Ghost Writer

Julio Moreno, head of research at CryptoQuant, recently declared that Bitcoin is in a bear market that could extend through the third quarter of 2026.
He's not alone. Matt Hougan at Bitwise and a growing chorus of institutional voices are using the “bear” label more freely than at any point since early 2023.
Yet the same analysts often hedge with structure: many institutions are holding or adding exposure even as they acknowledge the regime shift.
This creates a definitional problem. If a bear market no longer means capitulation and exodus, what does it mean?
And if the famous four-year cycle is dead, as VanEck, K33 Research, and 21Shares have each argued in recent reports, how long does a bear market last when the old calendar no longer applies?
What configures a bear market
The traditional finance definition for a bear market offers a starting point.
The US Securities and Exchange Commission defines a bear market as a broad index falling 20% or more over at least two months. Bitcoin cleared that threshold months ago.
From its early October 2025 peak above $126,000, BTC has declined by roughly 41% to approximately $74,000 as of Feb. 3. By the headline standard, the case is closed.
However, Coinbase Institutional research explicitly calls the 20% threshold “somewhat arbitrary” and less applicable to crypto, where 20% swings can happen without a true regime change.
In practice, analysts rely on a three-part dashboard: price trend, positioning and derivatives, and demand and liquidity.
Price trend is the most visible. CryptoQuant leans heavily on the 365-day moving average as a boundary marker.
Bitcoin currently trades below that level, which sits around $101,448. CryptoQuant's Bull Score Index, a composite measure of on-chain health, registered 20 out of 100, described as extreme bear territory.
Coinbase has used the 200-day moving average in past cycle analyses to qualify bear regimes, and Bitcoin remains below that threshold as well.
Positioning and derivatives offer a second signal. Glassnode's recent Week On-Chain reports document rotation toward downside protection, bearish skew in options markets, and conditions that increase downside sensitivity, including dealer gamma below zero.
When traders pay premiums to hedge against further declines rather than to capture upside, the market is behaving defensively.
Demand and liquidity provide the structural context. CoinShares estimates that large holders have sold approximately $29 billion in Bitcoin since October. Digital asset exchange-traded products saw approximately $440 million in year-to-date outflows.
CryptoQuant and MarketWatch characterize the current regime as weak demand combined with contracting stablecoin liquidity, classic ingredients of a bear market.
The latest Coinbase Institutional and Glassnode global investor survey, conducted from Dec. 10, 2025, to Jan. 12, 2026, found that 26% of institutions now describe the market as being in the bear phase. The results are up from just 2% in the prior survey.
Yet the same survey revealed that 62% of institutions held or increased net long exposure since October, and 70% view Bitcoin as undervalued.
This disconnect is the defining feature of the 2026 bear market. It's not about capitulation—it's about regime recognition while maintaining structural exposure.
The label “bear market” is becoming less about who is fleeing and more about who is still buying, even as sentiment remains terrible.

When does this bear market end?
Defining the end of a bear market requires clarity about what “end” means.
The most rigorous approach treats it as a regime shift rather than a feeling. Analysts identify three practical triggers: trend reclamation, demand inflection, and risk appetite normalization.
Trend reclaim occurs when Bitcoin regains and holds above long-term moving averages, such as the 200-day or 365-day, for multiple weeks.
Demand inflection means exchange-traded fund and exchange-traded product flows shift from subdued or negative to sustained inflows, and large-holder distribution slows.
Risk appetite normalization means options skew returns to balanced levels, with less demand for downside protection and leverage building sustainably.
The forward-looking scenarios cluster into three time horizons, each supported by specific analyst commentary.
The first scenario is a classic crypto winter that extends through mid or late 2026.
Julio Moreno has identified $70,000 over three to six months and $56,000 in the second half of 2026 as a deeper potential path. This scenario assumes demand stays weak, flows remain negative, and Bitcoin fails repeated attempts to reclaim its moving averages. Bear-market rallies happen but fail to hold.
The second scenario is a shorter, shallower bear market lasting three to six months, characterized by choppy, range-bound price action, followed by improving conditions in the second half of 2026.
CoinShares explicitly expects a choppy three-to-six-month period, with medium-term constructive conditions as whale selling exhausts by mid-2026.
In this framing, the bear market is more about time than depth: a regime in which upside is capped until demand reverses, but the floor holds.
The third scenario treats the bear market as a liquidity-wave event rather than a calendar-based cycle.
The bear ends when demand and liquidity re-accelerate, regardless of what the halving clock says. This maps directly onto CryptoQuant's demand-led framing and avoids determinism stemming from halving. It acknowledges that the old playbook may no longer apply.

