Bitcoin Halving 25 Months Review: Is the Four-Year Cycle Really Dead? 9 pictures from veteran experts expose the truth that an SEO dares not to tell

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Bitcoin Halving 25-month review: Is the four-year cycle really dead? 9 pictures from veteran experts expose the truth that an SEO dares not to tell

Written in front: The author has followed the ICO craze from 2017 to now, experienced three halvings (2020, 2024, and 2028 have not come yet), and also cut his own flesh at the top of November 2021. Today, BTC is trading at $76,683, which has retraced 39% from the all-time high of $126,080 on 2025-10-06, and it has been 25 months since the halving on 2024-04-19. A bunch of readers in the background asked the author the same question: “Is the four-year cycle dead? Is it a bear market or a correction now?” This article has more than 5,000 words and is full of useful information. It is recommended to save it first and then read it.

Bitcoin halving cycle hero

1. Let’s first explain the “four-year cycle” clearly – what exactly is it and why does everyone believe in it?

Eight out of ten newcomers I have taken care of have the words “four-year cycle” on their lips, but if you really ask, few of them can explain it clearly. First understand the basics.

The logical chain of the Four-Year Cycle can be simplified into one sentence:

Bitcoin is halved every 210,000 blocks (about 4 years) → Miners’ new supply is cut in half → Circulation increment is reduced → Assuming demand remains unchanged, the price rises → Rise attracts more funds → Forms a bull market top → After the top, the bubble bursts and enters a bear market → After the bear market bottom, the next round of halving starts again.

Based on historical data, this narrative is indeed “too beautiful to be true”:

Halving time BTC price at halving Subsequent top Top time Increase Number of days until halving
2012-11-28 $12 $1,150 2013-12-04 95× 371 days
2016-07-09 $650 $19,800 2017-12-17 30× 526 days
2020-05-11 $8,600 $69,000 2021-11-10 8× 548 days
2024-04-19 $63,800 $126,080 2025-10-06 2× 535 days

The author printed out this chart and posted it on the wall for 4 years. Do you see the pattern – The increase is decreasing, but the time window for the top to appear is surprisingly stable, all between 12-18 months after the halving.

The top on 2025-10-06 was exactly 535 days before the halving on 2024-04-19. Snaps perfectly into the window. In this sense, the ** cycle is not only not dead, it is even clocking in on time **.

But this is only half the story.

The author will add another paragraph: Many people equate “four-year cycle” with “halving”. In fact, strictly speaking, Bitcoin’s supply curve is a logarithmic decay rather than a linear cycle. What Satoshi Nakamoto designed back then was to “halve every 210,000 blocks”, which was intended to bring the total amount closer to 21 million and reduce output – there was no such thing as “a bull and bear every four years”. The “four-year cycle” was a script that the market later imposed on Satoshi Nakamoto. Understand this and you can understand why it fails as the market cap gets larger.

2. Here comes the breaking point: The “top” of this round looks completely different from the first three rounds.

After looking through the daily K-line chart, the author found three anomalies at the top of this round compared with history:

Abnormal 1: Growth rate plummets

  • 95x increase in 2013
  • 30x increase in 2017
  • 8x increase in 2021
  • Top of 2025… Only 2x

This is not “decline”, this is “collapse”. If we follow the logarithmic trend, the “theoretical top” of this round should be $250k~$300k, not $126k. BTC has doubled this time. The essence behind this is the “diminishing margin” as the market capitalization increases – for a US$1 trillion asset to increase tenfold, it would require US$10 trillion to be withdrawn from the global capital pool, which is almost impossible.

Abnormality 2: The top is not a “spire”, but a “dome”

The tops in history have been sharp rises and falls. It took 12 months to go from $19,800 to $3,200 in 2017, and 13 months to go from $69,000 to $15,500 in 2021. What about this time? It peaked at $126k in 2025-10, and has only fallen to $76k as of today 2026-05-26, retracement 39%, 7 months – much milder and more viscous than the previous two rounds.

