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Ahmed Barakat
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Bitcoin never posted a daily close below its realized price during the current bear market, and the June 2026 low held above that aggregate cost basis. If price holds above the True Market Mean near $77,000, the June low becomes the shallowest bear-market bottom in Glassnode’s comparison set stretching back to 2017.
Bitcoin’s current bear-market phase has looked ugly on a headline-percentage basis at times this year, but the realized-price metric measures something narrower: whether the average holder, in aggregate, was ever underwater. In the 2018–19 and 2022–23 cycles, Bitcoin price traded below the realized price for months at a stretch. This time, it didn’t happen once on a closing basis.
Glassnode’s data shows that the Percent Supply in Profit fell to roughly the same level at the June low as at the November 2022 bottom; a comparable share of coins was sitting at a loss. The difference is in magnitude. Net Unrealized Profit/Loss, or NUPL, which tracks the aggregate paper gain or loss across the entire supply, stayed positive throughout the cycle. In 2018 and 2022, NUPL collapsed deep into negative territory as the market flipped into aggregate loss.
Smaller losses generally translate into less structural pressure to sell, which helps explain why this drawdown didn’t produce the kind of forced capitulation seen in prior cycles. It doesn’t mean downside risk is off the table. It means the aggregate cost-basis damage has been narrower this time, a pattern consistent with the on-chain accumulation signals that have shown up alongside this recovery.
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The Levels That Decide the Thesis
Price now trades above the True Market Mean near $77,000 and above the Short-Term Holder Cost Basis, both of which capped rallies for most of 2026. The largest nearby long-term-holder supply cluster sits at $84,000–$85,000, just above the current price.
The next major resistance at the mean MVRV price of $96,700. This is the level where the average holder’s unrealized profit returns to its long-run norm.
| Level | Price | Role |
| True Market Mean | ~$77,000 | Main downside support |
| Long-term holder supply cluster | $84,000–$85,000 | Near-term ceiling/floor pivot |
| Options gamma zone | $92,000–$95,000 | Dealer hedging speeds or slows moves |
| Mean MVRV price | ~$96,700 | Next major resistance |
Options positioning on Deribit reinforces the upper boundary. Positive gamma has built up sharply near $95,000, while negative gamma sits between spot and $92,000. This can be read that dealer hedging tends to accelerate moves in that lower band and slow them once the price approaches the mean MVRV zone.
Holding above $84,000 keeps the path to $96,700 open; a drop back below it puts $77,000 back in play, and a break of that level would undercut the shallow-bear-market read entirely.
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Bitcoin Price, ETF Flows, and Volume
U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs took in approximately $1.3 billion over the five trading days since the current squeeze began, following two weeks of net outflows, with the most recent day marking the largest single inflow since early July, per Glassnode.
It was a meaningful reversal after a stretch where flows had weakened, and it lines up with an institutional bid that didn’t exist during the 2018 or 2022 downturns, a structural difference worth weighing against any Federal Reserve policy shifts that could swing that flow in either direction.
Spot volume across exchanges more than doubled off its August trough, up 121% since the rally began. Every prior volume expansion from late 2025 through mid-2026 came on a leg down, marking capitulatory selling. August broke that pattern as the first spike in a year to coincide with rising Bitcoin price.
The seven-day average still sits roughly 30% below year-ago levels, so this reads as recovery off a floor rather than a full return to 2025 conditions.
Weekly realized profit-taking during this run remains a fraction of what it was at the 2024 and 2025 tops, even though almost all short-term holders are now sitting in profit. That’s the bullish read: holders aren’t rushing to lock in gains despite the setup.
A rise toward those 2024–2025 realized-profit levels would flag that recent buyers are converting the rally into exit liquidity, which is the first sign the thesis is weakening.
This cycle’s low was the mildest since 2017, as realized-price impairment falls apart, and the market reverts to a more conventional test of support.
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