While traders were sleeping—or re-watching the Game 7 thriller, depending on the time zone—Bitcoin quietly slipped into what Julio Moreno at CryptoQuant calls a “soft patch.” The phrase sounds harmless, but the numbers scream otherwise.
Here's What Actually Happened
On May 21, on-chain data showed apparent demand for BTC peaking at 228,000 coins per day. Fast-forward a month: that figure has halved to roughly 118,000 BTC. Moreno, who rarely uses alarmist language, put it bluntly in today’s note: “If this persists, prices could revisit $92,000 before fresh buyers step in.”
I’ve noticed a lot of traders on X (still getting used to not calling it Twitter) brushing this off as summer doldrums. Personally, I’m not so sure. The drop in demand isn’t just a holiday lull—it’s accompanied by falling stablecoin inflows, thinner order books on Binance, and a spike in dormancy metrics. Those are the ingredients for a nasty short-term retrace, at least in my experience following Bitcoin since 2013.
Numbers That Jumped Off the Screen
- Apparent demand down 48.2% month-over-month.
- Exchange netflows flipped positive: +31,600 BTC over the last seven days, signaling more coins are heading to sell-side wallets.
- Coinbase Premium Index turned negative for the first time since late April—U.S. desk buyers are stepping back.
- Realized cap drawdown at –6%, the biggest pullback since February’s pre-ETF jitters.
Zooming out, the charts look like that heart-stopping moment on a roller coaster right before the plunge. Maybe we turn up again, but nobody wants to be the one screaming hands up when the ride stalls halfway.
Why This Matters for Your Portfolio
If you’re leveraged, you’ve probably already felt the squeeze: perpetual funding rates have gone from 0.048% to 0.009% in 48 hours. In plain English, longs are scrambling to exit. I think this is where disciplined spot buyers quietly set limit orders between $92k and $95k—the 0.382 fib from the $73k to $115k stretch.
One tangential thought: remember when everyone mocked MicroStrategy for buying the April dip at $98,500? If Moreno’s downside target prints, Saylor will be underwater on that tranche. I’m curious to see whether he doubles down or blames “temporary volatility.” History suggests the former.
Voices From the Trenches
“Demand deterioration at this speed is rare in bull cycles. Either inflows bounce fast or we break the 100k psychological level.” —Julio Moreno, CryptoQuant
Meanwhile, analyst Will Woo argued in a Spaces chat that derivatives positioning is clean: “I don’t see cascading liquidations, so $92k feels extreme.” To be fair, Woo sounded less convinced than usual—he admitted the dormancy spike surprised him.
Stuff That Still Confuses Me
Why hasn’t the sovereign bid we heard about after the Hong Kong ETF approvals shown up on-chain? If it’s real money, it’s awfully quiet. Also, ETF inflows were supposed to decouple price from on-chain demand. Yet BlackRock’s IBIT saw its third straight outflow day yesterday. Maybe TradFi tourists are flightier than we hoped.
What I’m Watching Next
1. June 28: The CME quarterly futures roll. If open interest collapses, buckle up.
2. July 4 weekend: Low-liquidity holiday sessions love to spring traps.
3. $106,500: The 100-day moving average. A clean break there usually drags algos into full risk-off mode.
Let’s Zoom Out for a Second
Even if we tag $92k, that’s a 25% pullback from May’s high—well within normal bull-market corrections. Back in 2017, we saw 38% drawdowns four times before the final melt-up. But I get it; nobody wants to tweet “just another healthy correction” if their liquidation price is $95k.
One Last Thought Before I Grab More Coffee
I keep coming back to sentiment. Fear & Greed was a frothy 89 three weeks ago; it’s 72 now. That’s still greedy. In past cycles, true bottoms often arrived sub-40. So, while I’m not rooting for pain, I’m keeping dry powder ready. I’d rather buy panic than FOMO at $130k because TikTok told me so.
Stay nimble out there—this story is still unfolding.
