Breaking a familiar pattern, bitcoin is rising during the US session, rising to $70,800 after falling to just over $68,000 earlier in the day.
Bitcoin is now up 0.5% in the last 24 hours, with ether XRP and sunny ahead closer to 1.5% over the same time period.
Risk assets are generally in the green on Monday, with the Nasdaq up 1% and the S&P 500 up 0.5%. Gold is up 1.9% to $5,075 an ounce, and silver is up 7.4% to $82.50 an ounce.
“What we are experiencing is the weakest bitcoin bear case in its history,” Bernstein’s Gautam Chhugani wrote, reiterating the firm’s $150,000 price target for bitcoin by the end of the year.
“When all the stars are aligned, [the] The Bitcoin community manufactures a self-imposed crisis of confidence,” Chhugani continued. “Nothing exploded, no skeleton will fall apart; [the] “The media is back to write an obituary.”
“Time,” Chhugani said, “is still a flat circle in Bitcoin.”
Getting a little more technical, Schwab’s Jim Ferraioli said it’s useful to look at bitcoin miners to determine when a bottom has been reached.
“Previous sell-offs have typically bottomed out near the cost of bitcoin production,” Ferraioli said. “Miners with less efficient equipment often shut down operations temporarily… We can see this in real time by watching mining difficulty adjustment: as more miners leave the network, the difficulty drops. Once it starts to rise again, that’s confirmation that it may have hit bottom.”
In fact, CoinDesk previously reported that bitcoin mining difficulty just dropped by the most since 2021, as at least some miners capitulated to falling prices.
Crypto Stocks Rise
Crypto platform Bullish (BLSH) is leading the sector higher on Monday with a 14.2% gain. Other big advancers include Galaxy Digital (GLXY), up 8.2%, and Circle Financial (CRCL), up 5.1%. Strategy (MSTR) is up 3% and Coinbase (COIN) is up 1%.
Bitcoin miners that have moved to AI infrastructure are posting big gains and Morgan Stanley initiated positive coverage on TeraWulf (WULF) and Cipher Mining (CIFR); both increased by 14%. Hut 8 (HUT), IREN (IREN), and Bitfarms (BITF) are each ahead by about 7%.