Is this bear market smaller than past cycles?
The current drawdown of roughly 40% is already small compared to the stereotypical over 70% crypto winters of prior cycles.
However, multiple analysts' downside scenarios cluster around $55,000 to $60,000, implying a total drawdown closer to the mid-50% range if realized.
That would still be smaller than historic extremes but meaningful enough to qualify as a bear market by any standard.
The market is also increasingly bifurcated. Bitcoin holds structural leadership, whereas much of the rest of the crypto market performs far worse.
The Coinbase and Glassnode report emphasize this via dominance metrics and defensive positioning behavior. The 2026 market is K-shaped, and the “bear market” may affect asset classes unevenly.
The four-year cycle is over, but what replaces it?
VanEck argued in 2025 that the four-year cycle had broken and that the old playbook was less reliable.
K33 Research published a report titled “4-year cycle is dead, long live the king,” which lays out why the regime changed.
21Shares describes the cycle as evolving, potentially extending to five years, as liquidity waves lengthen and institutional participation deepens.
What replaces the four-year clock is a liquidity-and-flows clock. This includes real yields, global liquidity impulses, flows of exchange-traded funds and exchange-traded products, stablecoin liquidity, and hedging demand.
CoinShares explicitly frames Bitcoin's recent dislocation in terms of relationships with precious metals and macro liquidity. Coinbase and Glassnode emphasize a defensive derivatives posture as a real-time regime indicator.
The implication for bear market duration is that bear markets may become more frequent but less severe. Instead of existential winters, the market may experience more frequent regime drawdowns if institutional flows provide a floor.
Rallies can still fail until demand and liquidity turn, but the underlying structure may prevent the kind of multi-year capitulation that has defined past cycles.
This creates a paradox. The bear market may last longer in calendar time but inflict less damage in percentage terms. Or it may end sooner if demand inflects before the old cycle logic would predict.
Either way, the clock that governed Bitcoin for a decade no longer governs it.

he checklist matters more than the calendar
In 2026, calling a bear market isn't one metric, but a checklist.
Trend breaks, hedging demand, and a demand-liquidity rollover all point in the same direction. Bitcoin is in a bear regime by most frameworks that matter.
When it ends depends less on the halving calendar and more on the timing of the demand cycle. CoinShares expects three to six months of chop. CryptoQuant sees potential for deeper lows in the second half of the year.
Both could be right at different moments if the regime oscillates rather than resolves cleanly.
The four-year cycle is dead, but the question of when this bear ends is not unanswerable. It ends when Bitcoin reclaims its long-term moving averages, when institutional flows turn positive, and when options markets stop pricing for protection.
Until then, the market is in a regime where upside is capped, and patience is required. Even if institutions keep buying while calling it a bear.

#BTC $BTC

Today, we are going to perform a deep dive into the most critical process in any market: the formation of a bottom. I want to share with you not just patterns, but the very psychology and mechanics of a reversal, a subject I have been studying and honing since 2019. For my trading style, where the goal is to find an entry with minimal stop-loss and maximum profit potential, understanding the formation of the bottom and top.

Part 1: The Physics of the Market. Why Instant Reversals Don't Happen.

The first and most important rule that needs to be carved in granite is this: in an established market, especially for a multi-trillion dollar asset like Bitcoin, there is no such thing as a quick recovery after a prolonged decline.

The market is not a rubber ball. It is a massive mechanism that obeys the laws of inertia. Every phase—accumulation, growth, distribution—requires time. Big capital needs a wide price range and months to accumulate or distribute a position without creating anomalous movements. Liquidity in the crypto market is fragmented; it's spread across dozens of exchanges, and moving large funds onto a CEX is a risk in itself. All of this slows the process down.

Therefore, the market always moves according to the same pattern: Impulse -> Correction (Sideways) -> Impulse. We cannot skip the phase of a long, grueling sideways correction. And we are entering exactly such a phase right now.

Part 2: The $60k Breakdown. A Hunt and the "First Leg" of the Bottom.

Let's break down the recent drop. They will tell you fairy tales about an erroneous transfer on Bithumb. Let's leave those fairy tales to the storytellers who look for simple explanations.
In reality, what happened was a cold-blooded, calculated hunt for liquidity. The $64-66k zone was an obvious magnet.
The market always moves from one liquidity pool to another, and this was the largest one. Exchanges and the biggest manipulators earn from liquidations. Without any news, without any apparent reason, they came to the exact point where the maximum pain for long positions was concentrated, and they took their money. You saw the tears on Twitter. This is normal. This is market mechanics.

I stopped asking "why did this happen?" long ago. You can invent any explanation in hindsight. The fact is, someone was pushing buttons. I will not mince words: with this move, we have established the "first leg" of our future bottom. We have marked the first critical point from which the entire future formation will be built.

Part 3: The Architecture of a Bottom. What It Actually Looks Like.

A bottom is a complex structure. Here is the most common scenario I have observed over the years:

The "First Leg" Forms: A sharp drop occurs (like the one we just had), establishing the first significant low.
The Deceptive Recovery: A slow bounce begins. It gives the market false hope for a V-shaped recovery.
The Return and "Support" Illusion: The price slowly drifts back down to the level of the first low. This level starts to look like rock-solid support. Everyone sees it, everyone buys from it.
The Final Act: The Liquidation Sweep. Below this obvious support line, liquidity accumulates for weeks—the stop-losses of the buyers. When enough has gathered, a sharp, final move down occurs. It breaks the "support," collects all the stops, and only after this final capitulation does the true reversal begin.

We saw variations of this in 2024, in the
73k−49k range, where a series of lower lows transitioned into a long, grueling sideways market.

And we saw it in the great bear market of 2021-2022—a series of deadly downward impulses, interrupted by corrections that systematically killed off any hope.

In this post, I didn't say anything about the accumulation and distribution of Wyckoff.
But the last time I posted about it, I was told I didn't understand anything about it—okay.

Part 4: My Plan and a Warning to the Market maker.

I want to speak directly to those whose limit order was luckily filled at $60,000. If you think you've caught lightning in a bottle and become a god of this market, I want to warn you: the market brutally punishes such overconfident people.

One successful trade is not a system. We are in a global bear market, which is exacerbated by external factors. US indices and gold are at all-time highs. The geopolitical cards of Taiwan and the Middle East have not yet been fully played. The market dislikes instability, and in such times, capital flees from the highest-risk assets. And cryptocurrency is asset number one on that list.

