Track market-moving stories before they get noisy

Analyst: Central Banks Pushing Money into the Markets Behind Bitcoin Bull Rally

Posted: February 24, 2020

Bitcoin’s dominance in the cryptocurrency market has fallen over the past few weeks, with the same recorded to be 62%, at press time. This was in light of the altcoin rally that took up much of 2020. However, it has since simmered and only a few altcoins have managed to retain their position, when compared to Bitcoin.

Verge [XVG]

Verge [XVG], which was among the 8 new crypto-assets to be added to the conversion function on Binance, has seen exponential highs after posting gains of 10.48% over the past week.

Verge saw a steep rise in the price. However, the latest chart suggested that the coin might be re-entering the bearish zone.

XVG was valued at $o.0046, at press time. After a decline of 5.51% over the past 24-hours, the coin held a market cap of $75.20 million and registered a trading volume of $1.37 million.

VeChain [ VET]

Over the past month, VeChain’s social engagement metrics have reportedly been very heavy with spikes as high as 3,520,412 engagements per day, according to the crypto-insights provider LunarCRUSH. Additionally, the latest altcoin rally propelled VeChain to shoot up to highs not seen since December 2019.

The coin breached its crucial resistance along the way, however, it took a plunge of 8.05% over the last seven days, following which VET bulls found support at the $0.005 level.

At press time, VET registered a market cap of $379.3 million and was priced at $0.0068. After gaining by 3.93%, the coin recorded a 24-hour trading volume of $188 million.

Bitcoin Diamond [BCD]

This fork-coin of Bitcoin did manage to post some impressive gains this month and was up by 16.78% over the last week. However, the coin failed to regain its foothold as it ended up trading below the previously breached resistance point of $0.76. The coin found its support at $0.57.

At press time, Bitcoin Diamond [BCD] held a market cap of $145.3 million and was trading at $0.77 after a surge of 4.45% in the last 24-hours. Additionally, the fork-coin registered a trading volume of $7.70 million over the same time period.

Monero [XMR]

The most popular privacy coin, Monero also gained traction during the latest bull run. The privacy-centric coin was recently added to the list of cryptocurrencies supported by Monaco-based crypto startup Bitsa.

XMR bulls noted a significant upward momentum as it posted 12.12% gains over the past week. Additionally, it was up by 4.68% over the last 24-hours and was priced at $84.18, at press time. XMR held a market cap of $1.46 billion and a 24-hour trading volume of $143.8 million.

Posted: March 30, 2020

Almost all cryptocurrencies followed the same pattern as the top coin during this market crash. Altcoins like Bitcoin Diamond, Stellar, and Qtum were no different.

Stellar[XLM]

Stellar’s price has been suffering a major downtrend since Feb 14, as seen in the above chart. The XLM/BTC pair is also seeing a downward run to 0.00000641 BTC. The Chaikin Money Flow [CMF] indicator confirms the downtrend as the indicator is below the zero line at -0.17.

Resistance: $0.050, $0.05, $0.06, $0.07 and $0.08
Support: $0.035, $0.03
Price: $0.039524
Market Cap: $801,733,699
24-hour Volume Trade: $309,169,320

Bitcoin Diamond[BCD]

Bitcoin diamond went down to a low of $0.24 on March 13, but quickly recovered and rose by 137.91% percent reaching $0.56 on March 20. The Bollinger Bands, as seen in the chart, were contracting, indicating a decrease in volatility.

Resistance: $0.51 and $0.72
Support: $0.42 and $0.32

At press time:

Price: $0.449059
Market Cap: $83,746,326
24- hour Trading Volume: $6,071,134

Qtum

As seen in the above chart, the price of Qtum formed a symmetric triangle pattern. Additionally, MACD indicator also revealed a very negligible bullish crossover.

Resistance: If there’s an upward breakout, the price faces resistance at $1.3 and further at $1.43.
Support: If there’s a downward breakout, the price might find support at $1.02 and further down at $0.95.

