News · Oct 19, 2026 · 3 min read
Bitcoin today: back above $82,000 after a quiet weekend, and China grows 4.5%
Bitcoin closed the weekend at $82,002, 0.6% above Friday, and traded at $82,769 on Monday. China reported 4.5% growth for the third quarter, the spot ETFs lost another $228 million in the week to Friday, and the Fed meets in eight days.
Bitcoin opened the week at $82,769 after a flat weekend
Bitcoin closed Friday 16 October at $81,501, Saturday at $81,382 and Sunday at $82,002, then traded at $82,769 on Monday morning, according to CryptoTicker's reading of Kraken's daily candles. The 24-hour high was $82,774 and the low $80,568. The week's low came on Thursday 15 October, when bitcoin fell to $79,709, below $80,000, before recovering to $82,134 that evening.
Saturday was the thinnest day of the week, with under a third of Friday's turnover, and futures were equally quiet. On our liquidations chart, $21 million of longs and shorts were force-closed on Saturday and $65 million on Sunday. Weekends are quieter by habit: in our record since 2021 the typical Saturday or Sunday moves the price about half as far as a weekday, as we set out in bitcoin moves half as much on weekends.
China's economy grew 4.5% in the third quarter
China's National Bureau of Statistics reported on 19 October that gross domestic product grew 4.5% year on year at constant prices in the third quarter, and 4.6% across the first three quarters, in its release on the first three quarters. Industrial output grew 5.3% over the nine months and retail sales of consumer goods 1.1%.
Third-quarter growth was a little below the 4.6% of the nine months, and still above 4% in the world's second-largest economy.
The ETFs lost $228 million in the week, after $681 million the week before
The US spot bitcoin ETFs took out $228.4 million net in the five trading days to 16 October, on our flows series. That follows $681.2 million out in the week of 5 to 9 October. In the latest week the funds had two inflow days, $175.7 million on 13 October and $5.1 million on 15 October, and three outflow days, the largest $261.4 million on 14 October.
They held 1,288,642 bitcoin on 18 October, on our holdings chart, a little more than the 1,287,144 they held on 12 October. Two weeks of outflows have not shrunk the stack.
The Fed meets on 27 and 28 October
The Federal Reserve's meeting calendar puts the next policy meeting on 27 and 28 October. The last one, on 15 and 16 September, raised the policy rate by a quarter point to 3.75% to 4.00%, the first rise since 2023. We covered how bitcoin handled that week in the macro paradox.
The ten-year yield read 5.10% on 15 October, the last day in our Treasury series, against its 5.31% high on 5 October.
What it means for miners
Difficulty stands at 140.58 trillion after the 16 October retarget, above every reading since mid-March. There are 1,610 blocks to the next adjustment, and our estimate for it currently reads about 1% lower, a figure that will move with every block between now and then. Our earlier piece on the retarget has the arithmetic.
A quiet weekend does not change what a machine earns in coins. The most efficient machine we stock, the Antminer S23 XP Hyd at 8.9 J/TH, makes a bitcoin for about $17,900 of electricity at Nigeria's 3.9¢ on the hashprice our chart shows, which has not yet absorbed the 16 October step, and about $19,000 after it, against a market price of about $82,800. That is electricity only, and output is not guaranteed.
Each day the network pays out new coins whatever the price does, and a miner who keeps them holds the gap between about $19,000 and $82,800, whatever any one day does.
Sources and further reading
- Bitcoin price $82,769: the level that decides — CryptoTicker, 19 Oct 2026
- National Economy was Generally Stable with New Achievement Made in High-Quality Development in the First Three Quarters — National Bureau of Statistics of China, 19 Oct 2026
- FOMC meeting calendars — Federal Reserve Board, Accessed 19 Oct 2026
Disclosure
Firsthand Bitcoin sells and hosts mining hardware, including this machine. No manufacturer, distributor or affiliate programme paid for or reviewed this page and we take no commission on the links above. Historical figures are computed from daily bitcoin price and network hashprice, each day valued at its own prices. Nothing here is investment advice.