Throughout Bitcoin’s short history, its price has experienced enormous swings to new all-time highs, followed by retracements that take back most of the gains. Studying several Bitcoin (BTC) market cycles, it becomes clear that other than the first cycle, the others are relatively consistent regarding timing.

This trend is especially true of the last two cycles, which are close to four years each from peak to peak and bottom to bottom. Some have speculated that this timing results from the Bitcoin halving that occurs approximately every four years or 210,000 blocks mined. The question now is: Is the Bitcoin four-year cycle a real phenomenon or just a coincidence? And if it is real, what will it look like in 2024 and beyond?

Dissecting Bitcoin’s Market Cycles

For clarity, this article defines a market cycle from one bear market bottom to the next.

The first accurate Bitcoin price tracking occurred in July 2010. By October, Bitcoin’s price started to rise and peaked on June 8, 2011, at $31.90. The price began to fall over the next five months and bottomed at $2.01 on Nov. 19, 2011. This first cycle was the shortest of all the cycles to date.

Cycle No. 2 began at the 2011 bear market bottom on Nov. 19, after which the price bounced higher almost immediately. After the bounce, there was a six-month period of consolidation. After BTC broke out of the consolidation, it peaked at over $268 on April 10, 2013; a 76% drop followed that peak.

BTC recovered almost immediately and hit a bull market peak of $1,177 on Nov. 30, 2013. An 86% drop followed that peak; the bottom was hit on Jan. 14, 2015.

The third cycle began at the 2015 bear market bottom on January 14. For the first 9 ½ months, the price of Bitcoin accumulated in a range of about $100. After the price of Bitcoin broke out of the accumulation range, it re-tested the range once before moving higher.

The move higher culminated in the bull market peak at just under $20,000 on Dec. 17, 2017. Once again, a price drop of 84% followed the peak and the bottom was hit almost one year later, on Dec. 15, 2018.

The fourth cycle began on Dec. 10, 2018, and after about four months of accumulation, the price of Bitcoin broke out in a dramatic fashion. Over the next three months, the price of Bitcoin increased by over 200% and hit a high of $13,831 on June 26, 2019.

Over the remainder of the year, Bitcoin’s price slowly dropped but still finished up about 90% for the year. The start of 2020 saw a 45% increase in the price of Bitcoin, which peaked in mid-February. That was followed by the COVID crash, which bottomed in mid-March.

The recovery from the COVID crash was swift and eventually led to the next bull market. This bull market was reminiscent of the 2013 bull market. After pushing higher throughout much of 2020, the price of Bitcoin peaked on April 14, 2021. This peak was followed by a 55% pullback that bottomed on July 20.

Over the next month, the price of Bitcoin increased by over 134%, which led to the ultimate bull market peak on Nov. 10 at $69,000. Bitcoin’s price immediately began to drop and just over a year later, on Nov. 21, 2022, it hit what appears to be the bottom at $15,495.

By zooming out and looking at the entire price history of Bitcoin, you can calculate the timing of each market cycle. In the chart above, the green vertical lines mark the bull market peaks and the time intervals between them. The yellow dashed lines mark the bear market bottoms, with the time intervals between them.

Note the timing of the last two market cycles. They are close to a four-year cycle, from one peak to the next and from bottom to bottom. Another interesting observation is the time of year when the peaks and bottoms occur.

Other than the first peak in 2011, all the others occurred in November, December or January. Is this timing a coincidence, or is there a reason behind it?

It is also clear that with each successive cycle, the percentage increase in price for the year leading up to the halving is declining. The same pattern is evident from the halving to the following peak. Again, with Bitcoin’s short history, it is unclear whether this pattern will continue. Visually, it is easy to see the diminishing returns with each successive cycle in percentage terms.

Read more: Benzinga.com

What is the Bitcoin Market Cycle?

The Bitcoin market cycle refers to the recurring pattern of price behaviour in the Bitcoin market, characterised by alternating periods of appreciation and depreciation. This cycle is a result of market participants’ perceptions and actions, such as buying and selling, and is influenced by a variety of factors, including market sentiment, regulatory changes, technological developments and the wider economy.

Historically, Bitcoin has followed a four-year cycle tied to Bitcoin halving events, which happen approximately every 4 years. A halving event marks a 50% cut in the Bitcoin reward miners receive for mining new blocks and verifying transactions; in effect Bitcoin supply continues to increase, but at a slower rate. The knock-on effect can be a steep increase in price, assuming the demand for Bitcoin remains the same or increases after a halving. The next halving is due April 2024, when the block reward will fall to 3.125 bitcoins.

What are the Bitcoin Market Cycle Phases?

Phase 1 – Accumulation

Occurs when prices are low, but small signs of growth appear. During this phase buyers will accumulate cheaper Bitcoin and so it represents the point of maximal financial opportunity.

Typically, there is bearish sentiment in the market so volume is low and prices are fluctuating in a tight range, near the bottom.

Phase 2 – Continuation

The price continues moving towards the all time high. A halving event has historically occurred here, coinciding with shrinking exchange reserves as buyers hoover up supply as they look to capture rising prices in anticipation of new all-time highs.