At press time:

Price: $1.17
Market Cap: $114,715,215
24-hour Trading Volume: $351,550,785

Posted: April 3, 2020

Monacoin and Bitcoin Diamond are leading the way with respect to their relative performance against the likes of IOTA. With over 50% in gains over the last 90 days for both MONA and BCD, IOTA doesn’t even come close since its price change was recorded to be -11%.

Source TradingView

IOTA Perhaps, the aforementioned poor performance of IOTA was due to the attack on the Trinity wallet, an attack which resulted in the theft of 8.55 Ti in IOTA tokens from a total of 50 user accounts. However, since then, the coordinator has been rebooted.

IOTA, however, is higher in terms of market cap [$412 million] and ranking [24], when compared to BCD and MONA, despite the fact that the performances aren’t at par. With the formation of an ascending triangle and the MACD indicating a bullish crossover, hopefully, the token will register some profits.

Monacoin Monacoin is the 53rd largest crypto on CoinMarketCap with a market cap of $79 million and a 24-hour trading volume of $3.6 million. At press time, the price was $1.21 and the token was struggling to firmly breach the 200-DMA, a level which was acting as a resistance. The 50-DMA [light blue] was heading close, indicating further bearish pressure. The scenario, at press time, seemed bearish, with a confluence of resistance.

Bitcoin Diamond Bitcoin Diamond, a fork of Bitcoin, has been performing considerably better, especially as it started rising after the recent collapse. At press time, BCD was trading at $0.482 with a market cap of $89 million.

Stuck between $0.518 and $0.409, the coin was trying to be bullish. The RSI indicator also showed that it was struggling to reach the overbought zone. Over the next week, the price might try to breach $0.518 and head higher.

Posted: April 3, 2020

For altcoins, March and April told very different tales. While the former closed for most coins with significant losses, April seems to be a lot more favorable as coins such as EOS, Synthetix and Bitcoin Diamond have all recorded surges over the past few days.

EOS

After suffering from a 50 percent price drop, EOS was on the right path to recover its losses. Over the past 24-hours, EOS saw its value increase by close to 9 percent, with the token having a trading price of $2.33, at the time of writing.

EOS had a market cap of $2.1 billion and a 24-hour trading volume of $3.1 billion. If the uptrend were to last for EOS, the price would soon test the resistance at $2.45. However, if EOS were to record price correction, there are two points of support at $2.2 and $2.1.

According to the Bollinger Bands, EOS may see increased volatility as the bands were now beginning to expand. However, the moving average, at press time, was acting as a support for the price. The MACD indicator continued to show bullish momentum after having undergone a bullish crossover less than a day ago.

Synthetix [SNX]

Over the past month, Synthetix announced its plans to add derivatives trading on its platform in Q3 of 2020. In the past month, Synthetix has recovered much of its losses following the 12 March crash.

In the past 14 days, its price rose by over 40 percent. At press time, SNX was being traded at $0.675, with a market cap of $62 million. In sync with the altcoin trend over the past 24-hours, SNX surged by 8.9 percent.

At press time, SNX had a 24-hour trading volume of  $2.6 million. According to the coin’s previous price movements, SNX had two strong supports at $0.60 and $0.56, if the price were to give in to bearish pressure.

Bitcoin Diamond [BCD]

Bitcoin’s fork coin, Bitcoin Diamond, continued the trend as it saw its price rise by over 11 percent in the past 24-hours. BCD had a market cap of $92 million and a 24-hour trading volume of $8 million. At press time, Bitcoin Diamond was being traded at $0.50.

If the price were to continue to rise, the coin was likely to soon start testing the resistance at $0.56; there were also supports at $0.45 and $0.38, if a bearish scenario were to transpire.

The MACD indicator, after having undergone a bullish crossover, continued to register bullish momentum for the coin. The Stochastic indicator echoed a similar sentiment, with the token in the overbought zone, at the time of writing.