There is an old saying in technical analysis: The spire will fall faster, but the dome will fall longer. Among the assets I have looked at, the top of gold in 2011 was a typical top. It took 4 years to fall from $1,920 to $1,050. The shape of BTC this time is more like gold than the purely retail-driven peak of 2017.

Anomaly 3: New supply after halving is cut in half, but prices are slow to respond

After the 2024-04 halving, the number of new BTCs per day dropped from 900 to 450, which theoretically reduces the number of BTCs entering circulation by approximately 160,000 per year. But the reality is that ETF can absorb 10,000-20,000 a day, and the miners’ supply is nothing. The supply and demand story was overshadowed by the “institution story”.

After seeing these three anomalies, the author concluded that the ** cycle is not dead, but the “narrative” that drives it has been replaced by **. This is the key.

3. Disenchant the “four-year cycle”: it has never been driven by halving

Bitcoin four-year cycle peaks chart

This sounds counter-intuitive, but I must say it.

The halving will print 450 less BTC every day. Calculated at $76k, the “new market selling pressure” reduced every day is $34 million. The BTC spot market trades $22 billion per day. The marginal selling pressure brought about by the halving is reduced, accounting for only 0.15% of the trading volume.

As soon as this number is laid out, the narrative of “halving to promote the bull market” goes bankrupt.

So what is the real driver? The author’s review shows that it is Global Liquidity Cycle:

  • 2020 Bull Market = Fed Zero Interest Rate + QE $4 Trillion
  • 2017 Bull Market = ICO Liquidity Boom + Retail Investors Entry
  • 2013 Bull Run = Bitcoin’s first awakening from geek toy to hedge narrative
  • 2024-2025 Round = US Spot ETF Pass + AI Narrative + Fed Rate Cut Cycle Starts

Four bull markets, four different “main themes”. Halving just happens to be the right rhythm, it’s the calendar, not the engine.

The author says this not to deny the four-year cycle – the cycle will continue to clock in, because every four years the global liquidity cycle, the pace of interest rate cuts, and the timing of risk asset reallocation all happen to be close to the halving pace. But it’s important to understand cause and effect: you’re betting on liquidity, not miners.

Add a counterexample: There was no halving in 2019, but BTC rose from $3,200 to $13,800, an increase of more than 4 times. There is also no halving in 2023, and BTC has risen from $16,500 to $42,000, which is more than 2 times. The increase in the past two years cannot be explained at all according to the “halving drive theory” – but it can be explained by “liquidity + narrative” (2019 is the launch of Libra + the Fed’s interest rate cut, 2023 is ETF expectations + banking crisis hedging). This is the fundamental basis for the author to downgrade “halving” to “calendar”.

4. Why is this round so “moderate”? Three forces are suppressing it

After reviewing the market, the author found that the top increase and retracement of this round were milder than those of the previous three rounds, and there are three clear explanations.

4.1 ETF turns BTC into an “institutional asset”

After the adoption of the BTC spot ETF in January 2024, as of today, eleven ETFs including BlackRock IBIT and Fidelity FBTC hold a total of approximately 1.3 million BTC, accounting for 6.5% of the circulating supply. This means –

  • Volatility is compressed: Institutional positions will not be cut off just because “the currency price fell by 5% today”;
  • Downward support strengthens: Every time it falls to the 60-day line, pension funds and family offices start to buy;
  • Upside ceiling lowered: In the past, retail FOMO could push BTC to a deviation of 200% from the moving average, but now institutions will sell at a deviation of 80%-100%.

To put it simply: After professional players enter the market, BTC becomes more and more like gold and less like meme.

The author has looked at the trend of gold prices after the gold ETF (GLD) was listed in 2004 – it rose five times in the seven years after its listing, but the annualized volatility was reduced from 22% to 14%. BTC is now following the exact same path: the upper limit is being pulled down, the lower limit is being held up, and the overall shape has become “boring” but “safe”. It is a great benefit for long-term holders, but a nightmare for short-term traders.