My personal timing has not changed: I believe the complete formation of the bottom and my position accumulation phase will conclude by September 2026.

Since 2022, I have, and I don't say this lightly, identified the key tops and bottoms of this market with 90% accuracy
proof in the links:

This isn't financial advice. It's an approach based on an understanding of timing and market cycles
#BTC $BTC

Altseason without myths: what actually shows up on charts before alts go crazy

Everyone loves to say “altseason is coming” the same way kids say “summer is coming” in March. Feels good, zero responsibility.

But altseason isn’t magic. It’s just money rotating. And that rotation leaves fingerprints on the charts way before your favorite microcap does +500%.

Let me walk you through the main conditions I usually want to see before I start taking alt setups seriously – not memes, not hopium, just price.

1. King Bitcoin does his move first

Healthy altseasons rarely start from a flat Bitcoin price.

Typical pattern:
- First, a strong impulsive move up on BTC
- After that move, BTC stops trending and starts chopping in a range
- Volatility cools down, candles get smaller, volume drops

TL;DR: Big boys rode BTC, locked in chunky profits, and now their fresh capital is looking for higher beta plays. That’s when alts start feeling “lighter”.

If BTC is nuking or making fresh parabolic highs every day, alts usually just get dragged around like bags on a train.

2. BTC dominance stops climbing and starts bleeding

Open BTC.D (Bitcoin dominance) and zoom out.

Before most big alt runs, I usually see:
- A clear uptrend in dominance while BTC is running
- Then a topping structure: double top, lower high, or a fake breakout above the previous high
- And then – the key part – a confirmed breakdown with lower lows

That’s literally money leaving BTC relative to alts.

No need to overcomplicate:
Rising dominance – the market respects Bitcoin.
Falling dominance – the market starts gambling on the side quests.

3. ETH vs BTC wakes up

ETHBTC is my canary in the coal mine.

If ETH can’t even beat BTC, why should I expect your random GameFi coin to do it?

Before many altseasons, I’ve watched:
- ETHBTC prints a base or higher low
- Breaks local resistance
- Starts grinding up, even if slowly

ETH often leads the rotation. When this pair wakes up, liquidity is starting to accept “more risk”.

4. Total alt market cap breaks structure

Open TOTAL2 or TOTAL3 – that’s your x-ray of altcoins as a whole.

What I like to see:
- A clear downtrend turning into a sideways accumulation range
- Higher lows forming under a big horizontal resistance
- Breakout of that resistance with expanding volume

That’s not your random lucky pump – that’s the whole sector getting repriced.

5. Volume rotation: BTC quiet, alts noisy

Check the volume bars:
- BTC: volume fades while it ranges
- Major alts: volume spikes on green days, pullbacks on lower volume

That’s exactly what “rotation” looks like. Money doesn’t appear from nowhere – it walks from chart to chart.

Maybe I’m wrong, but I think “altseason” is mostly a marketing term influencers use when they've run out of Bitcoin content. On charts, it’s just a sequence:
BTC pumps → BTC chills → dominance tops → ETHBTC turns → alt market cap breaks out → volume rotates.

Last nuance: don’t try to guess the exact start like it’s New Year’s midnight. Focus on conditions, not dates. When several of these signals line up, I start hunting alt setups. When they disappear, I stop dreaming about 50x and go back to trading what the market actually gives.

In the end, altseason is just greed with a chart pattern. Learn to spot the pattern – and the greed will find you on its own.
#altsesaon #TrendingTopic

In crypto, technology may build the rails—but community supplies the momentum. And when you look at Binance, the numbers make one thing clear in under five seconds: this is no longer just a platform, it’s a global movement powered by people.
Over 130 million users have visited @Binance Square Official , more than 3 million creators actively contribute, and over 1,000 in-person and virtual events have connected builders, traders, and learners worldwide. These aren’t vanity metrics. They are signals of something deeper: trust, participation, and shared belief in an open financial future.
Why Community Matters More Than Ever in Crypto
Crypto is fundamentally different from traditional finance. There is no central authority that users blindly follow. Instead, value is built through collective understanding, shared narratives, and distributed participation. Community is how education spreads, how products are stress-tested, and how innovation survives bear markets.
For Binance, community is not a marketing layer—it’s core infrastructure. When millions of users discuss markets, share insights, challenge ideas, and educate newcomers, the ecosystem becomes more resilient. Misinformation gets corrected faster. Good ideas travel further. Bad actors are exposed sooner.
This is especially important in an industry where confidence moves markets.
Data Shows Community Is Not Just “Engagement”

Let’s talk impact.
130M+ visits to Binance Square mean ideas don’t stay local—they scale globally.3M+ creators means knowledge is no longer top-down; it’s peer-to-peer.3.7M+ event attendees show learning in crypto is active, not passive.$5M+ donated via Binance Charity proves community can mobilize real-world change, not just online discussion.
These numbers show how cthe ommunity transforms Binance from a trading venue into a knowledge and coordination hub. Traders learn faster. Builders get feedback earlier. New users are onboard with less friction. That flywheel is extremely hard to replicate.
Community as a Defensive Moat
In volatile markets, platforms without strong communities lose users quickly. Binance’s scale advantage is not just liquidity—it’s collective intelligence. During market stress, communities provide context. During innovation cycles, they amplify adoption. During uncertainty, they hold attention.
That’s why features like Binance Square, Write-to-Earn, and creator incentives matter. They don’t just reward content—they align incentives between users, creators, and the platform itself.
The Bigger Picture for the Crypto Industry
What Binance’s community demonstrates is a blueprint for crypto’s future:
Platforms that invest in people, education, and creator economies will outlast hype cycles. Those that don’t will struggle once incentives dry up.
Crypto doesn’t grow because of charts alone. It grows because people explain, debate, warn, teach, and inspire each other—at scale.
Your Turn
Community is not a statistic. It’s you.
💬 What role has the Binance community played in your crypto journey—learning, trading, or building?
Drop a comment and be part of the conversation shaping the next chapter of crypto.
#BinanceSquareFamily #TrendingTopic

What if everything you’ve been told about “oversold” and “overbought” was statistically backwards? 

