Bitcoin just broke through every past record by hitting $123,637 on Wednesday night, according to Binance market data.
It’s now sitting at $123,334.03, up 2.82%, with traders who tried to short the asset losing big. Coinglass showed that over $397 million got wiped out in market liquidations, and $259 million of that came from short positions that bet against this price climb.
JUST IN: Bitcoin hits new ATH of $123,500 pic.twitter.com/ldUksSC5zd
— Cryptopolitan (@CPOfficialtx) August 13, 2025
Ether didn’t sit this one out either. It’s now just 3% away from its 2021 high, and helped push total crypto market cap to a record $4.2 trillion, according to data from CoinGecko. Ether has been lagging behind for a long time, but it just caught a second wind.
A flood of money has moved into Ether-focused investment funds. These funds are, of course, public companies buying Ethereum like Michael Saylor used to buy Bitcoin. Those companies now hold nearly $17 billion worth of ETH, per numbers from StrategicEthReserve.xyz.
ETHZilla stock explodes after Ether stash reveal
One of those Ether-stacking firms is 180 Life Sciences Corp., now trading as ETHZilla. The firm used to be in biotech, but after it pivoted into crypto and announced that it holds 82,186 ETH tokens, its stock price shot up.
The price jumped more than 200% on Tuesday and kept rising, gaining another 50% in premarket trading on Wednesday. ETHZilla is backed by billionaire Peter Thiel, which likely added fuel to the fire.
The change in momentum is also visible in trading activity. For the first time ever, nine US spot Ether ETFs recorded more daily trades than Bitcoin ETFs, based on Bloomberg data. In August alone, those Ether ETFs pulled in $1.7 billion, while Bitcoin funds saw a net outflow of $436 million.
Traders aren’t just buying ETH, they’re betting on it long-term. Coinglass data showed Ether futures across all exchanges reached $66 billion in open interest, a new record high.
There’s a policy angle here too. The GENIUS Act, passed in July, cleared the way for stablecoins to go fully mainstream in the US. That bill is already having ripple effects.
Geoff Kendrick, global head of digital assets research at Standard Chartered, said stablecoins already account for 40% of blockchain fees, and over half of them run on Ethereum.
In his words, “The GENIUS Act should indirectly boost Ethereum’s layer one activity.” With more stablecoin use, Kendrick expects more DeFi action, and DeFi lives on ETH.
The bank has now revised its forecast. Standard Chartered moved its year-end 2025 Ether price target from $4,000 to $7,500, citing the ongoing demand spike and ecosystem growth.
Bitcoin holds its spot at the top of long-term growth rankings
Even with Ether doing numbers, Bitcoin is still the asset everyone’s watching for long-term growth. A new Bitcoin Intelligence Report compared its 10-year gains to other major assets.
Over the past decade, Bitcoin’s modeled compound annual growth rate (CAGR) came in at 42.5%. That number crushed everything else. The Nasdaq had a CAGR of 16%, Gold averaged 10.65%, and US M2 money supply grew at just 6% per year. Even adjusted for its limited supply, Gold only hit 12.88%.
Right now, the next level for Bitcoin is just above $130,000, where resistance is building. But the year-end forecast remains way higher. Using a mix of power-law trends and quantile analysis, analysts have pinned $200,000 as a realistic top by the end of 2025. The base projection still holds at $120,000, but a cyclical bull phase could push it higher.
That’s not where it ends. Looking further ahead, the same models put Bitcoin’s price in 2035 between $1.2 million and $1.5 million.
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