4.2 Altcoins ate up all the “overflow funds”

Historically, after the top of the BTC bull market, funds will rotate to ETH and then to altcoins. But this round of “copycat season” happened ahead of schedule – SOL rose from $20 in 2023 to $260 at the end of 2024, an increase of 13×; the MEME sector surged in 2024-Q4; the AI ​​sector took over in 2025-Q1.

结果是 BTC 还没冲到周期顶，溢出资金已经被山寨提前吸走。 BTC 反而在 2025-Q3 被山寨”反向虹吸”流动性。 This is a reversal that has never happened in history.

Let me give you a specific figure: from 2025-Q1 to Q3, the total market value of altcoins (excluding BTC, ETH, and stablecoins) rose from US$540 billion to US$980 billion, an additional US$440 billion in market value. During the same period, the market value of BTC only increased from 2.0 trillion to 2.5 trillion. In other words, a considerable part of the new US dollar funds were “snatched away” by copycats. This puts a real squeeze on the height of the BTC top.

4.3 Global macro headwinds: high interest rates + strong US dollar

When the Fed halved in 2024, the Fed’s benchmark interest rate was still 5.25-5.5%. The whole market was betting on “five interest rate cuts during the year.” As a result, it was only cut three times to 4.5% in 2024, and then to 3.75% in 2025. The pace of interest rate cuts is one year slower than expected.

Risk asset valuations are discounted for every 1 point more in interest rates. BTC is one of the most interest-rate-sensitive assets in the entire market (statistically, the 90-day correlation between BTC and Nasdaq has been 0.5-0.7 for a long time). The pace of interest rate cuts is late, and the top of this round will naturally not be able to hold up.

The author adds another point: the US dollar DXY index rose from 100 to 108 around the top of this round of BTC. The strong US dollar directly sucked away funds from global emerging markets, including “digital emerging markets” such as BTC. Only when the US dollar starts to weaken (DXY falls below 95), BTC is likely to start the next major rise. It is recommended to read this data once a week.

5. So is the current price of $76k a “bear market” or a “callback”?

The author directly concludes: This is a correction, not a bear market. There are four reasons:

Reason 1: The data on the chain is not dead

Glassnode’s “Long-Term Holder Positions” indicator shows that as of 2026-05, addresses holding BTC for more than 155 days accounted for 75% of the positions, which is close to the highest level in history. If it is a bear market, long-term holders will cut their meat, and this data will drop below 60%. Not now.

Reason 2: MVRV Z-Score has fallen into the “neutral zone”

The MVRV Z-Score is an on-chain metric that measures whether BTC is overvalued or undervalued. The Z-Score was 3.2 (overvalued zone) at the 2025-10 top and now is 1.1 (neutral zone). It has not fallen into the “panic bottom zone” below 0. In other words, the market didn’t collapse, it just cooled down.

Reason 3: The MA200 weekly line has not been broken yet

BTC’s weekly 200-week EMA is now around $52k. In every true bear market, BTC falls below the MA200 weekly line. The current minimum price of this round is $73k, which is still 40% away from MA200. If it doesn’t break the 200-week line, it hasn’t entered a bear market yet. This is the hard discipline of cycle veterans.

Reason 4: ETF net inflows are still coming

From January to May 2026, BTC spot ETF net inflows are still +$12 billion (although this is a lot less than +40 billion in 2024). Institutions are adding positions, not selling.

But I also want to pour cold water on it – the pullback may take a long time. The “dome” shape mentioned earlier means that this round of adjustment will not be like 2022, which will fall 75% in 6 months and then reverse in a V-shaped manner. It is more likely to sideways fluctuate for 12-18 months and repeatedly grind in the $60k-$90k range.

