PlanB, the pseudonymous analyst behind the stock-to-flow mannequin, says bitcoin’s drawdown has left markets gazing 4 believable bear-market paths, starting from a basic 80% drawdown to the likelihood that the lows are already in.
In a put up on X and a follow-up video dated Feb. 4, PlanB framed the controversy round the place bitcoin sometimes finds bear-market bottoms relative to long-term development metrics, whereas additionally arguing that the earlier rally’s lack of momentum might translate right into a shallower reset this time.
Bitcoin closed January at $78,000, he mentioned, marking a roughly 40% decline from the cycle’s all-time excessive at $126,000. On his chart, the 200-week shifting common closed at $58,000 and realized worth at $55,000, with the January RSI ending at 49, a stage he treats as a regime shift.
“RSI right here, 49. RSI, as you already know, is an index between 0 and 100. And every thing above 50 is an uptrend. Every part under 50 is downtrend,” PlanB mentioned. “So 49 is under 50, it’s downtrend. It’s a bear market… just like 2014–15, 2018–19 and 2022–23.”
Associated Studying
4 Bitcoin Bear Market Eventualities
From there, he outlined 4 situations for a way the drawdown might evolve. The primary is the historic “worst case” that also sits in merchants’ psychological fashions: an 80% drop from the highest. With an ATH of $126,000, PlanB mentioned that may indicate a transfer to roughly $25,000 — “someplace right here between these two traces” on his chart, even when he acknowledged it could “look actually actually odd.”
The second state of affairs is extra typical by his personal backtests: a backside across the 200-week shifting common and realized worth, which he pegged within the $50,000–$60,000 stage. PlanB pointed to prior cycles the place worth finally “drop[s] to the shifting common realized worth ranges,” highlighting 2022 and 2015 as examples the place the RSI trough coincided with these long-term anchors.
The third state of affairs is shallower nonetheless: a retrace that stops simply above the prior cycle’s all-time excessive, round $69,000–$70,000. PlanB’s reasoning is that the previous bull section seemed muted in his indicators, which might compress the magnitude of the bear.
“So what I feel is… as a result of the bull market was very weak… it didn’t have the purple dots, the excessive RSI peaks,” he mentioned. “Due to that, the bear market may very well be very shallow. And that may imply, for instance, going again to the extent or simply be above the extent of the… earlier all-time excessive, which was 69,000.”
Associated Studying
The fourth state of affairs is the one merchants all the time need on their screens: that the market already printed its low. PlanB wrote that “yesterday’s $72.9k was the underside,” and reiterated within the video that “possibly the $72.800 that we noticed a pair days in the past was already the underside.” Notably, the BTC worth already dropped to $70,140 on Wednesday, invalidating this state of affairs.
IMO there are 4 bitcoin bear market situations:1) -80% from ATH $126k => $25k2) all the way down to 200w MA / realized worth => $50k-60k3) down to simply above earlier ATH => $70k4) yesterday’s $72.9k was the underside
I focus on these state of affairs’s in my new video:👉 https://t.co/mXSxJK9LLx
— PlanB (@100trillionUSD) February 4, 2026
PlanB additionally revisited his stock-to-flow framework, saying it stays at $500,000 as a worth sign derived from shortage whereas stressing it’s not constructed to name turning factors. “Inventory to stream says nothing about tops and bottoms,” he mentioned, including that it speaks to “the four-year common” and periodic “section transition each 4 or 5 years.”
That caveat arrange his ultimate level: the cycle template could also be shifting. PlanB famous that in his four-year-cycle view, the height traditionally lands within the first or second yr after a halving, however “it didn’t occur after 2024 halving.” In his telling, that leaves room for an upside section later within the cycle, whilst his nearer-term framework retains the concentrate on whether or not bitcoin gravitates towards realized worth and the 200-week common, holds the prior ATH zone, or validates a better low within the low-$70,000s.
At press time, BTC traded at $
Featured picture created with DALL.E, chart from TradingView.com