Posted: April 6, 2020

The much-hyped alt season still seems to be a distant dream even though most alts are continuing to make minor gains towards recovering the losses they collectively incurred during the previous month’s massive price crash. Altcoins such as Stellar, Bitcoin Diamond and Qtum have seen their price surge up to 10 percent in less than a week’s time.

Stellar [XLM]

The Stellar Development Foundation [SDF] has been in the news for announcing that it plans to donate around $2.5 million as an aid to support efforts against the COVID-19 pandemic. Since the start of the month, Stellar has done fairly well and has seen its price go up by 6.5 percent. At press time, XLM had a trading price of $0.041 and a market cap of $848 million. If the bullish momentum were to sustain, the price of XLM could soon test resistance at $0.043. In case the price drops, there are two strong supports at $0.040 and $0.038.

MACD indicator has currently undergone a bullish crossover implying an upcoming price hike. The RSI indicator also shows bullish sentiment as it heads towards the overbought zone.

Bitcoin Diamond [BCD]

Bitcoin Diamond, over the past week, registered significant gains. BCD’s current price of $0.49 marks a 10 percent increase in less than 7 day’s time. At press time BCD had a market cap of $91 million and a 24-hour trading volume of $8 million. BCD’s price is likely to soon test support at $0.47 if a price correction were to occur. There is also another support at $0.44 and a key point of resistance at $0.53.

Bollinger Bands for BCD have contracted substantially and signal very little price volatility and its moving average is now proving support for the price. RSI indicator, however, has made a reversal and is now heading towards the oversold zone.

Qtum

In the past week, another big winner among the altcoins happens to be Qtum registering over a 10.5 percent increase in its price. Currently, Qtum has a trading price of $1.27 and if the price were to continue on this uptrend, it might not be long before the resistance at $1.31 is tested. There are also two important points of support at $1.24 and $1.92.

EMA ribbons have now gone below the price of the coin and are now providing support for the coin’s price. The Stochastic indicator, however, is now moving towards the oversold zone – a sign of bearishness.

The advent of Bitcoin, Ethereum, and other cryptocurrencies has introduced unprecedented ways to distribute new assets, creating complex tax situations. Here’s how to account for forks and airdrops, and a few strategies to minimize taxes.

There is little precedent when it comes to taxes around forks and airdrops.

“In the traditional world, nobody airdrops anything. The dollar doesn’t fork every Tuesday,” said Alon Muroch, CEO of crypto accounting platform Blox, in an interview with Crypto Briefing.

Ruling from other regulatory agencies adds to the complexity. By the letter of the law, many cryptocurrencies are not considered money, or commodities, but instead securities⁠—investments that represent a contract between a buyer and an enterprise.

“You should start with the assumption that you’re starting with a securities offering,” said SEC Chairman Jay Clayton. Failing this assumption, or misinterpreting the rule of tax law, has led to “a majority of companies filing incorrectly,” LukkaTax’s co-CEO, Robert Materazzi, told Crypto Briefing, who claims that most portfolio apps that link to a tax service are doing so incorrectly.

FinCEN has issued its own guidelines around money transmitter rules for cryptocurrency, treating crypto like cash for anti-money laundering purposes. Meanwhile, the Commodities Future Trading Commission treats Bitcoin as a commodity. The U.S. Internal Revenue Service treats it as property. Ethereum falls somewhere in the middle.

Between the regulators, it’s one confusing mess of three and four-letter acronyms giving mixed messages.

What Is a Blockchain Fork? A fork is a software change that creates two separate versions of the same blockchain. Most often, forks are used to introduce upgrades, where the old version of a blockchain is replaced by the new one as soon as the fork is executed.

Occasionally, however, forks are used to settle disagreements over technical features, like the block size debate that lead to Bitcoin Cash. Other times, it’s about governing philosophy, like in Ethereum Classic. Yet other times it’s about taking advantage of a brand name, like Bitcoin Diamond. They’re an integral part of what makes a decentralized blockchain, well, a blockchain.

