SUI Surges Past 10% As Short Sellers Face Mass Liquidation

TLDR:

• SUI climbs 10.29% in 24 hours as short liquidations hit $1.74 million market-wide today.
• Binance leads spot buying with $2.94 million in net inflows over a 12-hour window.
• Aggregate open interest expands 18.48% while Binance top traders lean 3.06x long overall.
• Support sits at 0.735–0.745 as SUI risks a shakeout near the $0.80 resistance zone.

SUI is trading at $0.7966 on August 21, 2026, marking a 10.29% gain over the past 24 hours. The token has climbed 16.70% across the past seven days, building on a rally that started near the $0.704 base.

Source: Coingecko

Traders point to a wave of short liquidations paired with steady spot buying on major exchanges as the main drivers. Market watchers are now weighing whether the momentum can hold above resistance or whether crowded long positioning points to a pullback ahead.

Short Liquidations Fuel The Breakout

Data from CoinGlass shows a sharp wave of short liquidations across multiple timeframes on August 21. Over the last 24 hours, total liquidations reached $2.17 million, with $1.74 million coming from shorts. Longs accounted for only $432,650 of that figure during the same window.

The pace picked up over shorter periods too. In the last four hours alone, $586,270 in positions were liquidated, and $485,270 of that came from short sellers. The 12-hour window recorded $849,590 in total liquidations, with $624,420 tied to shorts.

Market analyst Sarosh, posting on X, noted that more than 80% of all liquidations over the past day involved trapped short sellers.

Those traders were forced into programmatic buybacks, adding upward pressure to the price as SUI pushed past the $0.750 mark toward fresh local highs near $0.780.

Spot Buying Signals Real Demand

Beyond the liquidation-driven momentum, spot market data points to genuine buying interest. Binance led total market absorption with $2.94 million in net spot cash inflows over a 12-hour period, according to CoinGlass figures shared in the same analysis.

Other exchanges also recorded positive spot flows during the same window. Gate saw $570,110 in net inflows, while Coinbase added $275,040. OKX and Bitstamp posted $262,820 and $331,170 in net inflows, respectively, bringing the combined green cash total across these four venues past $4 million.

That buying stood in contrast to activity on Upbit and Kraken, where sellers were more active. Upbit recorded a net outflow of $830,810, reflecting Korean retail traders offloading into strength, while Kraken posted a $339,370 outflow. The gap between inflows and outflows suggests spot demand is outweighing distribution for now.

Open Interest Expands As Long Positioning Grows Crowded

Aggregate open interest across SUI futures markets expanded by 18.48%, rising into a range between $614.79 million and $615.59 million. Twenty-four hour derivatives volume grew alongside it, climbing 23.21% to roughly $955 million.

Binance and KuCoin currently hold the largest shares of open interest, at $108.31 million and $76.57 million. Bybit follows closely with $76.32 million, while LBank rounds out the top four exchanges at $34.66 million in open interest.

Positioning data shows traders leaning heavily toward the long side. Binance’s top trader accounts carry a long-to-short ratio of 3.06, an elevated level that raises the risk of a shakeout if momentum stalls.

Funding rates remain positive but moderate, sitting between 0.005% and 0.010% over eight-hour windows. Analysts point to the $0.735 to $0.745 range as the shelf that needs to hold on any pullback, since it marks the prior breakout zone now acting as support.

SUI remains down 44.80% year to date despite the recent gains, though the 30-day performance window has turned positive for the first time in a month.

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