Most traders learn RSI as a simple reversal tool: buy when it’s oversold, sell when it’s overbought. But when you actually test RSI behavior across market structure, volatility conditions, volume environments, and forward‑return distributions, a very different picture emerges. The 12 Laws of RSI (BTC Edition) were created to correct the most common misunderstandings traders have about the Relative Strength Index. These laws rely on statistical findings (Due to be released soon) that summarizes the truth about the behavioral characteristics of how this indicator performs on the bitcoin daily chart with a 10-day horizon. Instead of treating RSI as a simple “overbought/oversold” reversal tool, these laws reveal how RSI actually behaves in bull markets, bear markets, momentum phases, and periods of weakness. If you want to use RSI intelligently, these 12 laws are the foundation:

Law 1: RSI is a Continuation Indicator in Bull Markets, not a Reversal Indicator.
• In a bullish market structure (price > MA50 > MA200), treat RSI > 70 as a momentum confirmation, not a sell signal.
• When the market is going up, and RSI is high, do not bet against it, it means that the move is strong and its going to keep going for at least 5 days.
• If the market is strongly moving upward, and RSI is in a strong overbought position, that is an indication of double strength, not a warning sign.

Law 2: RSI < 30 is not a buy signal in bear markets.
• Do not aim for long setups with an RSI under 30 in downtrends; treat the oversold condition if the market is bearish as a sign of continuation in the negative direction.

Law 3: RSI > 70 Outperforms RSI < 30 Over 10-day horizons.
• RSI>70 can be used as a trend-strength filter for continuation setups
• This is the first place where RSI behavior produces a real, measurable, statistically significant edge.

Law 4: RSI Behavior is Asymmetric, meaning Overbought does NOT equal oversold conditionally.
• RSI > 70 has stronger, more consistent continuation in bull markets
• RSI < 30 has weaker, inconsistent bounces in bear markets
• This breaks the concept of the “buy when oversold” and “sell when overbought”

Law 5: Oversold means sellers are in control, not that an immediate reversal is incoming.
• Sellers have been beating up the price for days
• This is NOT a buy signal
• RSI < 30 means the price is weak, not a discount alert.

Law 6: Oversold moves are very fast and hard, and are not statistically random.
• Bearish moves are very sharp and aggressive, and usually steep negative movements fall with force
• Sharp drops are going to often keep going rather than stop
• Expect volatility and instability, not a clean bounce

Law 7: Oversold does not prove that positive returns are within a 10-day horizon.

This is because of how violent price can move in an oversold territory.

Law 8: Oversold price reversals are weak, inconsistent, and mostly random.
• RSI values below 30 do not indicate a “bottom is in”

Law 9: Buying the “dip” just because the RSI indicator indicates a bottom is statistically a bad idea.
• Never assume that oversold means “Safe to buy”, you should always treat values below 30 as a signal to expect more moves to the downside.

Law 10: It’s not smart to pair volatility indicators to see if you can get a statistical edge with even the best oversold setups with the RSI.
• High volatility oversold, and low volatility oversold produce statistically indistinguishable forward returns, and volatility does not make RSI < 30 better or worse in any reliable way.

Law 11: Trend Indicators with low RSI filters do not offer a “fix”.
• Strong downtrends do not make RSI < 30 reversals any stronger
• All the “Oversold works best after a big dump” narratives fail statistically.
• Avoid rules like “buy RSI<30 after a 10-day crash.”

Law 12: Prior uptrends do not offer an extra edge
• High RSI + Prior uptrends do not equal major bull runs are about to occur at all, that’s why you should use good risk management and position sizing, and only sacrifice what you can afford to lose

The 12 Laws of RSI make one thing clear: RSI is not a reversal tool; it is a context‑dependent continuation tool.

High RSI in bull markets signals strength, not danger.
Low RSI in bear markets signals weakness, not opportunity.

Oversold reversals are unreliable, inconsistent, and cannot be repaired with volatility indicators, trend indicators, or deep‑decline indicators.

The only meaningful edge comes from understanding RSI’s asymmetry: RSI > 70 has more continuation power than RSI < 30 has reversal power.

If you want to use RSI effectively, you must stop treating it as a bottom‑finder and start treating it as a market structure-aware momentum gauge.
#Bitcoin #BTC $BTC

Bitcoin continued to trade under pressure on the 4-hour chart as traders assessed the damage from January’s sharp decline. The pullback followed a rejection near $97,900, which marked a local peak and shifted short-term sentiment. 
Since then, price action has reflected hesitation rather than confidence. Market participants now appear focused on whether the recent rebound can become more durable. 
Short-Term Structure Remains Fragile
The 4-hour chart shows Bitcoin holding inside a corrective phase despite a bounce from the $60,100 area. That level marked the lowest point of the recent cycle and sparked a technical rebound. However, the recovery stalled below $69,040, which now acts as a key pivot. Besides that, price remains capped below short-term trend indicators, reinforcing caution.
The rebound lacked strong momentum, which suggests traders treated the move as relief rather than a trend change. Hence, the market still lacks confirmation of sustained buying interest. A clean push above $74,500 would improve the short-term structure. Until then, rallies may continue to face selling pressure near known resistance zones.

