Here’s how 592K BTC could deepen Bitcoin’s bear market

Key Takeaways

Is Bitcoin’s 2025 rally over?

Mid-Q4, Bitcoin has lost momentum, with November erasing most quarterly gains and nearly 99% of short-term holders underwater.

What’s the near-term risk for Bitcoin?

With 592k BTC at risk and weakening bid support, fear is dominating sentiment, setting the stage for a deeper Q4 correction.

Has Bitcoin’s [BTC] 2025 rally fallen apart?

Midway through Q4, and BTC is having its weakest fourth quarter since 2018, with a 15.13% net loss. What’s more, 74% of that drawdown came in November, making it the second-worst month of 2025 after February.

So in terms of returns, BTC has clearly lost momentum. November basically wiped out most of the quarter’s earlier gains, leaving HODLers underwater. Against this backdrop, is “greed” set to override “FOMO” for the rest of Q4?

Bitcoin sits at a major FOMO-Greed inflection point

Bitcoin is signaling a clear shift toward a bear market structure. 

From a technical standpoint, since topping out at $126k in early October, BTC has printed four lower lows, and every attempt to flip resistance into support has failed, triggering repeated long-side liquidity sweeps.

The latest breakdown came as BTC lost the $98k floor. For context, following a 5.2% drop on the 14th of November, Bitcoin slid back to early-May levels, leaving nearly 99% of STHs sitting on unrealized losses.

Source: Glassnode

In short, Bitcoin’s capitulation risk is far from over. 

As it stands, BTC has wiped out all of its prior cycle gains, November has cemented itself as the second-worst month of 2025, and 99% of STHs are now underwater, leaving the cohort increasingly exposed to forced selling. 

Against that backdrop, a shift back toward FOMO is critical. However, the question now is whether broader market sentiment will pivot in that direction, or whether greed will instead trigger quick exits into stop losses.

Bearish signals mount as HODLer incentives erode

Bearish signals are stacking up, eroding the incentive to HODL Bitcoin.

For starters, big money isn’t treating this “dip” as an opportunity yet. Nearly $3 billion has flowed out of BTC ETFs this month alone, with over 50% of that coming in the past three days.

As a result, this is showing up in sentiment as well. On the Fear & Greed Index, a 6-point drop in the last 24 hours has pushed the index into “extreme fear” for the first time in more than seven months.

Source: CoinMarketCap

In short, the incentive for STHs to hold and avoid capitulation is fading.

Looking at the data, Bitcoin’s UTXO Realized Price Distribution (URPD) shows the largest supply stacked at $112k, accounting for 2.97% of BTC’s circulating supply. Importantly, this represents the exact cost basis of STHs.

From a technical angle, that’s 592k BTC at risk of being realized at a loss. In this context, with Bitcoin’s bid support weakening, extreme fear is likely to continue outweighing greed, paving the way for a deeper Q4 correction.