Forks happen all the time. Since inception, Bitcoin alone has had over 50 forks.

To make matters worse, holders often aren’t aware that a fork has even taken place and many coins go unclaimed. Nevertheless, the IRS views forks as taxable events.

Understanding Token Airdrops Airdrops are another situation where money falls out of thin air. In an airdrop, coins are “carpet bombed” to thousands, or even hundreds of thousands of cryptocurrency addresses as part of marketing campaigns, said Muroch.

One example of a massive airdrop was the one executed by Stellar, a cryptocurrency created by XRP co-founder Jed McCaleb. In September of last year, the Stellar Foundation announced it would airdrop 2 billion XLM, worth over $120 million at the time. An unprecedented sum.

Again, like forks, the owner of a cryptocurrency address that benefits from an airdrop is often unaware of the windfall. Many times they do not even consent to receiving an airdrop.

“You’re not always aware that you receive assets from a fork. You can couple that with airdrops, not just forks,” said Muroch. “All those holders had taxable events because someone in the marketing department decided to use that as a marketing tool.”

Tax Implications of Forks and Airdrops Consent aside, the IRS has voiced its position on forks and airdrops⁠. “The receipt or transfer of virtual currency for free, including from an airdrop or following a hard fork,” needs to be reported for tax purposes, says the IRS.

The power to collect taxes from these events, even crypto, come from broad powers given to the government over a century ago. “The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes on incomes, from whatever source derived,” reads the 16th amendment.

The IRS has offered some clarity concerning the confusion. In October 2019, the agency issued a ruling on the issue.

Crypto holders recognize income when they “exercise dominion and control over the cryptocurrency” received through a fork or an airdrop, according to the rules. That is, when a holder gains the ability to transfer or sell the cryptocurrency.

Wendy Walker, a tax withholding and reporting expert at Sovos, a tax reporting software company, reaffirmed this position in a conversation with Crypto Briefing. Forks are treated as “ordinary income,” and the specific amount of tax liability would depend on the valuation scheme the taxpayer is using, she said.

By default, coins are valued using the FIFO, or “first in first out,” method of accounting, where the oldest units of cryptocurrency are used to determine the cost basis, said Jim Calvin, a tax partner at Deloitte.

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Though there are other valuation methods that may produce less tax liability, like LIFO or average cost, and these are viable so long as they are consistently applied. If this all seems confusing, an example might help illustrate the tax implications.

Using the Bitcoin Cash Fork as an Example Bitcoin Cash split from the Bitcoin network on Aug. 1, 2017, to settle a disagreement over the block size⁠⁠, which essentially determines the upper limit to how many transactions can be processed by the Bitcoin network in a roughly a 10 minute interval.

Those who held their private keys prior to the chain-split received a number of BCH equal to the number of BTC they held.

Bitcoin was trading at $2,800 the day of the fork. Immediately after the split, Bitcoin Cash opened on exchanges at $290. A taxpayer who had received BCH would recognize $290 in income, which would also determine the cost-basis of the BCH.

Later the next day, if the taxpayer sold their Bitcoin Cash when it was trading at $380, they would recognize capital gains of $90:

$380 - $290 = $90 Hypothetically, if the price of Bitcoin dropped as a result of the fork, it might be possible to offset some of the income from the fork, but the rules around this are unclear.

Tron’s Ethereum Airdrop as an Example Another example to demonstrate the recognition of income is when Tron airdropped 30 million TRX to Ethereum holders. Announced April 2018, Ethereum addresses with a balance of one or more ETH received between 10 and 100 TRX.

TRX was trading at $0.5 on the day of the airdrop, April 20, 2018. Assuming an address received 50 TRX, the Ethereum holder would recognize income of $25 on that day ($0.5 x 50).