Several resistance levels continue to define the upside path. The $74,569 region marks the first major hurdle, followed by $79,037. Moreover, the $83,505 level stands out as a trend-defining barrier that previously supported price. A move toward $89,866 would require a clear shift in momentum and participation.
On the downside, $69,040 serves as immediate support. Additionally, the $65,800 to $66,000 zone remains important due to its alignment with trend support. A break below that range would increase the risk of a return toward $60,100. Consequently, short-term risk remains skewed until buyers reclaim higher ground.
Derivatives and Spot Flows Signal Caution

Open interest data adds context to the price action. Leverage expanded during earlier advances, then unwound sharply during pullbacks. The latest drop toward $46 billion suggests long positions exited the market. However, it does not signal aggressive new short exposure. Significantly, this reset keeps positioning relatively balanced.

Spot flow data also reflects caution. Net outflows dominated recent sessions, especially during sell-offs. However, a modest inflow near $70,400 hints at early dip-buying interest. Still, accumulation remains limited. Therefore, Bitcoin’s near-term outlook depends on whether buyers can build conviction above resistance levels.
Technical Outlook for Bitcoin Price
Key levels remain clearly defined for Bitcoin as price consolidates after a sharp corrective move. 
Upside levels include $74,500 as the first recovery hurdle, followed by $79,000 and $83,500, which aligns with the 0.618 Fibonacci retracement. A sustained breakout above $83,500 would signal improving structure and open the path toward $89,800 if momentum strengthens. 

On the downside, $69,000 acts as immediate support. Below that, the $65,800–$66,000 zone serves as a critical demand area tied to trend support. The major downside level remains $60,100, which marks the recent cycle low.
The technical structure suggests Bitcoin is stabilizing after a deep pullback rather than starting a fresh uptrend. Price continues to trade below key resistance levels, indicating sellers still control the broader 4-hour structure. 
However, compression between $69,000 and $74,500 points to a buildup of short-term pressure. A decisive move beyond this range could trigger volatility expansion in either direction.
Will Bitcoin Regain Momentum?
Bitcoin’s near-term outlook depends on whether buyers can defend $69,000 and reclaim $74,500 with conviction. Stronger spot inflows and improving open interest would support a push toward $79,000 and higher. 
Failure to hold $69,000, however, risks a renewed test of $65,800 and potentially $60,100. For now, Bitcoin remains in a pivotal consolidation zone. Directional confirmation, rather than anticipation, will likely define the next major move.
#BTC $BTC #BitcoinGoogleSearchesSurge

Bitcoin trades every minute of every day, but CME Bitcoin futures stop for the weekend. That mismatch is how a CME gap is born, and why it keeps turning up in the middle of the most stressful weeks.

A CME gap is the blank space on a CME futures chart between Friday’s final traded level and the first traded level when the market reopens Sunday evening (US time). CME futures trade on a weekly schedule with a weekend break, while spot Bitcoin keeps moving. When the first CME print lands far from Friday’s close, the chart draws a jump and leaves an empty zone in between. That zone is the gap.
An analyst's report on this topic made the key point that the gap is not a mystical force, but a record of time when one market was closed, and the other was still trading. This is not about prophecy. It’s about a calendar mismatch that becomes visible on charts.
This week gave us a clean, real-world demo.
On the continuous CME Bitcoin futures chart, the Friday (Jan. 30) close printed around $84,105, and the first Sunday reopen printed near $77,730, leaving a roughly $6,375 weekend gap. Then the drawdown accelerated.
Bitcoin slid from about $72,999 at the start of Feb. 5 to a low of $62,181 on Coinbase, and then printed near $60,000 early Feb. 6 before rebounding into the mid $60,000s. CME’s 30-minute series shows the same shape, with a low near $60,005 and a rebound toward $66,900.
Even with that kind of volatility, the prior Friday level in the mid $80,000s stayed far overhead. The gap remained open through Feb. 6 because the price never got close enough to revisit it.
That’s a good place to start, because it answers the question most non-traders are really asking when they hear the term “gap.” They're asking why two prices that both say BTC can look like they live in different universes for a moment, and why that mismatch sometimes disappears as the week goes on.
How a gap forms when one Bitcoin market takes the weekend off
CME lists cash-settled Bitcoin futures that trade in a near-continuous weekly session: Sunday evening through Friday afternoon, with a daily break, and a hard weekend stop. But spot Bitcoin doesn’t have that off switch, so if a big move hits on Saturday, CME can’t print it in real time. The chart just has no data for that stretch.
When CME reopens, it doesn’t resume trading from the Friday close. It resumes from wherever the market is at the opening hour. If spot is down 8% or up 6% while CME is closed, the first futures trade will reflect that, plus whatever premium or discount futures carry at the reopen. The result is a visible jump, and the empty zone between Friday’s last level and Sunday’s first level becomes the gap.