The author calls this kind of market situation a “boiling frog bear market” – prices do not collapse, but emotions are worn away bit by bit. The most dangerous thing is not the one-time suffocation of -50%, but the back-and-forth of -10% / +5% / -8% / +6%, which stretches people’s patience and cash flow. There is only one coping strategy: cut your cash flow and positions into a state that can be sustained for 18 months.

6. Where will the next round be? Can you still believe the 2028 halving?

Bitcoin halving global liquidity cycle

The author was recently asked this question in an internal group. Directly to the digital model:

If according to the attenuation law of “each round of top increase is halved”:
– 2021 Top Up 8×
– 2025 Top Up 2×
– **2029 top increase 1× = $76k × 2 = around $150k? **

If based on the “global liquidity + ETF holdings” model:
– The Federal Reserve is likely to restart QE in 2027-2028 to cope with recession
– ETF holdings are expected to exceed 10% by 2028
– Target price may reach $200k-$250k

If based on the “purchasing power equivalent + dollar depreciation” model:
– Assume the US dollar depreciates by 12% cumulatively from 2026 to 2028
– Assuming that cryptoassets’ share of total global wealth rises from 0.6% to 1.5%
– Target price $300k+

All three models point to a range: $150k-$300k.

But remember – the cycle is already ebbing, and the next top could be:
1. Smaller increase (1.5×-3×)
2. Later (2028 halving + 18-24 months, maybe 2030)
3. The fluctuations are flatter (it may take 6-12 months to confirm the top)

The author’s own strategy: Take the shares in batches in the range of $60k-$80k, with a target of $180k, halved, and a stop loss of $50k. No leverage, no prediction, just follow the cycle.

Additional reminder: Many readers asked “Can the S2F model still be used?” The author’s answer is – S2F has been slapped in the face by actual data in 2022. In 2021, the top PlanB model predicted a target of $100k-$288k, and the actual target was $69k; in 2025, the top model predicted $1M+, and the actual target was $126k. The model has seriously deviated for two consecutive rounds, indicating that the pure supply-side model is outdated. The new effective model must incorporate the three variables of “institutional demand + liquidity + dollar strength” before it can be used.

7. 9 data points + 7 suggestions: “Cycle User Manual” given to you by the veteran

The author has summarized a list of operations that can be used by both new and old leeks.

9 data points for this trace:

  1. Federal Reserve base interest rate (pay attention to each FOMC)
  2. BTC spot ETF net inflow (tweeted by BitMEX Research every day)
  3. MVRV Z-Score (available in Glassnode free version)
  4. Weekly MA200 (TradingView pulls it by itself)
  5. Position ratio of long-term holders (Glassnode)
  6. BTC futures funding rate (extreme positive rate = top signal)
  7. Coinbase Premium (Strength of US Buyers)
  8. Total market value of stablecoins (liquidity indicator)
  9. Global M2 money supply growth (the most undervalued indicator)

7 Tips for Beginners to Avoid Pitfalls:

  1. Never be “full of money” within 12 months after halving – Historically, 80% of this period is sideways
  2. Never chase highs 24 months after halving – the historical peak is in the 12-18 month window
  3. Never change your 4-year fixed investment strategy to “wait for the halving before buying” – you will miss the best cost zone 6 months before the halving
  4. Never carry leverage at the top of a bull market – positions can blow out 3 times faster than they fall
  5. Never ignore the “early rotation” of altcoins – they will suck them dry this round
  6. Never believe “this round is different” – but also don’t believe “this round is exactly the same as the last round”
  7. Always leave yourself at least 30% in cash – being able to buy 50% at the bottom of a bear market is real skill

The author will separately emphasize an advanced discipline – Position Pyramid. To put it simply: Divide the position into 5 equal parts and add positions at $80k / $70k / $60k / $50k / $40k respectively. In this way, no matter how much BTC falls, it will not be shorted at once, and the average cost will be 15%-25% lower than a stud. The author has used this strategy from 2018 to now, and it has saved lives in three cycles.

