The global cryptocurrency market cap rose above $2 trillion early on Tuesday, driven by a sudden surge in buying activity across major exchanges.
What Happened: Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC) surged above $42,340, gaining 3.4% in over a four-hour time frame on Tuesday morning. Ethereum (CRYPTO: ETH) gained 5.80% over the same period and was trading above $3,011 at the time of writing.
Ethereum Classic (CRYPTO: ETC) led altcoins in terms of daily gains, rallying 14.77% to $43.27. ETC has gained 69% over the past week.
Avalanche (CRYPTO AVAX), Solana (CRYPTO: SOL), Cardano (CRYPTO: ADA), and Polkadot (CRYPTO: DOT) gained 4.33%, 4.90%, 7.38%, and 6.25% respectively in the last 24 hours.
Meme-based cryptocurrencies such as Dogecoin (CRYPTO: DOGE) and Shiba Inu (CRYPTO: SHIB) saw gains of 2.80% and 4.85%, respectively.
The sudden spike in prices led to $70 million in liquidations over four hours. According to data from CoinGlass, $65.77 million was liquidated from short-sellers alone.
Over the one-hour time period, $25.65 million shorts were liquidated while only $1.53 million worth of longs were liquidated.
