Bitcoin Holds Above $81,000 as Producer Prices Post Largest Jump Since 2022

Bitcoin and the other largest tokens held their overnight levels on Thursday morning after the Labor Department reported the fastest monthly rise in U.S. wholesale prices in four and a half years.

The flat tape reverses Wednesday's pattern, when a one-tenth-of-a-point miss on consumer prices knocked 2.1% off bitcoin within minutes of the 8:30 a.m. release. Thursday's print was larger by every measure and moved crypto less. Traders raised the odds of a Federal Reserve increase at the Oct. 27-28 meeting to 27.5% from 21% a day earlier, and Fed officials stop speaking publicly on Saturday.

Bitcoin last changed hands at $82,235, up 0.5% over 24 hours and down 0.4% over seven days, after trading between $79,806 and $82,011, CoinGecko data shows. The low came after Wednesday midday and took the token below the $81,300 level that Bitget analyst Lewis Huang had flagged as support in a note sent before Wednesday's consumer price release. Ether was at $2,420.59, down 0.8% on the day and 5% on the week, between $2,324.97 and $2,451.03. XRP was unchanged at $1.34 and down 5.3% over seven days; Solana rose 0.7% to $105.35 against a 6.6% weekly decline; BNB slipped 0.4% to $730.48. Total crypto market value stood at $2.77 trillion, with bitcoin dominance at 59.5%. Seventy-three of the 125 largest non-stablecoin tokens rose on the day and 50 fell. Bitcoin trades 34.8% below the $126,080 it reached in October 2025.

"That is a huge number from the PPI and will really hurt risk appetite," said Jeff Anderson, Head of US at STS Digital, in a note sent after the release. "We would expect to see defensive positioning for the next few sessions as participants digest the recent hawkish data and monitor prices."

Eighty Percent Energy

The index for final demand rose 1.3% in September after 0.5% in August, and 6.3% over the 12 months ending September against 5.6% a month earlier, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported at 8:30 a.m. ET.

"The September increase is the largest advance since rising 1.7 percent in March 2022," the bureau said.

Goods carried it. Final demand goods rose 2.6%, and the bureau said "over 80 percent of the broad-based rise in September is attributable to the index for final demand energy," which rose 10.8%. Gasoline rose 20.3%, and "half of the September increase in the index for final demand goods can be traced to prices for gasoline."

Services rose 0.8%, with a 1.4% rise in trade margins accounting for nearly half of that. Margins for automotive fuels and lubricants retailing fell 30.3%.

Core prices, measured as final demand less foods, energy and trade services, rose 0.5% in September after 0.3% in August, and 5% over 12 months against 4.8% a month earlier.

Yields Go The Other Way

The 10-year Treasury yield closed at 5.19% on Wednesday and the 30-year at 5.52%, both lower than Tuesday's 5.21% and 5.56%, according to Treasury data. Thursday's rates publish after the U.S. close.

"The one encouraging piece of data has been the price action in bonds, which have repriced higher after hot inflation data," Anderson said. "Yields are pushing counter-intuitively lower which has been a real sticking point for risk taking and points to a likely local top in the 10yr yield behind us."

The S&P 500 closed Wednesday at 7,718.94, down 1.11%.

Warsh Speaks Before Blackout

Traders on Polymarket put the odds of no change at the Oct. 27-28 meeting at 72.5% and a quarter-point increase at 27.5%, with cuts below 1%, on $41.6 million of volume. The same contract priced a hike at 21% on Wednesday.

Fed Chair Kevin Warsh appears in a "Conversation between IMF Managing Director Georgieva and Federal Reserve Chairman Warsh" in Bangkok at 11:30 p.m. ET on Thursday, according to the Federal Reserve Board calendar. It is the last entry before the FOMC blackout, which runs from 12:00 a.m. ET on Saturday, Oct. 17 through 11:59 p.m. ET on Thursday, Oct. 29, under the board's published rule. The October meeting carries no Summary of Economic Projections; the next one comes at the Dec. 8-9 meeting.

