Bitcoin ended October above $61,000 at a record month-end level

Bitcoin completed October 2021 above $61,000 on October 31, establishing its highest month-end price level then recorded. The milestone capped a month shaped by a new intramonth price high and the arrival of a U.S.-listed exchange-traded fund based on bitcoin futures.

Kraken’s report for the October 31 UTC reporting day marked bitcoin at $61,380, down 0.8% for the session. Kraken attributed $266.8 million of trading volume to bitcoin and $1.24 billion to all spot markets on the exchange, compared with a stated 30-day all-market average of $1.35 billion.

Those figures describe Kraken’s markets and reporting methodology, not a universal closing auction. Bitcoin trades continuously, so prices assigned to the end of October depend on the exchange, currency pair, data aggregation method and UTC cutoff.

What made the close a record

Kraken’s March 31 report had marked bitcoin at $58,900 at the end of what had been its strongest prior month-end level. The exchange’s October 31 reading was $2,480 higher, a difference of approximately 4.2% calculated by Coinburn from those two Kraken figures.

A later CryptoCompare asset report independently classified October as bitcoin’s highest monthly close to that point. Its aggregated series placed the October close at $61,350 and calculated a 40.0% return from September. The roughly $30 difference between the Kraken and CryptoCompare readings is consistent with venue and methodology differences and is why this reconstruction describes the outcome as above $61,000 rather than asserting one universal settlement price.

The record month-end should also be distinguished from the month’s peak. CryptoCompare measured an intramonth high of $66,980. Finishing below that level meant bitcoin had surrendered part of its advance before October 31, even while retaining most of the month’s gain.

Institutional context

October’s market structure changed when the ProShares Bitcoin Strategy ETF became effective and began trading under the ticker BITO. The fund’s October 18 SEC prospectus identified NYSE Arca as its listing venue and explained that it sought bitcoin exposure primarily through futures contracts rather than direct ownership of bitcoin.

That distinction mattered on October 31. BITO expanded access through conventional brokerage accounts, but it was not a spot-bitcoin fund and did not create a regulated closing price for the underlying cryptocurrency. Futures costs, portfolio management and the relationship between futures and spot markets could affect the fund independently of bitcoin’s quoted spot price.

The ETF’s appearance therefore supplied institutional context for October’s rally without proving that it caused the entire 40.0% monthly move. The cited records establish timing, product design and market measurements; they do not isolate investor motivation or establish a single causal explanation.

Later confirmation and limits

CryptoCompare’s report, published after October 31, confirmed the record using an aggregated dataset and reported that BTC/USD monthly volume increased 35.8% to $61.8 billion. That later calculation clarifies the completed October record but is not presented as information available before the month closed.

The lasting event-day conclusion is narrower: bitcoin ended October 31 above $61,000 across the cited datasets, exceeded its previous month-end high and did so during the first month in which a U.S.-listed bitcoin-futures ETF traded. None of those facts established future returns, eliminated venue-specific price differences or converted futures exposure into direct bitcoin ownership.