

What are the Midterm Expectations for BTC Price

Earlier on Thursday Citigroup lowered its Bitcoin price target for the end of this year from $135k to $133k. However, the bank raised its BTC price target for 12 months to $181k.
Meanwhile, JPMorgan reiterated that the Bitcoin price is heavily undervalued relative to gold and issued a midterm target of about $165k. Notably, the gold price has recorded a new weekly all-time high since mid-August 2025.