While Bitcoin was hovering above $40,000, Pantera Capital CEO Dan Morehead made an enlightening assessment about Bitcoin's proximity to the top.
Morehead began his analysis as follows:
“Given that Bitcoin has rallied 150% to date, the question people are asking themselves is 'where are we in this cycle today? The bottom line is that if historical price movements around the tops of the 1-Year HODL Wave indicator are any indication of future performance, most of the gains in this cycle are yet to come.”
Morehead stated that the 1-Year HODL Wave indicator tracks the percentage of all bitcoins that have not been moved from one wallet to another for at least a year.
As Bitcoin's price approaches a new cycle top, there is a noticeable decrease in the percentage of coins held for more than a year. This trend is partially attributed to owners of these coins choosing to make a profit by selling, resulting in these coins no longer being categorized as “+1 year” in this analysis.
“Historically, the BTC price has increased slowly and steadily towards the tops of this indicator,” Morehead noted and added:
“After reaching the peak, the price rose quickly and sharply, and these rallies lasted an average of 1.3 years from the benchmark peak to the price peak.”
Morehead notes that there is no clear indication that the indicator has peaked for this cycle. According to the CEO, the natural question to ask in this situation is “when will the indicator reach the peak of this cycle and we see a sharp increase in prices?” should be:
“What is interesting is that the peaks in the indicator have occurred within two quarters at most of Bitcoin halvings, 0.2, 0.5 and 0.3 years before or after halvings so far. “The next halving is expected to occur at the end of April 2024.”
*This is not investment advice.