CryptoQuant said in a Monday research report that Bitcoin’s 100-day NUPL average has not yet fallen to the levels seen at prior bear market lows. NUPL tracks whether circulating BTC supply is sitting in unrealized profit or loss based on the last transaction price of each coin. The report put the current NUPL reading at 0.158, a level not seen since the start of 2023.
The 100-day average is moving toward a critical zone
TheChessOnChain, a contributor to the research, said NUPL becomes one of the clearer on-chain cycle signals when smoothed with 30-day and 100-day exponential moving averages. The chart attached to the report showed the 100-day NUPL average slowly approaching the sub-zero regions that have lined up with cycle bottoms in the past. According to the analysis, every time the 100-day NUPL average dropped below zero, Bitcoin formed a cycle low, including at the end of 2011, early 2015, through the 2018 bear market, and after the FTX collapse in 2022.
Past lows shared the same zero-line break
CryptoQuant compared those periods with the approximate bottom prices seen in each cycle: around $2 at the end of 2011, $182 in January 2015, $3,206 in December 2018, and $15,792 after the FTX crisis in November 2022. In each case, the 100-day NUPL EMA was below zero. By contrast, with Bitcoin trading just above $60,000, the 100-day NUPL average now stands at 0.215, leaving room for the metric to decline toward areas that matched earlier bear market bottoms.
Zero remains important, but not a fixed rule
CryptoQuant also said the pattern should not be treated as a strict requirement. Over Bitcoin’s history, NUPL has built progressively higher lows, which means the metric may not need to move below zero again to mark a bottom. The report described the previous four zero-line crossings as a recurring pattern rather than a hard rule. It added that the zero line will be a key level to watch in the coming weeks, while saying no exact timeframe can be assigned to the next bottom at this stage.
Supply data still points to an unfinished process
Axel Adler Jr., another CryptoQuant analyst, said short- and medium-term supply data still paint a cautious picture. He noted that the amount of supply held at a loss remains about two months away from the levels usually seen near the end of earlier Bitcoin bear markets. On that basis, Adler said it is more accurate to describe the capitulation process as ongoing, not completed.