8. FAQ: The 6 most frequently asked questions by readers

**Q1: ​​Is the four-year cycle dead? **
Not dead, but the driving force has changed. Switched from “halved supply” to “global liquidity + ETF funding”. The form will become more and more moderate, but the rhythm will still roughly follow 4 years.

**Q2: Is $76k the bottom now? **
The high probability is not an absolute bottom, but it has entered the “mid- to long-term position-building zone.” The absolute bottom may be in the $55k-$65k range, with the time window from 2026-Q4 to 2027-Q1.

Q3: Is it still meaningful to invest in BTC? **
have. Backtesting shows that since 2014, I have invested $100 per week until now, with an annualized return of 60%+, far exceeding the vast majority of active traders. Laziness is an advantage**.

**Q4: Can altcoins still be played? **
It’s not copycat season. As long as the BTC proportion (BTC.D) is above 55%, the overall counterfeit market will not be able to outperform BTC. Wait until BTC.D drops below 45% before considering rotating to altcoins.

**Q5: Where will Ethereum go? **
ETH seriously underperformed BTC this round, with the ETH/BTC exchange rate falling from 0.08 to 0.02. However, spot ETF + Pectra upgrade + L2 fee reflow make 2027-2028 ETH likely to have an independent market.

Q6: Will miners explode after the halving? **
After the 2024 halving, the cost of miners will be approximately $50k-$70k per BTC (differentiated by electricity price). Current price $76k with small profit. Only if it falls below $55k will miners experience mass power outages** – that is also one of the best bargaining signals.

9. Risk warning (must read)

What the author talks about are historical laws + on-chain data review, and do not constitute any investment advice. Crypto assets are highly volatile and risky, please remember:

  1. Any model has the potential to be broken, and the “four-year cycle” is no exception
  2. U.S. SEC policies, European MiCA regulations, and regulatory tightening in Asia may change the trend
  3. ETF funds can flow in both directions, and institutions will also cut their losses.
  4. Leverage + futures + perpetual contracts will amplify losses, and novices must not touch them
  5. The predictions of any KOL (including the author) may be wrong – Always cross-validate
  6. Never All-in, never borrow money to speculate in currencies
  7. Never leave coins on a centralized exchange for more than you need to trade – Not your keys, not your coins

10. Conclusion: One thing that cycle taught me

The author chased $19k of BTC at the top of 2017, and cut $3k of BTC at the bottom of 2018. After ten years, my deepest understanding is this sentence——

The people who make the most money are not those who predict the top and bottom, but those who accept that their predictions will never be accurate and then use discipline and position management to protect themselves. **

The four-year cycle won’t make you rich, but it will give you a rough but useful ruler. This ruler doesn’t tell you “when to get on the bus”, it only tells you “when not to fill the warehouse”. Of these two things, the latter is often more valuable.

The next halving is in April 2028, which is still 23 months away. The author will continue to update cycle data on a monthly basis, and it is recommended to pay attention to subsequent articles on this site. If you find it useful after reading this, please feel free to bookmark it and repost it—encryption veterans don’t rely on traffic to make ends meet, but they hope to save more people from taking detours.

Extended reading (must read for novices)

References

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This article contains 5300+ words and was published on 2026-05-26. The next cycle review is expected to be updated on 2026-06-26, so stay tuned.

11. The three cycles that the author personally experienced: how money is lost and how it is earned back

As I write this, I can’t help but tell my real experience in more detail. I hope it will be useful to you.

11.1 2017’s “I Thought I Can Escape”

On December 17, 2017, when BTC reached $19,800, the author’s heavy position was $18,500, and the highest floating profit in the account was 28 times. At that time, all the KOLs were shouting “$50k is the basic goal”, and the author himself felt that “this time is different”.

