Bitcoin’s drop back into the mid-$90,000s has reignited the debate: is this the start of a true bear market, or a sharp reset inside an ongoing uptrend? Analysts are converging on the same battleground levels but differ on what they imply.
Using monthly Fibonacci retracements from the March 2024 high to the November 2022 low, he notes that Bitcoin previously tagged the 0.618 retracement at $51,518, “even wicked below, then bounced.” On a fresh set of fibs drawn from the October 2025 top to the August 2024 low, that same key level now sits at $96,975. Price is currently trading slightly below it, similar to the 2024 wick.
With two weeks left in November, Mattsby stresses that the close matters more than the intramonth volatility: “If BTC holds this $96-$97k zone for a monthly candle close in November, this could mirror last year’s setup: a couple more months retesting this zone, then a run to new all-time highs would be possible.”
On the weekly timeframe, however, market analyst Rekt Capital is less comfortable with the latest breakdown. For him, the 50-week exponential moving average has been a core “bullish structure” of this cycle. He writes: “Bear Markets confirm when the bullish structures that supported continued bullish momentum start to fail.”
The key question, in his view: “Can BTC produce enough upside in the coming weeks to invalidate this Weekly Close below the 50 EMA and reclaim the EMA as support?”
Frank’s approach is straightforward: “I’m a buyer of standard deviation moves to the downside; they don’t come often, but they tend to be excellent opportunities.”
CryptoQuant founder Ki Young Ju focuses on who is selling this dip. He characterizes the move as internal rotation among long-term players rather than broad distribution: “This dip is just long-term holders rotating among themselves. Old Bitcoiners are selling to tradfi players, who will also hold for the long run.”
In short, the technical picture has clearly weakened, with the 50-week EMA and the $96,000–$97,000 monthly Fibonacci zone now acting as critical lines in the sand. If Bitcoin can reclaim the weekly EMA and secure a monthly close above that 0.618 retracement, the case for this being a deep but standard consolidation remains credible.
A sustained failure at these levels, by contrast, would lend significant weight to the bear-market argument. For now, the verdict hinges on how the next few weekly and monthly candles close, not on the intraday noise.
At press time, BTC traded at $93,938.