To illustrate the impact of FIFO, if those coins were received over a series of days (from the 20th to the 22nd, for example), then the following accounting would take place:

April 20: 50 TRX at $0.5 each ($25) April 21: 50 TRX at $0.6 each ($30) April 22: 50 TRX at $0.7 each ($35) In all, the account holder received $90 worth of TRX, and would recognize this sum as revenue. Hypothetically, if they sold 60 TRX at $0.7, they would recognize gains from the oldest batches of coins first under FIFO.

The April 20 batch as the “first in” would get sold first, for reporting purposes. The 50 TRX with a cost basis of $0.5 each and sold for $0.7 each would register a gain of $10:

(50 x $0.7) - (50 x $0.5) = $10 Then, it would take 10 TRX from the batch from April 21, which were obtained at $0.6 each:

(10 x $0.7) - (10 * $0.6) =  $1 In total, the taxpayer would recognize capital gains of $11, in addition to the $90 of income from the three batches of airdrops.

In some circumstances, especially for those who trade often, it can be advantageous to use the LIFO method which takes the newest coins first, allowing some of the coins held for more of the year to get preferential long-term capital gains treatment.

Issues Raised by Airdrops Airdrops are an issue for holders of Ethereum and other smart contract blockchains. Even if the owner of the address did not consent to receiving the tokens they would still incur tax liability. Oftentimes, Ethereum holders receive hundreds of unsolicited tokens at no fault of their own.

Looking at Vitalik Buterin’s wallet address as an example, he has received over a hundred unsolicited airdrop coins worth thousands of dollars.

Vitalik Buterin’s main wallet address on Etherscan If the rules are to be followed by the book, each and every one of these airdrops would be recognized as revenue on the date of receipt. Further complicating the issue is that many of these coins are not traded on reputable exchanges, meaning their prices are unreliable.

In the end, this results in an accounting headache and an unwanted tax liability for holders of Ethereum, Tron, EOS, and other smart contract coins.

IRS Ramps Up Crypto Enforcement These tax agencies mean business. Regulators are well aware of cryptocurrency’s role in aiding tax evasion and money laundering. Those who think they can get away without paying taxes are at risk of an audit, along with steep penalties.

Transactions on the Bitcoin blockchain are public, for the most part. It’s only a matter of time before the IRS is able to trace these transactions back to taxpayers, Walker told Crypto Briefing.

More alarming is that more than 50% of CPAs expect that at least half of their clients will be audited for back taxes on their crypto holdings, according to a joint report by Blox and Sovos. Reputable exchanges report activity from crypto traders to the IRS. Coinbase, Kraken, Binance.US, and Gemini all disclose this information to tax agencies, making evasion difficult.

In June of last year, the IRS mass mailed targeted letters to taxpayers suspected of “misreporting” cryptocurrency transactions. British tax authority HM Revenue & Customs has issued similar warnings.

“Cryptoassets like Bitcoin have attracted a lot of interest from people who are new to investing and have probably never filed a tax return in their life. It’s really important for investors to start doing the maths now so they know how much profit they’ve made and the tax due,” said Iqbal Gandham, UK managing director of eToro.

These authorities are serious, and it’s likely they’ll continue to crackdown on those intentionally and unintentionally underpaying on their taxes.

Caveats and Strategies Around Cryptocurrency Income Recognition There are, however, some caveats. Exchanges don’t always immediately recognize forks as tradable assets, and many do not register airdrops at all. This can be used to the taxpayer’s advantage.

Coinbase, for example, did not offer support for BCH for a full four months after the fork. As a result, holders wouldn’t recognize income until they could “exercise control” over the asset. That is, until they could transfer and trade it.

So, for those trading on Coinbase, income wouldn’t be recognized until that date, when Bitcoin Cash was worth over $2,500 per coin (instead of $290 per coin).

This fact can be used as a tool to reduce tax liability. By storing coins on an exchange, a holder can avoid getting bombarded by airdrops, which would normally trigger taxable events.

To take advantage of this, an investor could store coins on an exchange and wait until their income drops⁠ to claim those coins (supposing they waited until they could offset their gains by selling some coins at a loss, or expected less income in a coming tax year⁠).