The important part is what happens next, because the gap existing in the first place is a calendar fact, but the gap getting filled is market behavior.
Think of the gap as a skipped page in a book. Friday ends on a cliffhanger, the weekend writes three chapters somewhere else, and CME comes back with a whole new chapter. The skipped pages are still missing on the CME chart, but the story has already advanced on spot exchanges.
This is also why the gap meme can feel persuasive in weeks like this one. When Bitcoin is calm, the reopen is close to Friday’s close, so there is no dramatic blank space to talk about. When Bitcoin is violent, the blank space is big, and the human brain treats big blank spaces as unfinished business.
Myth vs. reality:
Myth: “CME gaps have to fill.”Reality: Gaps often fill because markets tend to converge once CME liquidity returns, but they do not have to fill on any schedule. In trend weeks, the gap can sit open for a long time.
Why gaps often get filled, and why this week shows the limits
A “gap fill” simply means price later trades back through the empty zone, often all the way to the prior CME close. CryptoSlate’s explainer argued that this happens so often because, once CME is live again, there are practical incentives to pull futures and spot back toward each other.
That pull is just a set of boring, repeatable reasons that tend to show up during staffed market hours.
If futures and spot are far apart, there’s money to be made in narrowing the difference. Companies that can access both markets can buy low and sell high, aiming to profit as the spread compresses.
This is a convergence process driven by arbitrage and relative-value positioning rather than a belief that Bitcoin must go up or down. You can understand the intuition without touching the trade, because two linked markets rarely tolerate a huge disagreement for long once liquidity is back, and risk limits are active.
Then there’s the attention effect. Gaps are now widely tracked and shared, which emphasizes their importance during price volatility. When lots of people watch the same level, liquidity tends to gather there. That liquidity can make it easier for the price to revisit the area, especially in choppy markets where mean reversion is already in play.
CryptoSlate’s previous report backed the claim that gaps fill with numbers from its own study, showing a high fill rate and a tendency for many fills to happen quickly once CME sessions resume. That helps explain why the gap myth survives: it has enough historical reinforcement to feel like a rule, even though it isn’t one.
This is where Feb. 5 and Feb. 6 matter, because they show the boundary case that keeps the story honest.
Bitcoin dropped hard, touched $60,000, and then snapped back, causing over $1 billion in liquidations in just 24 hours.
That is the kind of environment where the CME gap starts mattering less. When the market is dumping and leverage is being forced out, price doesn’t care about a few missing candles in CME’s chart from the week before. It cares about where bids actually exist right now.
Both Coinbase and CME fell into the low $60,000s, then bounced toward the mid $60,000s. So, the old CME Friday close near $84,105 stopped being a magnet for price and started looking more like a distant marker.
This is also why the open gap can be a better explaining tool than predicting one.
In a calm market, fills can happen quickly because the price is already oscillating and liquidity is comfortable revisiting prior levels.
In a stressed market, the open gap is a reminder that the price has moved so far that the old close is simply out of reach in the near term. That’s not a failure of the concept; it’s just the concept doing its job: showing the consequences of a weekend move that never got retraced.
The Feb. 6 coverage of corporate Bitcoin treasuries adds a second layer that makes the story feel bigger than chart culture. CryptoSlate reported that the slide toward $60,000 pushed corporate holders deeper underwater on paper, and it singled out the stress this creates for companies whose equity story is built around Bitcoin exposure.
This gives us a very grounded reason why this drawdown felt different. It didn’t stay contained inside crypto venues, but kept bleeding into balance sheets and public narratives. That isn’t the kind of week where price just returns to a Friday close because a gap exists.
Treat the CME gap as a level traders notice, not a level Bitcoin owes you. Gaps matter most when the market is already mean-reverting, and liquidity is comfortable revisiting old prices.
In liquidation regimes and trend weeks, the gap can stay open because the market is busy dealing with something bigger than chart symmetry.
#Bitcoin $BTC #BTC

Internet đã trải qua một chặng đường dài kể từ những ngày đầu. Từ một tập hợp các trang web tĩnh đơn giản, nó đã phát triển thành các nền tảng tương tác, và xã hội phong phú mà chúng ta sử dụng hàng ngày. Giờ đây, chúng ta đang đứng trước ngưỡng cửa của một sự chuyển đổi lớn khác, từ Web2 sang Web3, và tất cả là về việc trao lại quyền lực vào tay người dùng.
Trong Web2, chúng ta có mạng xã hội, chia sẻ video và giao tiếp tức thời, tuy nhiên, nó cũng trao cho các công ty lớn quyền truy cập và bán thông tin cá nhân của chúng ta. Ngược lại, Web3 hứa hẹn một internet phi tập trung hơn, nơi người dùng có thể sở hữu dữ liệu của họ, kiểm soát danh tính kỹ thuật số của họ và tích cực tham gia vào việc tạo ra giá trị thông qua blockchain và token. Hiểu được sự khác biệt này là chìa khóa để thấy tại sao tương lai của internet lại trông khác biệt đến vậy