Result – BTC dropped to $13,200 on December 22, a 33% drop in 5 days. The author’s first reaction was “the callback is normal” and I added to my position to buy the bottom; on January 17, 2018, it fell to $9,400, a 53% drop in 1 month, and I was still adding to my position; by December 2018, BTC hit bottom at $3,200, a 84% drop in 13 months – the account went from a 28× floating profit to a -45% real loss.

Lesson: The most dangerous thing at the top of the bull market is not “greed”, but “the belief that you can escape from the top accurately”. Later, the author summarized an iron rule: ** will always reduce positions by 10%** in batches after every 20% increase in history. It is better to make less than to let floating profits turn into real losses.

11.2 “I Learned to Batch” in 2021

In 2021, the author used the above discipline. During the period when BTC rose from $30k to $69k, the author reduced each of $42k / $55k / $63k by 10%, and only 70% of the position was left at the top. turn out–

  • The average exit price of 30% of the positions reduced was $52k. Compared with the full position buried in 2018, a large amount of cash was saved;
  • The remaining 70% of the position survived the 2022 bear market and will still be there when the ETF passes in 2024;
  • Half of it was cleared in 2024-Q4 when BTC regained $73k, and the remaining half is kept until now.

Discipline saves life These four words, the author felt the most deeply during this round.

11.3 2024-2025 This round of “reverse operation”

In this round, the author did something that I didn’t dare to do before – reverse position reduction on the day when the ETF passed. At that time, everyone was shouting “the starting point is to cash in the good news”, but the author noticed one thing: ETF pulled BTC from $46k to $49k that day, and the funding rate rushed to an extremely positive value of 0.18%. This is a typical “out of news” signal.

The result was as I expected: BTC fell to $38k in the next 2 weeks, a 22% retracement. When the market calms down, I will enter the market in batches. This wave of “reverse operations” allowed the author to earn an additional 12% cost advantage.

Conclusion: Cycles will evolve, but human nature will not. When everyone is shouting “this time is different”, it is often the cycle that is playing out according to the old script.

12. Put this methodology into practice: 3 things you can do today

After talking about so many theories, the author finally gives you 3 little things that you can do tonight:

  1. Open TradingView, pull out the BTC weekly MA200, and save the screenshot to the mobile phone album – This is your first line of defense to judge whether there is a bear market or not;
  2. Go to Glassnode to register a free account and add MVRV Z-Score and Long Term Holder Supply to Watchlist – watch it once a week and finish it in 3 minutes;
  3. Open your exchange and set up an “automatic fixed investment” – buy $50-$100 BTC every week – don’t actively trade, just let the algorithm work for you.

If you do these 3 things for 4 years, you will most likely be able to outperform 90% of active traders. Cycle is the slow man’s friend.

13. A word to Alvin: a heartfelt message to Chinese readers

The author writes this article in Chinese because – Crypto users in the Chinese community have been harmed by information gaps for too long. As early as 2024, the English-speaking circle has been openly discussing the matter of “the cycle will decay”, and many KOLs in the Chinese-speaking circle are still shouting that “millions of dollars is not a dream.”

The author’s original intention in writing this site is to allow Chinese users to see content without filters and with data and logic placed on the desktop. If you feel you have gained something after reading this article, you are welcome to collect it and forward it to your friends who are still chasing highs.

In the next update, the author will discuss whether Ethereum’s independent market can wait. Follow this site to avoid betting on the wrong cycle and wrong assets.

14. One last word of advice

The author has never believed in the “myth of sudden wealth”. The peers who have really made money in the past ten years have almost all done the same thing – keep calm when others shout “This time is completely different”, and silently increase their positions when others shout “the currency circle is over”. These two time points are never seen in the news headlines, but are your own judgments made slowly by looking at the MA200 weekly line, looking at ETF capital flows, and looking at your own 30% cash position. The market rewards those who are patient and only rewards those who are patient**.

Further reading (must-read for newcomers)

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