Bitcoin is heading towards an uncomfortable milestone, a possible fifth consecutive month-to-month decline if February closes within the crimson, and the setup is beginning to look much less like a crypto-specific drawdown and extra like a macro-driven repricing.
This five-month shedding streak can be notable within the post-ETF period and would even be Bitcoin’s longest stretch of month-to-month declines since 2018, when it posted six consecutive down months in the course of the bear market.
At below $63,000, BTC is down by virtually 20% this month, which is its largest month-to-month drawdown since June 2022.
Nevertheless, the damaging worth streak itself isn’t the primary story.
The larger shift is that Bitcoin is being priced in a distinct regime, one the place ETF flows, charge expectations, and cross-asset danger sentiment are carrying extra weight than crypto-native catalysts.
Because of this, BTC merchants are not centered on the timing of a return to new highs. As a substitute, the controversy has shifted to the place the subsequent sturdy bid sits, and the extent attracting essentially the most consideration is $58,000.
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Feb 19, 2026 · Liam 'Akiba' Wright
A market pushed by ETF flows, positioning and macro
Over the previous a number of weeks, Bitcoin has traded much less like a standalone digital asset and extra like a high-beta danger instrument.
That distinction issues as a result of it modifications how merchants learn the tape.
In a crypto-led market, narratives round adoption, protocol upgrades, or long-term shortage can dominate short-term worth motion.
Within the present setup, the important thing inputs are extra acquainted to macro merchants, circulate information, choices positioning, and broader danger urge for food.
That shift exhibits up most clearly in ETF habits.
When spot Bitcoin ETFs had been taking in regular inflows, pullbacks had been usually met with computerized demand. These flows acted as a cushion, not as a result of sentiment had turned bullish, however as a result of the construction itself required shopping for.
Now the alternative dynamic is in place. Persistent outflows don’t simply take away assist; they will grow to be a supply of provide stress.
This 12 months, US spot Bitcoin ETFs have seen greater than $4.5 billion in internet outflows, an indication that institutional demand via the ETF wrapper stays below stress whilst elements of the market proceed to search for a flooring.
That may be a massive shift in marginal demand, and it helps clarify why rebounds have struggled to carry.
Information from CryptoQuant additional buttresses the case for why spot Bitcoin ETFs have grow to be integral to BTC's worth efficiency.
Since Might 2025, day by day buying and selling quantity in Bitcoin spot ETFs has exceeded the mixed quantity of world centralized exchanges. At this time, 55% of all day by day Bitcoin spot buying and selling quantity comes from ETFs.
Basically, institutional flows have now grow to be the market’s dominant liquidity channel and are not one a part of the market.
That shifts the market’s middle of gravity, as retail buyers more and more react to a price-discovery course of led by Wall Avenue.
The result’s a tape that appears extra like a macro asset below stress, decrease highs, repeated checks of assist, and a market that retains revisiting the identical worth zones till both the circulate backdrop improves or a stronger flooring is established.
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Why $58,000 has grow to be the important thing stress-test degree
The rising give attention to $58,000 isn’t a few single chart sample. It displays a convergence of frameworks.
The primary is a long-cycle technical construction. The 200-week EMA stays one of the vital broadly watched regime markers in Bitcoin.
In previous bear phases and late-cycle resets, worth motion close to that degree has usually compelled a broader reassessment, whether or not it's a correction inside an uptrend or the beginning of a deeper repricing.
The second is on-chain cost-basis gravity. Under the contested zone, merchants are watching combination cost-basis measures, together with realized-price sort anchors.
When Bitcoin begins shifting towards the typical embedded buy worth of holders, habits tends to vary.
Some buyers minimize danger and lock in losses. Others step in as a result of the worth appears to be like cheaper relative to the community’s buy historical past.
The third is the demand cluster within the present vary.
Latest on-chain evaluation factors to a contested zone between $60,000 and $69,000, the place demand has been absorbing repeated promote stress.
If that zone breaks cleanly, $58,000 turns into the subsequent clearer reference level, sitting beneath the cluster and above deeper cost-basis anchors.
That’s the reason $58,000 is finest understood as a stress take a look at, not essentially the ultimate flooring.
If the market holds there, it could actually grow to be the beginning of a base. If it fails, consideration can shift shortly towards deeper on-chain ranges within the mid-$50,000 space.
Choices markets present organized draw back demand, not panic
Derivatives information reinforces why $58,000 has grow to be the focus.
Information from Deribit exhibits a steady downtrend within the present vary, and merchants within the choices market have continued to place for draw back via safety trades and bearish expressions.
