Bitcoin closes four consecutive months red as stocks and gold markets reprice liquidity, rate outlook: analysts

Bitcoin (BTC) has extended its January selloff, slipping to around $77,800 on Monday, as a broad repricing of global liquidity has rippled across crypto, equities, and precious metals, erasing the defensive bid that had supported so-called safe havens earlier in the year.

The latest leg lower has unfolded alongside accelerating institutional withdrawals, analysts said. Global crypto investment products recorded another $1.7 billion in weekly outflows, according to CoinShares, following $1.6 billion in net ETF redemptions over January — one of the worst monthly runs on record.

Bitcoin has now closed four consecutive red months for the first time since 2018, while January marked its weakest start to a year since 2022, per CoinGlass data.

Reset and repricing

Amid the pullback, market observers have increasingly pointed to a macro reset rather than crypto-specific stress.

Timothy Misir, head of research at BRN, said the final week of January delivered a "decisive risk-off reset" across global markets after the nomination of Kevin Warsh as the next Federal Reserve chair and a hotter-than-expected U.S. producer price index print. He added that the shift triggered a swift repricing of expectations surrounding financial conditions, amplified in crypto by ETF redemptions, miner distribution, and synchronized de-risking across asset classes.

Expanding on that move, Misir opined that this reassessment has not been confined to digital assets. He noted that gold fell nearly 7% from its late-January peak, while silver suffered a steep drawdown from highs as investors digested the outlook for U.S. monetary policy and dollar liquidity.

QCP Capital also stated the risk-off move has spilled into traditional safe havens, with precious metals retracing sharply as higher margin requirements accelerated the unwinding of leveraged futures positions.

A similar cross-asset signal emerged from Wall Street. Analysts at JPMorgan said bitcoin futures are now oversold following the recent washout, while silver has flipped from overbought territory after its sharp reversal. The bank argued that the divergence reflects a broader liquidation of leveraged positioning across macro-sensitive assets, even as it reiterated a long-term bullish outlook for gold, forecasting prices could reach $8,500 over time.

Derivatives

Meanwhile, crypto has so far absorbed the impact with particular force.

According to The Block's price page, Bitcoin briefly touched lows near $74,500 earlier this week, representing a drawdown of more than 20% from its mid-January peak. Spot bitcoin ETFs logged $1.49 billion in weekly outflows, while ether-linked funds lost $327 million, producing an all-red week across major crypto ETFs.

Derivatives markets have also amplified the move. Samer Hasn, senior market analyst at XS.com, declared that futures open interest has declined sharply as speculative participants stepped back amid broader market uncertainty.

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Hasn cited CoinGlass data showing total crypto futures open interest falling to about $109 billion, roughly 53% below its all-time high, while bitcoin futures open interest dropped to around $52 billion, about 44% off its peak. The Block's data shows an ever deeper drop, with aggregated open interest in BTC futures below $33 billion.

He added that the downturn coincided with the largest long liquidation wave since October, totaling about $5 billion over the past six days, including roughly $1.7 billion in bitcoin futures alone.

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Under the hood

Onchain indicators have weakened as well. Misir said bitcoin is trading below several short-term cost-basis measures, pushing many recent buyers underwater and increasing capitulation risk. At the same time, miners have continued to send coins to exchanges, adding structural sell pressure during a period of declining liquidity.

The selloff has also left a technical imprint on futures markets. Bitcoin opened the week with a large downside gap in CME Bitcoin futures — one of the largest on record — leaving a broad unfilled zone between roughly $78,000 and $84,000–$84,560 that traders are now watching closely as a potential price magnet during reflexive rebounds. Crypto majors like Ether and other altcoins have followed BTC's footsteps, dropping to multi-month lows as the total digital asset market retreated to $2.7 trillion.

"When it comes to future projections, it's worth noting that the current drawdown marks a 40% drop from Bitcoin’s all-time high of around $126,000, which is far from extreme by historical terms," said investment analyst Nic Puckrin, co-founder of Coin Bureau. "In the previous cycles, Bitcoin has dropped between 72% and 84% from peak to trough. However, with BTC’s volatility declining, we may well not see as deep a correction in this cycle."

Still, some analysts caution against extrapolating short-term stress too far forward. Hasn said large holders appear to be accumulating into the selloff, citing BGeometrics data showing the number of addresses holding between 1,000 and 10,000 bitcoin rising toward recent highs — a divergence from previous drawdowns.

Looking further out, Bernstein analysts argued that the current downturn resembles a short-term bear phase rather than the start of a prolonged crypto winter. Bernstein expects the cycle to reverse later in 2026, with bitcoin potentially bottoming in the $60,000 range once forced selling clears and macro conditions stabilize.

For now, however, markets remain in reset mode — with liquidity, rather than narratives, back in control, according to BRN's Misir.