When Bitcoin’s Bear Market Might End

David Canales plotted every Bitcoin bear market since 2013 on the same timeline, defining the start as the prior bull market all-time high and the end as the price trough. He treats markets from 2018 onward as the more relevant comparisons because earlier cycles had shallower market depth and no ETFs. He also acknowledges the analysis cannot be performed in real time since the bottom is never identifiable in the moment.

At the time of recording the current bear market was approximately 235 days old. The three comparable prior bear markets lasted 360 days in 2018, 249 days in the 2019 to 2020 cycle, and 375 to 376 days in the 2021 to 2022 post-FTX cycle, producing a median of roughly 363 days. Based on that median, Canales estimates the current bear market is about two thirds complete, with a projected end around September or October 2026. Critically, in all three prior cycles the bottom had not yet been reached by day 235, suggesting the current cycle is unlikely to be an exception.

The current drawdown has been notably shallower than historical precedents at the same stage. Bitcoin was approximately 41 percent down from its peak at day 234 of the current cycle, whereas by the same point in 2018 it had lost two thirds of its value and in the 2021 to 2022 cycle it was down roughly 70 percent. The 2018 bear market ultimately ended with an 82 percent total retracement and the 2021 to 2022 bear market with a 75 percent retracement.

The shape of the current decline also differs from prior cycles. The 2018 bear market was front-loaded, with Bitcoin losing 40 percent in the first 30 days and 59 percent by day 90. Both the 2018 and 2021 to 2022 cycles featured extended sideways periods followed by a sharp final capitulation triggered by specific shocks, including the Coincheck hack and China crypto bans in 2018 and the FTX collapse in 2022. The current trajectory more closely resembles the early phase of the 2019 to 2020 bear market before the COVID crash accelerated losses. Canales flags a potential AI bubble collapse as a plausible black swan equivalent that could produce a similar late-cycle capitulation in 2026.

Peak-to-trough drawdowns have been shrinking each cycle, from 83 percent in 2018 to approximately 76 percent in 2022. Following that mean regression trend, the predicted bottom for the current cycle falls around 68 percent down from the late 2025 all-time high, which would place Bitcoin at approximately 39,500 to 40,000 dollars and would require an additional 46 percent correction from levels at the time of recording. Canales personally hopes that ETFs, Strategy, and other structural buyers create a higher floor this cycle and prevent a drawdown of that magnitude, but he characterizes all cycle-based price analysis as the equivalent of astrology given the limited price history available.

The time between halving events and subsequent bull market peaks has been consistent across cycles: 526 days after the 2016 halving, 548 days after the May 2020 halving, and 535 days after the April 2024 halving. Canales notes that Bitcoin bull and bear cycles are somewhat self-fulfilling prophecies in the context of the halving schedule, and that the small number of completed cycles means none of this analysis can be treated as an exact science.