How to Report Forks and Airdrops on Your Taxes In sum, here’s how to report forks, airdrops, and capital gains on a tax return. The following exercise uses the Bitcoin Cash fork and Tron airdrop from the earlier examples. The entire process requires four different IRS forms.

These include the following: the 8949: Sales and Other Disposition of Capital Assets, the Schedule 1: Additional Income and Adjustments to Income, the 1040, Schedule D: Capital Gains and Losses, and the 1040: Individual Income Tax Return.

Assuming the taxpayer received 1.0 Bitcoin Cash from the fork and 50 Tron from the airdrop in the earlier example, first fill out the Schedule 1 as follows:

($290 x 1 BCH) + (50 TRX x $0.5) = $315 Then, for the capital gains associated with the sale of the Bitcoin Cash, itemize each sale and report it on form 8949. For those who trade regularly attaching a spreadsheet can greatly speed-up the process.

(Sale price: $380) - (Price at fork: $290) = $90 gain The sum of these cryptocurrency sales are then reported on Form 1040, Schedule D. Finally, input these figures on the 1040 form with all other sources of income:

(Capital Gains: $90) + (Fork and Airdrop Income: $315) = $405 total income Between the fork, the capital gain, and the airdrop, this taxpayer would have $405 in additional total income.

At first glance, it may seem that reporting tens and sometimes hundreds of cryptocurrency transactions would be daunting. It is, without the aid of spreadsheets or software.

But, with enough diligence, it’s possible to report these transactions yourself. Beyond that, those who plan in advance can even reduce how much they owe, allowing them to keep more of their hard-fought gains.

For more information on proper filing, refer to official guidance from the IRS and their frequently asked questions guide.

The information presented here does not represent tax advice. Please consult with a professional before making decisions about your taxes.

Disclosure: This article was edited by Mitchell Moos. For more information on how we create and review content, see our Editorial Policy.

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On-chain data shows Bitcoin HODLers are still able to sell at a profit while the weak hands are going through a major capitulation event.

Bitcoin Diamond Hands Still Comfortably Selling At A Profit As pointed out by CryptoQuant Head of Research Julio Moreno in a new post on X, the BTC short-term holders have capitulated during this latest downturn in the market.

The “short-term holders” (STHs) make up for one of the two main divisions of the Bitcoin userbase done on the basis of holding time, with the other group being called the “long-term holders” (LTHs).

The cutoff between the two groups is 155 days, with investors who have been holding since less than this time falling into the STHs and those with more qualifying as LTHs.

Statistically, the longer an investor holds onto their coins, the less likely they become to sell or transfer them at any point. As such, the STHs represent the weak-minded side of the market, while the LTHs include the HODLers.

During the latest crash, both of these cohorts have shown a reaction, but this reaction has been very different between the two. To showcase this difference, Moreno has made use of the “Spent Output Profit Ratio” (SOPR) indicator.

The SOPR basically tells us about whether a given group is selling Bitcoin at a profit or loss right now. The metric being above 1 implies members of the group are realizing profits, while it being under suggests loss-taking is the dominant mode of selling.

Now, here is a chart that shows the recent trend in the Bitcoin SOPR for the STH and LTH cohorts:

The difference between the behavior of the STHs and LTHs | Source: @jjcmoreno on X As displayed in the graph, the Bitcoin STH SOPR has been mostly at levels under 1 during the latest drawdown in the price, implying that these investors have been selling at a loss.

At its worst, the indicator had even fallen under the 0.8 mark, suggesting that the cohort had been taking a loss of more than 20%. Clearly, these fickle-minded hands were thrown into quite a panic by the crash.

While the STHs have been capitulating, the LTHs are still participating in net profit-taking, as the SOPR for them has remained strong above the 1 level. The indicator even reached a notable level during the rebound BTC saw following its lows, suggesting that these diamond hands had sold for significant gains.

