Bitcoin: bull-bear market cycle at a low?

On CryptoQuant, there is a metric called the Bull-Bear Market Cycle Indicator. 

This is an indicator that measures the momentum of Bitcoin’s bull/bear market cycle.

Technically, it is calculated as the difference between the P&L index and its 365-day moving average.

In turn, the P&L index of CryptoQuant uses the MVRV ratio, NUPL, and LTH/STH SOPR to create a single price valuation indicator for Bitcoin.

The P&L index measures whether the price of Bitcoin at a given moment is overvalued, neutral, or undervalued, while the Bull-Bear Market Cycle Indicator assesses whether it is currently within a bull cycle or a bear cycle. 

The P&L Index

Until early October 2025, the P&L index of CryptoQuant was in positive territory. 

This is an index that has historically fluctuated between -3.2 points and +1.6 points, but throughout 2025 it never managed to rise above 1.2. 

During the previous bull runs, however, it had reached a peak above 1.6 points in November 2023, and one above 1.4 points in December 2017. 

In 2021, it had managed to briefly surpass 1.3 points, but throughout 2025, it never managed to exceed the 1 mark. 

Practically since March 2021, it hasn’t exceeded 1.2 points, which CryptoQuant considers the threshold beyond which it can be deemed overvalued. To be honest, this threshold seems set a bit too low, so much so that during 2025 it barely managed to surpass 0.9 points. 

It is worth noting, however, that in November 2022 it fell below -1.8 points, although the historical low was reached in 2015 at -3.2.

At the beginning of February this year, it dropped to -0.8, which is a low level but not extremely low, while now it is still in negative territory (-0.5) but, to be honest, not very low. According to CryptoQuant, therefore, the current price of BTC should not be considered undervalued. 

The Bull-Bear Market Cycle Indicator

The real news is that the current value of CryptoQuant’s Bull-Bear Market Cycle Indicator is at its lowest since the FTX bottom of 2022. 

In fact, the current level of the P&L index is below -0.5, while its 365-day moving average is approximately +0.4.

Since the Bull-Bear Market Cycle Indicator measures the difference between the P&L index and its 365-day moving average, it is currently very low, below -0.9 points. In fact, on February 5th, it reached a local low of -1.2 points, aligning with the minimum peak recorded in March 2020 at the onset of the pandemic.

To be honest, though, in 2022 the lowest point was reached at nearly -2 points, which is significantly lower than where it is now. However, not only had it never fallen below -0.8 since January 2023, but until November 2025, it had never dropped below -0.3.

Therefore, the current situation is not similar to that of November 2022, but it is still decidedly negative. In fact, it closely resembles the early months of 2022, before the May crash caused by the implosion of the Terra-Luna crypto ecosystem. 

The Forecasts

In theory, this indicator is not used for making predictions. 

However, the comparison with the past indeed suggests similarities with that 2022, which was the last year of a major bear-market for Bitcoin’s price. 

That said, from this perspective, 2025 does not seem at all similar to 2021.

In 2020, this index returned to positive in May, then surged in July, corrected slightly in September, and surged again in October. The peak was reached in January 2021, and it remained at high levels until April. 

It fell below zero in May, then climbed back above zero in October, and dropped below again in November. 

This time, however, during 2025, it was above zero for only a few months and never exceeded 0.3 points. 

Furthermore, it had already returned above zero in January 2023, remaining there uninterruptedly until August 2024. 

In other words, although the early months of 2026 resemble the early months of 2022, 2025 appears very different from 2021, just as 2024 was very different from 2020 and 2023 from 2019. 

This chart clearly shows us how it cannot be used to project past performance into the future, as it often ends up behaving differently. 

The bear market

What is certain, however, is that the price of Bitcoin is currently in a bear market. 

What remains entirely unclear is how long this bear-market will last, and how far the price will go. 

In the past, major bear markets have always lasted at least 12 months, but there’s no guarantee that history will repeat itself. Just as 2025 was different from 2021, and 2021 was different from 2017, there’s no reason to assume that 2026 will necessarily resemble 2022 or 2018. 

In fact, since 2023, the cycle seems to be progressing ahead of schedule, in some cases even by several months. 

In theory, therefore, it cannot be completely ruled out that in this February 2026 local lows similar to those of May or June 2022 may have been reached, even though in the second half of that year a further decline occurred.