Phase 3 – Parabolic

When the price eclipses the previous all-time high, price action will start to move exponentially to the upside pushing the price to a new all-time high, which has exceeded the previous landmark by a significant factor. This phase is extremely volatile, with rapid price increases followed by large corrections

Sell volume builds as a portion of investors lock in healthy profits, while many market participants will continue buying believing the bull market has more room to run. As a result, price volatility is low given the buy and sell volumes begin to balance against a backdrop of overconfidence. At this point, many investors would see the Fear & Greed Index flashing Extreme Greed.

Phase 4 – Correction

Following the euphoria of the Parabolic phase, this is when the market will see a major correction to the downside. Previous bear market periods have resulted in approximately 80% drawdowns from the top and negative price action for approximately a year. The most recent example saw the price tumble from an all-time high of $69,000 (November 2021) to $15,476 (November 2022).

The chart below shows the cyclical nature of Bitcoin’s price and how it has played out in the past.

Read more: CaleAndBrown.com

[An interesting summary of Bitcoin cycles from the end of 2023]

History shows there’s likely a bright year ahead for BTC’s price.

The crypto market may seem like a foreign world to many, with no real rhyme or reason for how it trades.

Just like traditional markets, though, crypto goes through its own cycles – and these price cycles are remarkably consistent, including their timing between peak-to-trough bottoms, price recoveries and subsequent rallies to new cycle highs.

We believe we’re in the early stages of a new cycle. Using bitcoin (BTC) as our benchmark, here’s the typical structure of a crypto market cycle:

• BTC’s price peaks at a new all-time high.
• BTC then suffers a painful 80% or so drawdown.
• The price eventually bottoms almost exactly one year after the prior cycle’s high.
• BTC starts to recover and takes about two years to reach a new all-time high.
• BTC continues to rally for another year before topping out at its next cycle high.
• Then the cycle repeats.

The last few cycles have followed this playbook to a T.

The consistency of these cycles isn’t by coincidence. It’s driven by bigger, more powerful macro trends – and one that lies at the very heart of bitcoin’s value proposition.

Bitcoin is not an inflation hedge in the way many believe it to be. Bitcoin is not a hedge on the Consumer Price Index, or CPI. It’s a hedge against currency debasement.

That distinction is important because currency debasement is driven by monetary inflation and the expansion of central bank balance sheets. In essence, BTC is of the most leveraged bets on an expansionary liquidity environment.

Is Bitcoin back from the dead? A year ago, Bitcoin — and “crypto” in general — was in a parlous state. A series of major scandals, including the FTX collapse, had investors running scared and regulators on a warpath. The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) launched numerous full-bore attacks on crypto companies, and even blamed crypto for a short-lived banking crisis last summer. The public perception of digital assets was also in the toilet, and politicians, fearing reputational contagion, wanted nothing to do with them (this was in stark contrast to early 2022, when a third of the US Congress took money from a certain Sam Bankman-Fried).

Critics, not unreasonably, said crypto had failed to offer compelling use-cases, beyond speculation. They said it was a cesspit of money laundering and terrorism (its involvement in the latter tends to be vastly overstated). They said it was dangerous for the environment. They said it could never become part of the financial system, because key financial players on Wall Street would never accept it. Some even dared to bid a valedictory “Sayonara”, as they have hundreds of times before now.

Yet today, Bitcoin is trading at around $70,000, above its previous all-time-high of about $69,000. The world’s premier cryptocurrency now has a market cap greater than silver, and many expect it to reach parity with gold within a few months. Meanwhile, the rest of the crypto market, which slumped along lifelessly for much of 2023, isn’t far behind.

So, what’s going on here? What sparked Bitcoin’s resurrection? The truth is there are five principal reasons behind its revival, the first of which may seem rather obvious…

1. You can’t kill Bitcoin

It’s awfully difficult to eradicate something like Bitcoin. Its network is peer-to-peer and decentralised, with roughly 18,000 public nodes working to validate and maintain the network daily, and they work independently. There isn’t a central point of failure or vulnerability for someone or something to stop. It’s a self-perpetuating system. And, more importantly, Bitcoin has tremendous latent support in the world: there are more than 100 million Bitcoin holders globally and, characteristically, they do not respond to political pressure. Since its emergence 13 years ago, Bitcoin has purred along efficiently, steadily growing, even in the face of massive competition and numerous hacks (particularly to exchanges and individual wallets).

This resilience isn’t directly connected to price; Bitcoin can be resistant without the price going up. But the price is based on this sense of permanence. It’s a function of everyone knowing with certainty that the Bitcoin code can’t be changed and that the issuance of new Bitcoin isn’t a political matter. Unlike fiat currencies, which are subject to central bank issuing more or less of a currency depending on the economic circumstances, the issuance of Bitcoin is predictable. That’s a unique selling point in a world where everything, even money, is increasingly politicised.

2. The arrival of ETFs

Though the Bitcoin industry takes pride in its outsider status, it has long sought mainstream support, whether from regulators or blue-blood institutions. This January, after 10 years of trying, it hit the mother lode, winning SEC approval for Bitcoin exchange-traded funds, or ETFs. These vehicles, which helped to popularise gold in the 2000s, allow everyday investors to buy into Bitcoin as if they were purchasing a conventional stock. There’s no need to own the underlying asset or to store it oneself.

Read more: Unherd.com