Some STHs, too, had managed to take profits in this recovery, but as is visible in the chart, the metric had only slightly breached the 1 mark and that too just briefly, meaning that the profit realization hadn’t been anything significant and had lasted for only a moment.

BTC Price At the time of writing, Bitcoin is trading at around $55,000, down more than 17% over the past week.

Looks like the price of the coin has been sliding down recently | Source: BTCUSD on TradingView Featured image from Dall-E, CryptoQuant.com, chart from TradingView.com

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A notable diamond hand investor recently sold 199 Bitcoin ($13.55 million) for a profit, according to data from Lookonchain. This transaction marks another significant move for the investor, who has made a series of profitable sales over the years.

https://twitter.com/lookonchain/status/1847196510666346762?s=46

Bitcoin Investor Pulls $44M Profit After Strategic Sales Over 5 Years He pulled out 801 Bitcoin ($8.25 million) from HTX exchange five years ago when Bitcoin was only at $10,297. Since then, the individual has gradually been offloading parts of their holdings and within the last month they have disposed of 500 Bitcoin worth $32.13 million.

At the moment, the investor owns 301 BTCs, which is equal to $20.42 million. The accumulative revenues from such transactions have now risen to about $44.28 million, further demonstrating their performance in terms of good holding gains and timed exit gains.

Diamond Hand Investor’s Volatility Management Leads to Huge $BTC Profits This ‘diamond hand’ strategy is based on the investor’s confidence in Bitcoin’s fundamentals, while they are at the same time making good money out of short-term price movements. The fact that the investor has been selling considerable proportions of it especially when Bitcoin prices had skyrocketed in the months prior to the writing of this paper, affirms the investor’s volatility management, and portfolio health.

Stories like this, from Lookonchain, show how Bitcoin attracts both retail and institutional investors, and may result in large gains for those who could afford to wait out the cycles.

AUTHOR

Umair Younas is a cryptocurrency-related content writer linked with this work since 2019. Here, at Blockchainreporter, he serves as a news and article writer. He is a crypto, blockchain, NFTs, DeFi, and FinTech enthusiast. He has strong command over writing authentic reviews about brokers and exchanges and he has collaborated with our education team to write educational content as well. He has a dream to raise awareness among people about digital currencies. His works are well-researched and brimmed with information hence they provide fresh insights. Stay tuned to his posts if you want to stay up-to-date with the crypto-verse.

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Bitcoin has spent the last five days trading within a relatively narrow range between $106,229 and $111,807, following its recent all-time high of $111,814. Despite the increase in selling pressure from miners after the all-time high, the price of Bitcoin has managed to hold above $108,000, with on-chain data showing Bitcoin diamond hands absorbing all the selling pressure.

Long-Term Holders Accumulating With Minimal Spending According to data from the on-chain analytics platform CryptoQuant, the Long-Term Holder (LTH) Spending Binary Indicator has fallen to its lowest level since September 2024. This interesting trend was initially noted on the social media platform X by crypto analyst Alex Adler Jr.

The 15-day moving average of this metric, as shown in the chart by CryptoQuant, has dropped to the minimal spending zone. Notably, this zone has consistently preceded a more bullish move in the Bitcoin price. 

Source: Axel Adler Jr on X In parallel, long-term holder supply has risen by approximately 300,000 BTC over the past 20 days. This marks a deviation from the trend of declines in the long-term holder supply since 2024. At the time of writing, 14.6 million BTC, representing about 74% of the total current circulating supply of BTC, is in addresses classified as long-term holders. 

This pattern suggests that so-called “diamond hands”, i.e., investors with a strong conviction who hold through volatility, are not only refraining from selling with Bitcoin’s recent new peak, but are actively accumulating. The chart below shows the correlation between minimal LTH spending and rising price action, a behavior that also aligned with phases of Bitcoin’s uptrend in 2019, late 2020, and late 2024.