The construction of these trades issues as a result of it helps clarify what sort of transfer members are bracing for.
In accordance with the agency, BTC's put skew is again to Feb. 5 ranges, and implied volatility is buying and selling greater than 10% above realized volatility on a seven-day measure.
That mixture factors to robust demand for draw back safety, and it’s taking place with out a recent spot collapse of the identical scale because the Feb. 5 transfer.
The demand is concentrated round $58,000 strikes. Merchants have been lively in 58,000 places, put spreads, and danger reversals, with the derivatives market more and more organized round that degree as the primary draw back reference.
Deribit identified that the clearest instance got here with the addition of March 6, 58,000 places, the place about $200 million in notional was purchased for about $2 million in premium.
That issues as a result of it suggests funds are positioning for a decrease grind, not essentially a sudden capitulation.
In a grinding market, put spreads and danger reversals will be extra environment friendly than outright places, as a result of they cut back premium prices and prolong the period of the commerce’s potential payoff.
On the similar time, Galaxy Digital’s Head of Analysis Alex Thorn stated Bitcoin is nearing all-time oversold territory.
Thorn stated the weekly RSI is decrease than at any level exterior what he known as the darkest bear phases, and he flagged the one decrease readings since 2016 as Nov./Dec. 2018, when Bitcoin fell from roughly $6,000 to $3,000, and Jun./Jul. 2022, in the course of the Three Arrows Capital collapse and the interval earlier than Genesis’ insolvency grew to become clear.
That doesn’t assure a rebound, but it surely does body the present setup as statistically stretched, even when the market nonetheless wants a catalyst to stabilize.
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On-chain information exhibits the place deeper ache and assist might emerge
CryptoQuant information on long-term holders provides one other layer to the market’s determination tree.
In accordance with the agency, long-term holders (LTHs), a cohort that’s typically much less delicate to short-term worth fluctuations, are nonetheless sitting on a mean revenue of roughly 74%.
Meaning the cohort isn’t but below broad stress, however the margin is shrinking as spot worth drifts decrease.
CryptoQuant estimates the LTH price foundation at about $38,900, and that determine is rising over time as short-term holders who purchased at greater costs age into the long-term class.
In different phrases, the ache threshold isn’t fastened. It climbs with the cycle.
Traditionally, CryptoQuant famous that bear markets have usually featured a break beneath the LTH price foundation, adopted by a ultimate capitulation section marked by realized losses of about 20%.
That has normally been the type of washout that clears leverage and permits a extra sturdy rebuild.
CryptoQuant cautioned that this was solely an commentary based mostly on a restricted variety of occurrences. That caveat issues, particularly within the present cycle.
The construction of Bitcoin possession has modified. Establishments, company entities, and sovereign actors now play a bigger function than in prior cycles.
These members convey totally different mandates, time horizons, and liquidity profiles, and people structural modifications might alter how the market behaves round conventional on-chain ache factors.
That’s one purpose the mid-$50,000 to $60,000 space is so essential.
It might function the zone the place old-cycle patterns and new-cycle market construction meet, and the place merchants discover out whether or not institutional participation softens the drawdown or just amplifies it via ETF flows and macro-sensitive positioning.
The subsequent transfer is determined by whether or not the market can restore, or has to flush
The cleanest solution to body Bitcoin into the month-end is as a set of paths, not a single forecast.
The bottom case is an orderly grind. Bitcoin continues to commerce contained in the contested $60,000 to $69,000 area, with sharp intraday swings however no decisive break.
February closes crimson, the five-month shedding streak turns into official, and the market treats the transfer as a reset quite than a collapse.
That path would seemingly require ETF outflows to maintain slowing, spot promoting stress to ease, and choices markets to remain defensive with out a recent spike in volatility.
The bear case is a mechanical flush. A break beneath the $60,000 demand zone triggers stop-losses and systematic promoting, and worth strikes into the $58,000 take a look at.
If the 200-week EMA fails to draw sufficient demand, focus would shift to deeper cost-basis anchors within the mid-$50,000 vary.
On this state of affairs, the catalyst isn’t essentially a crypto-specific shock. It’s continued ETF bleeding, weaker danger sentiment throughout markets, and a derivatives market that retains paying up for draw back safety.
The bull case is a flow-led reclaim. Bitcoin holds the present demand zone, ETF flows stabilize after which flip optimistic, and choices skew begins to normalize.
That will enable worth to maneuver again towards greater on-chain imply ranges related to extra expansionary situations.
In that setup, the streak ends not as a result of sentiment improves first, however as a result of the marginal purchaser returns.
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