Medha Singh and Lisa Pauline Mattackal

(Reuters) – The crypto winter has entered its ninth week, and bitcoin is still struggling to shake off the chills.

The biggest cryptocurrency has experienced a drop in value of a third, thanks to market indicators ranging from turnover and technicals.

Now what?

The crypto winters are not well-known. We define this as prolonged bearishness lasting for at least a month.

Since 2017, there have been five and three, respectively. Two bitcoin crashes in 2017 caused Bitcoin to drop between 45% and 47% over the course of 14 and 10 week. As if they were not unusual, the latest bitcoin crash – 36% loss in just eight weeks – has a long way to go.

Bitcoin is not appealing to retail investors at the moment. Joseph Edwards from Solrise Finance, who heads financial strategy for fund management company Solrise Finance said nobody sees the potential of bitcoin giving out 10x (return).

The macro backdrop is not favorable for an asset class that’s now seen as risky, volatile and vulnerable to inflation. Cryptocurrencies are not on the shopping lists of anyone who is worried about rising geopolitical rates and U.S. stock prices.

There are signs, even though it is in an icy desert, that crypto king plans to make a comeback.

Bitcoin has been gaining strength from the rest the crypto market. For example, its relative stature provides some comfort to investors fleeing unstablecoins like TerraUSD, which was collapsed in May.

Bitcoin dominance (a measure of Bitcoin’s market cap relative to all other crypto markets) has increased to over 44%, even though it has declined in price.

Marcus Sotiriou from GlobalBlock, an analyst based in the UK, stated, “Institutional Investors are especially fleeing safety, to some extent to bitcoin which has the greatest institutional adoption.”

The largest net position of bitcoin futures since its launch in 2018 was seen last week. CFTC data shows that this indicates traders’ increasing anticipation for a rising price.

Graphic: Crypto winters – https://fingfx.thomsonreuters.com/gfx/mkt/akpezrmbgvr/Pasted%20image%201653292753399.png

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Fear and Greed

It’s scary times.

Bitcoin lost 50% since its peak value of $69,000 on Nov. 10. After touching a low of $25,000 on May 12, Bitcoin is now flirting with $30,000 this week. Although it is still the most valuable digital asset in terms of market capital, its market value now totals $1.3 trillion. This represents less than half the $3 Trillion peak reached in November.

Data platform Coinglass’s bitcoin Fear & Greed index of market sentiment – where 0 indicates extreme fear and 100 extreme greed – is hovering at 13.

Ether, No. The No.2 token according to market value is Ether. It has been hovering around the $2,000 mark and is about 60% down from its peak of $48,868 on November 10.

Macro Hive’s CEO Bilal Hafeez said that $2,300 was the key level and suggested that failure to keep above these levels in the immediate future would signal a bearish trend.

Crypto market has been beaten.

The total spot market volume of all cryptocurrency at major exchanges fell to $18.4 Billion as of Monday. This is less than half the $48.2 Billion seen May 14th, which was the largest volume in 2022 according to The Block news and research.

Glassnode Blockchain Analytics firm stated on May 9th that at $33,600 bitcoin puts 40% investors underwater on their holdings.

“Many folks are left wondering what they should do with their coins – keep holding on for dear life or book losses and move on?” Lindsey Bell was chief markets strategist and money strategist at Ally Invest.

It’s important to remember that crypto shouldn’t make up more than 1-2% of your overall portfolio.