Why It’s Bullish For The Market The significant uptick in long-term holder supply, combined with minimal selling activity, reveals a hidden strength in the market. The current behavior of long-term investors also indicates their confidence in Bitcoin’s valuation at current levels, despite the recent price surge. Many of these long-term holders are in substantial profit, yet still choose to hold. This is unlike short-term holders, who have collectively realized over $11.6 billion in profits over the past month alone.

Drawing a parallel with historical data, the current decline in long-term holder (LTH) spending mirrors a similar pattern observed in September 2024. At that time, the LTH Indicator was in the minimal zone, and the long-term holder supply was also increasing steadily.

What followed was a remarkable 96% surge in Bitcoin’s price, rising from approximately $54,000 to peaks around $106,000 in December and January. If the market were to follow a similar trajectory from the current price level, a comparable 96% rally would see Bitcoin rise to a new peak near $212,000.

At the time of writing, Bitcoin is trading at $109,000.

BTC trading at $108,723 on the 1D chart | Source: BTCUSDT on Tradingview.com Featured image from Getty Images, chart from Tradingview.com

Spot Bitcoin (BTC) Exchange-Traded Funds (ETFs) have shown strength amid the crypto market’s correction and the flagship crypto’s latest performance. Some experts have praised investors’ resilience, suggesting that the “real story” is not in the recent outflows.

ETFs Investors Hold Strong Despite Market Downturn On Thursday, Nate Geraci, co-founder of the ETF Institute, affirmed that Bitcoin ETF investors have “largely displayed diamond hands” during the recent crypto market downturn.

The flagship crypto has seen a 48.2% correction from its October 6, 2025, all-time high (ATH), recording five consecutive months of strong bleeding after the October 10 market crash.

Since then, spot BTC ETFs have seen about $6.5 billion in outflows, the expert observed, which he considers a “drop in the bucket” compared to the $55 billion in cumulative total net inflows that the category has seen since launching in January 2024.

It’s worth noting that crypto-based investment products have seen five weeks of outflows this year, with Bitcoin having the weakest sentiment among major assets amid the negative market sentiment of the past month.

According to SoSoValue data, BTC funds have recorded $3.81 billion in net outflows since January 23, starting the week with $203.82 million in outflows on Monday.

However, Geraci highlighted potential renewed demand for the investment products as the category sees a three-day streak of consistent inflows. Notably, Bitcoin ETFs have seen over $1 billion in inflows over the past three days, setting the stage for their potential biggest week since mid-January.

The ETF expert emphasized that 50% drawdowns “are a walk in the park for long-time BTC investors,” but observed that newer ETF investors also appear unfazed by the current market conditions.

“Not first time btc has experienced 50% decline & likely won’t be the last. ETF investors clearly aren’t panicking, though. Apparently buying the dip,” he wrote on X.

Bitcoin ETFs Strength Is The ‘Real Story’ Bloomberg Intelligence Senior ETF Analyst Eric Balchunas backed Geraci’s comment, praising the remarkable performance of spot Bitcoin ETFs over the past two years.

“As an ETF watcher, you know just how absurd this strength amid a 50% drawdown,” Balchunas stated. “This is the real story, vs focusing on the $6b that came out, which most stories do.”

“Further, the narrative that crypto is ‘paying the price’ for getting financialized is absurd. $55b in net new cash in two years is the opposite of paying the price,” he added on X.

In a recent interview, the senior analyst observed that the amount of Bitcoin held by ETFs is only down around 6% despite the market pullback. He noted that these types of corrections happen to every asset, including bonds and stocks, before recovering.

Stocks have the same thing. Every time stocks go down, I remind myself and then other people that stocks have a 100% perfect record of coming back to hit all-time highs from a downturn. So, why would I worry that much, right?

Balchunas affirmed that these assets can have “really horrible streaks, but then when they come back around, the flows come back.” He concluded that the price volatility and the negative market sentiment are “the cost of the holy grail returns that most people have gotten.”

Bitcoin trades at $65,366 in the one-week chart. Source: BTCUSDT on TradingView Featured Image from Unsplash.com, Chart from TradingView.com