Daily Market Update: Nasdaq Gains 1.3% and Bitcoin Recovers as AI Chip Demand Grows

TLDR

• Bitcoin rose 3.5% to nearly $64,000, finishing the week up 4.2%
• Ether, XRP, Dogecoin, and Solana all posted gains on Friday
• The Nasdaq led U.S. stocks higher, up 1.3%, with the S&P 500 gaining 0.8%
• Memory chip stocks including Micron and Sandisk were among the top S&P 500 performers
• A weakening dollar and strong AI chip demand are driving both crypto and equity gains

Bitcoin climbed back toward $64,000 on Friday, recovering losses from earlier in the week tied to geopolitical tensions. The move came as Asian markets surged and the U.S. dollar continued to slide.

The largest cryptocurrency rose 3.5% after briefly dipping to around $61,850 following President Trump’s warnings that U.S. strikes on Iran could intensify. Around $28 billion changed hands in 24 hours. Bitcoin ended the week up 4.2%.

Ether gained 2.6% to $1,760, finishing the week up 4%. XRP added 2.2% and TRON led the major cryptocurrencies over seven days with a 4.7% weekly gain. Dogecoin rose 2.6% on the day but remained slightly negative for the week. Solana was the only major that did not recover to weekly gains, up 2.6% on Friday but still down 2.1% for the week.

Analysts pointed to leverage trading as a key factor in the speed of the rebound. Traders cut positions on the geopolitical headline, then reloaded within hours.

Chip Stocks Drive the Broader Rally

The crypto recovery ran alongside a strong session for equities. In Asia, South Korea’s Kospi jumped 4%, partly driven by memory chip maker SK Hynix, which priced $26.5 billion in American depositary shares in one of the year’s largest share sales.

MSCI’s Asia Pacific equities gauge climbed 1.4%, cutting its weekly loss to under 1%. The yen strengthened 0.6% and Japanese government bond yields fell after Japan’s Finance Minister said the government wants pension funds to raise domestic asset holdings.

Wall Street Follows Tech’s Lead

U.S. markets closed higher on Thursday with tech leading the way. The Nasdaq rose 1.3%, the S&P 500 gained 0.8%, and the Dow added 129 points, or 0.3%.

Around two-thirds of S&P 500 components closed in positive territory. Memory chip makers Micron and Sandisk were among the top performers, along with optical tech companies Lumentum and Corning.

The dollar fell for a second straight week. Bitcoin analysts say this matters. Crypto gains this week came as the dollar lost value, meaning the move was partly a currency story, not just a crypto one.

No crypto-specific events drove Bitcoin this week. There were no major ETF flows, no protocol news, and no exchange issues. Bitcoin absorbed oil price shocks, a bond selloff, and two rounds of U.S. military strikes on Iran, and still finished the week higher.

If the dollar continues to weaken and AI chip demand holds up, analysts expect crypto markets to keep tracking the semiconductor cycle.

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