Flows Turn Back Out

U.S. spot bitcoin ETFs lost $261.4 million on Wednesday, erasing the $175.7 million they took in on Tuesday, according to Farside Investors. Fidelity's FBTC accounted for $152.7 million of the outflow and BlackRock's IBIT $110.9 million, with Bitwise's BITB the only fund to add, at $2.2 million. Spot ether ETFs lost $129.5 million on Wednesday after a single positive session of $24.8 million. Thursday's figures publish after the U.S. close.

Options traders moved before the producer price report. "Hedging activity is doubling, with the odds of Bitcoin dropping below $80K by this Friday's expiry nearly doubled, surging from 9.5% to 18.4%," said Nick Forster, founder of Derive.xyz, in a note sent Thursday morning. "In the three hours following the CPI release, Derive saw an explosive spike of $129 million in $BTC and ETH options volume, a 12x increase compared to the three hours before the announcement."

Forster said a single trader "spent $151,000 on a 500 $BTC put spread, which is approximately $41 million face value, betting heavily that Bitcoin will sit below $78K by Friday morning."

Starknet Polls On Going L1

Starknet's $STRK carries the widest weekly gain in the table at 42.1% and the widest 30-day gain at 205%. The Starknet Foundation opened a non-binding poll on Snapshot on Thursday asking whether the network should become an independent post-quantum layer 1. Voting opened at 9:32 a.m. UTC and closes Oct. 22.

The poll had drawn 320 votes and 194.9 million $STRK of voting power by Thursday morning, 99.9% of it on "Yes, this should be researched." Henri of the Starknet Foundation wrote in the accompanying forum post that StarkWare announced on Oct. 8 it is "actively exploring the possibility of Starknet evolving into an independent post-quantum L1, with greater control over its own security." That is the date $STRK's seven-day window opens. "Whatever the path, $STRK is the token, with no new token. Bridges from Ethereum to Starknet will stay open," the post says. A "No" result means "the post-quantum work as an L2 continues."

$STRK turned over $308.5 million against a $641 million market value, the widest ratio on either table. Akedo led the day at 23.8% for a second session in the gainers table, at a $722 million market value and 96th by market value, with no project announcement dated to either move. Pyth Network rose 19% on the day and 18.5% on the week; its blog has not published since Oct. 7. Dispersion among the largest tokens stayed narrow, with four of the five biggest ending the window within 1% of unchanged.

Bitway Gives It Back

Bitway led Wednesday's gainers at 26.3% on the day and 101.9% on the week. It fell 18.7% on Thursday, cutting its weekly gain to 38.4% and its market value to $2.88 billion from $3.67 billion, CoinGecko data shows. Turnover fell to $32.3 million from $118 million, against 1.51 billion $BTW in circulation. No project announcement accompanied either move. Canton is the largest decliner by market value at $4.35 billion.

Pump.fun extended a 23.1% weekly decline while its fee take held. The protocol collected $14.56 million of fees over seven days and $1.91 million over 24 hours, with $6.85 million of the weekly total going to $PUMP buybacks, DefiLlama data shows. Its $122.79 million of gross protocol revenue in the third quarter is the highest of the past four quarters. The Defiant covered the buyback program passing $400 million in June.

Monero fell 1.4% to $541.92 and Zcash 0.9% to $1,150.85, leaving the two largest privacy tokens 1.8% and 6.3% lower over seven days. The Defiant covered Grayscale's filing to convert its Zcash trust into a spot ETF in November 2025.

TVL Drops Three Percent

DeFi total value locked stood at $88.10 billion, down 3.25% over 24 hours, DefiLlama data shows, against $91.06 billion on Wednesday. Stablecoin supply was $307.21 billion, down 0.59% over seven days and up 0.63% over 30 days.

The Crypto Fear & Greed Index read 53, or neutral, on Thursday, against 62 on Wednesday and 57 on Tuesday, according to Alternative.me. It is the first reading outside greed since Sept. 17, ending a 27-day run.

Prices and market data as of 11:32 a.m. ET on Oct. 15, 2026. The story covers the overnight Asia and Europe sessions and the first two hours of U.S. trading.