I Measured the Last Two Bitcoin Bottoms. The Signal Everyone Waits For Was 1-for-2.

2026-08-04 $BTC

Everyone wants to know if $BTC has bottomed. I measured what the last two bottoms actually looked like, and one of the two things people use to call them does not survive the check.

WHERE WE ACTUALLY ARE

  peak                126,200
  now                 63,462
  from the peak       -49.71%
  months since        10

THE TWO COMPLETED CYCLES

Measured on monthly candles, a peak being the highest monthly close to date that then went unbeaten for a full year:

  2017-12 to 2018-12   -77.0%   12 months
  2021-10 to 2022-11   -74.8%   13 months

Both went past seventy percent. Both took at least a year. We are at 49.7% in month 10 — shallower than either, and earlier than either.

That is a comparison, not a forecast, and I want to be precise about how weak it is: **two observations.** Anyone quoting a cycle bottom to you as a probability is quoting a sample of two.

THE PART THAT SURPRISED ME

The standard way to call a bottom is to wait for capitulation — one enormous volume month where everybody sells at once. So I measured turnover in each trough month against the year before it.

  2018-12   0.74x
  2022-11   1.83x

They disagree. One bottom arrived on turnover **below** its own average. The other on nearly double. With two cases splitting one-all, "wait for the volume capitulation" has no support in this record at all — and I had been about to write the opposite before I ran it.

WHAT IS TRUE RIGHT NOW

  2026-07 turnover     0.62x its prior year
  turnover z-score    0.06
  three-day trend     -48.7%
  underwater          72.3% of the month's turnover sits above price
  RSI                 47.1
  fear and greed      25 (Extreme Fear), all month inside 20-33

Read those together. The month is running well under its own prior year, the three-day trend is falling, and today's turnover is entirely ordinary — a z-score of 0.06 is the definition of an unremarkable day. Nothing here is panicking, and nothing is arriving. Sentiment has been pinned at the fearful end for a month without ever reaching the extreme where people actually give up.

THE STAGE

Not the top — that was 10 months ago. Not capitulation — capitulation is loud, and the month is running at 0.62x its own prior year. This is the long flat middle, where price does very little and people stop watching.

It is also the part of a cycle that is boring for far longer than anyone plans for. Both prior bottoms took at least 12 months from the peak. We are at 10.

BIAS: WAIT

Not because I know where it goes. Because the one signal most people are waiting for turned out to be 1-for-2 in a sample of two, and a system that tells you that is worth more than one that tells you a number.

What would change it: turnover breaking above its prior-year average, or sentiment finally cracking below 20. Neither has happened.

Which are you waiting for — the price, or the volume?

Educational research, not financial advice. DYOR.