Lịch sử ngắn gọn về Web
Web1: Web “Chỉ đọc” (Những năm 1990 đến đầu những năm 2000)
Web1 là một thư viện kỹ thuật số, trong đó các trang web đơn giản và tĩnh, giống như các trang HTML cơ bản chỉ hiển thị thông tin và không có nhiều công dụng. Người dùng chủ yếu là người tiêu dùng, không phải người sáng tạo. Không có mạng xã hội, không có bình luận và rất ít tương tác. Kỷ nguyên này phi tập trung ở chỗ nhiều máy chủ lưu trữ các trang web một cách độc lập, nhưng việc tạo nội dung bị giới hạn ở một số ít, thường là các công ty hoặc các nhà phát triển lành nghề.
Web2: Web tương tác và xã hội (2004 đến nay)
Với sự phát triển của Web2, bất cứ ai cũng có thể tạo nội dung, kết nối với người khác và tham gia vào các cuộc trò chuyện thời gian thực. Các nền tảng truyền thông xã hội như Facebook, X và YouTube bùng nổ, cho phép người dùng chia sẻ ảnh, video và ý kiến ​​ngay lập tức. Điện thoại thông minh đã cá nhân hóa web và luôn có thể truy cập được. Nhưng trong khi người dùng có được các công cụ để tạo và kết nối, các tập đoàn lớn đã kiểm soát mọi thứ đằng sau hậu trường. Họ sở hữu máy chủ, kiểm soát dữ liệu và kiếm tiền bằng cách thu thập và bán thông tin người dùng thông qua quảng cáo nhắm mục tiêu. Sự tập trung hóa này đã làm dấy lên những lo ngại về quyền riêng tư, kiểm duyệt và độc quyền, tạo tiền đề cho làn sóng tiếp theo: Web3.
Vậy, Web3 là gì?
Web3 hay Web 3.0 được xây dựng trên công nghệ blockchain và các mạng lưới phi tập trung không phụ thuộc vào một công ty hay máy chủ duy nhất. Thay vào đó, chúng trao cho người dùng quyền kiểm soát dữ liệu và danh tính kỹ thuật số của họ, sử dụng ví mã hóa thay vì tên người dùng và mật khẩu. So với Web2, nơi quyền kiểm soát nằm trong tay người khác, Web3 trao cho bạn quyền lực. Với Web3, các tài sản kỹ thuật số như tiền điện tử, NFT (token không thể thay thế) và các token đại diện cho quyền sở hữu hoặc quyền biểu quyết nằm trong ví của bạn. Hơn nữa, nó cho phép bạn cộng tác và quản trị thông qua các tổ chức tự trị phi tập trung (DAO), tài chính phi tập trung (DeFi), nơi bạn có thể cho vay, giao dịch và kiếm lãi mà không cần ngân hàng.
Tại sao Web3 tốt hơn Web2?
Tập ​​trung hóa so với phi tập trung hóa
Web2 dựa trên các nền tảng tập trung kiểm soát dữ liệu và cơ sở hạ tầng của bạn. Ví dụ, Facebook có quyền truy cập vào tất cả thông tin cá nhân của bạn, bao gồm số điện thoại, vị trí và thậm chí cả ảnh hoặc video, trong khi Web3 được phân quyền. Điều này có nghĩa là mạng lưới không có một cơ quan duy nhất sở hữu. Ở đây, dữ liệu và ứng dụng chạy trên chuỗi khối và các giao thức ngang hàng (peer-to-peer).
Quyền sở hữu dữ liệu
Trong Web2, các nền tảng kiểm soát dữ liệu của bạn và có thể bán hoặc hạn chế quyền truy cập theo ý muốn, nhưng trong Web3, bạn có thể sở hữu dữ liệu trực tiếp thông qua ví điện tử của mình. Điều này giúp bạn theo dõi ai truy cập dữ liệu và dữ liệu đang được sử dụng như thế nào.
Quản lý danh tính
Web2 sử dụng tên người dùng và mật khẩu do các nền tảng quản lý. Trong Web3, nó sử dụng các khóa mã hóa được liên kết với ví của bạn, và "danh tính tự chủ" này có nghĩa là bạn có thể xác thực mà không cần đến trung gian.
Khuyến khích và Phần thưởng
Các nền tảng Web2 chủ yếu kiếm tiền từ quảng cáo. Chúng được hiển thị trên nền tảng trong bảng điều khiển bên hoặc dưới dạng cửa sổ bật lên. Quảng cáo là nguồn doanh thu chính của Web2, trong khi ở Web3, người dùng có thể kiếm được token khi tham gia — tạo nội dung, cung cấp thanh khoản hoặc quản trị mạng lưới, điều chỉnh các ưu đãi trong toàn bộ hệ sinh thái.
Tính minh bạch và Mã nguồn mở
Trong khi các thuật toán và chính sách của Web2 không cung cấp đủ thông tin và đôi khi mờ ám, các dự án Web3 có xu hướng là mã nguồn mở, với các blockchain công khai nơi bất kỳ ai cũng có thể kiểm toán các giao dịch và mã nguồn.
Những Thách Thức Web3 Vẫn Phải Đối Mặt
Mặc dù Web3 rất hấp dẫn, người dùng vẫn phải đối mặt với một số thách thức trong lĩnh vực này. Dưới đây là một số trở ngại phổ biến:
Trải nghiệm người dùng
Với những khái niệm mới như ví điện tử, khóa riêng tư và phí gas được giới thiệu, người dùng khá khó hiểu các thuật ngữ này. Tuy nhiên, các ứng dụng phi tập trung hiện nay đã trở nên dễ sử dụng hơn với giao diện người dùng và quy trình hướng dẫn sử dụng, do đó người dùng không cần phải có kiến ​​thức kỹ thuật chuyên sâu để kết nối với chúng.
Mối Quan ngại về Bảo mật
Hợp đồng thông minh rất mạnh mẽ nhưng dễ bị lỗi và tấn công. Các vụ lừa đảo, tấn công giả mạo và rút tiền bất hợp pháp đã đóng vai trò quan trọng trong việc gây tổn hại đến sự phát triển của Web3. Vì nền tảng này thiếu một cơ quan quản lý tập trung, người dùng phải tự chịu trách nhiệm về sự an toàn của mình.
Sự Không Chắc Chắn về Quy Định
Cuộc khủng hoảng liên tục về các điều kiện quy định là một trở ngại đối với người dùng. Với mỗi khu vực pháp lý có các quy định riêng, điều này tạo ra sự không chắc chắn cho cả dự án và người dùng.
Tác Động Đến Môi Trường
Các blockchain Proof-of-Work như Bitcoin sử dụng rất nhiều năng lượng, làm dấy lên những lo ngại về tính bền vững. Các phương pháp đồng thuận mới hơn như Proof-of-Stake thân thiện với môi trường hơn, nhưng nhận thức của công chúng vẫn là một thách thức.
Tại sao Web3 lại quan trọng?
Mặc dù gặp phải những thách thức này, Web3 không chỉ đơn thuần là công nghệ. So với Web2, Web3 trao quyền cho người dùng, cho phép họ sở hữu danh tính và tài sản kỹ thuật số của mình. Hơn nữa, tài chính phi tập trung cung cấp quyền truy cập vào các dịch vụ tài chính mà không cần đến ngân hàng, và NFT tạo ra những cách thức mới để sở hữu và kiếm tiền từ nghệ thuật và đồ sưu tầm kỹ thuật số. Thêm vào đó, DAO cho phép các cộng đồng tự quản trị một cách minh bạch. Tóm lại, Web3 trở thành một không gian chung, nơi người dùng có quyền kiểm soát thực sự, thay vì các tập đoàn lớn tham lam quyền lực.
#Web3 #TrendingTopic

Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin and other prominent “whales” have offloaded millions of dollars in ETH since the beginning of February, adding narrative fuel to a market rout that saw the world's second-largest cryptocurrency tumble below $2,000.
While the high-profile sales by Buterin served as a psychological trigger for retail panic, a closer examination of market data suggests that the primary pressure came from a systemic unwind of leverage and record-breaking selling activity across the network.
Nonetheless, these disposals, combined with significant selling by other industry insiders, have prompted investors to question whether project leaders are losing confidence or simply managing operational runways amid extreme volatility.
Why is Buterin selling his Ethereum holdings?
In the past 3 days, Buterin sold 6,183 ETH ($13.24M) at an average price of $2,140, according to blockchain analysis platform @lookonchain .

However, the specifics of Buterin’s transactions reveal a calculated, rather than panic-driven, strategy.
Notably, Buterin publicly disclosed that he had set aside 16,384 ETH, valued at approximately $43- $45 million at the time, to be deployed over the coming years.
He stated the funds are earmarked for open-source security, privacy technology, and broader public-good infrastructure as the Ethereum Foundation enters what he described as a period of “mild austerity.”
In this light, the most defensible explanation for “why he sold” is mundane. It appears to be the conversion of a pre-allocated ETH budget into spendable runway (stablecoins) for a multi-year funding plan rather than a sudden attempt to time the market top.
However, the channel through which these sales affect the market is more narrative-driven than liquidity-based. When investors see founder wallets active on the sell side during a downturn, it tilts sentiment and deepens the bearish resolve of an already shaky market.
Still, Buterin remains an ETH whale, holding over 224,105 ETH, which is equivalent to approximately $430 million.
Did Buterin's ETH sales precipitate a market crash?
The central question for investors is whether Buterin’s selling mechanically pushed ETH below $2,000.
From a structural perspective, it is difficult to argue that Buterin's $13.24 million sell program, by itself, breaks a major market level, given ETH's multi-billion-dollar daily trading volume.
So, a sell order of this magnitude is small relative to typical turnover and lacks the volume required to consume order book depth and drive prices down significantly on its own.
However, Buterin was not selling in a vacuum. He was part of a broader exodus of large holders that collectively weighed on the market.
On-chain trackers flagged significant activity from Stani Kulechov, the founder of the DeFi protocol Aave. Kulechov sold 4,503 Ethereum (valued at about $8.36 million) at a price of around $1,857 just hours before ETH's slide accelerated.
This activity is symptomatic of a broader trend. Data from CryptoQuant shows that the network has faced record selling activity this month.

The analytics firm noted that the network had seen an increase in large whale order sizes during the downturn, suggesting that high-net-worth individuals and entities were actively de-risking into the liquidity provided by the drop.

While a single whale cannot crash the market, a synchronized exit by industry leaders can create a self-fulfilling prophecy.
When liquidity is thin and leverage is stretched, these “headline flows” signal to the broader market that “smart money” is de-risking, prompting smaller traders to follow suit in a bid to preserve capital.
The real drivers behind ETH's crash
While the narrative focused on founder wallets, the bulk of the crash was driven by three distinct market forces: leverage unwinding, ETF outflows, and macroeconomic headwinds.
Data from Coinglass indicated hundreds of millions of dollars in ETH liquidations over 24 hours during the worst of the move, with long liquidations dominating.
This created classic cascading conditions in which price declines trigger forced sales from overleveraged positions, which in turn trigger further declines and additional forced selling.

Simultaneously, institutional support evaporated. US spot ETH ETFs have recorded about $2.5 billion of net outflows over the past four months, according to SoSo Value data.
This occurred alongside much larger outflows from Bitcoin ETFs. This represents the kind of institutional de-risking that matters more than any one wallet when the market is already sliding.
Compounding these crypto-specific issues is the macroeconomic backdrop.
Reuters tied the broader crypto drawdown to a cross-asset selloff and tighter liquidity fears. The crypto market has shed about $2 trillion from its peak in October 2025, with roughly $800 billion wiped out in the last month alone, as investors reduced risk and leveraged positions unwound.
#ETH $ETH #WhaleDeRiskETH