Key Takeaways:
Bitcoin's five-month stretch below the cost basis of both recent and active buyers has pushed long-term holder capitulation to its highest level since December 2022.
Bitcoin long-term holders are realizing losses of $280 million a day, the highest since December 2022, as the market enters the later stages of a bottoming process.
"Prolonged accumulation at such a discount, where new capital is consistently deployed below the cost basis of both recent buyers and the broader active market, has conventionally served as the foundation for cyclical bottoms," Glassnode said in its Week 27 On-Chain report published July 8.
Bitcoin has traded below both the True Market Mean at $76,600 and the Short-Term Holder Cost Basis at $72,200 since early February, a five-month stretch that ranks among the longest in the asset's history. Long-term holder losses now account for 43% of total realized value on the network, up from 15% in early February. The current wave of capitulation peaked at nearly $280 million per day and has not yet cooled, according to Glassnode.
The market requires a sustained compression in long-term holder losses, stabilization in institutional flows and a reclaim of the True Market Mean before a regime transition can be weighted constructively, Glassnode said. Bitcoin traded at $62,700 as of 14:00 UTC on July 9, down about 3% in the past 24 hours.
ETF Outflows Ease but Institutional Demand Remains Muted
Spot Bitcoin ETF net outflows have eased from a peak of $193 million per day in early June to a 30-day average of $88.9 million per day, according to Glassnode. While the deceleration is a tentative positive, the market remains in a net bleeding state on a monthly basis. Daily trading volume across US spot Bitcoin ETFs ranges between $650 million and $950 million, roughly 80% below the $4.4 billion per day peak recorded in October 2025, confirming that institutional conviction has not meaningfully returned.
Derivatives Positioning Tilts Cautiously Long
The options market's open-interest put/call ratio has fallen to 0.56, the lowest reading of 2026, leaving the market holding roughly two calls for every put. Perpetual futures funding has averaged well below the 0.01% exchange-neutral line, reflecting a book that has de-risked and leaned cautiously long. However, the 25-delta skew remains bid across every tenor, with traders still paying up for downside protection. Bitcoin trades about 6% below its aggregated max pain of $66,000, the strike where the most open interest expires worthless.
The macro backdrop adds another layer of uncertainty. WTI crude surged 7.9% over the past week after reports that the US-Iran memorandum of understanding had lapsed, dragging Bitcoin's weekly gains to 5% from 9.4%. The Federal Reserve's June minutes, released July 8, showed all participants supported holding rates at 3.50% to 3.75% and removed language that had pointed toward easing, with several officials flagging that persistent inflation could warrant policy firming. For Bitcoin, the path to recovery requires three conditions to align: long-term holder losses compress toward $100 million to $150 million a day, ETF flows turn neutral to positive, and the Fed's policy-firming scenario fades.
This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute investment advice.
