Take A Chill Pill: The Bitcoin January Dump Is Historically Normal, Analyst Says

Bitcoin has been on a wild downturn in the past week following a stellar November and a relatively good December, and while many crypto users are panicking over the "dump," an analyst explained that there's not much to be worried about.

Over the past years, the world's largest cryptocurrency by market cap has mostly repeated history. For instance, the digital coin largely followed the same pricing trends in the lead-up to the 2024 halving and the aftermath.

It isn't so different this time, said prominent crypto analyst Axel Bitblaze, indicating that crypto holders, especially newbies in the space, shouldn't take the price downtrend as a negative sign.

Based on History, It's a Normal Occurrence

"BTC dumping in January has historically a common occurrence in post-halving years," Axel Bitblaze wrote on X, along with a chart that showed how Bitcoin prices moved in January 2017 and January 2021.

He pointed out how, in January 2017, after the 2016 halving year, Bitcoin bled from $1,185 to $800. It had a similar movement in January 2021, after the 2020 halving year, when the digital currency had a significant plunge from $42,000 to $28,000.

Finally, in January of this year, the world's first decentralized cryptocurrency "dumped from $103,000 to $92,000."

"We all know what happened after the 2017 and 2021 dumps," he said, referring to the uptick price movement of Bitcoin after bleeding thousands both in the early months of 2017 and 2021.

To conclude his analysis, Axel Bitblaze pointed out that while he believes there won't be an "immediate reversal" to the Bitcoin downtrend, he expects a slow climb up in the coming weeks, "followed by alts taking the lead."

Alts or altcoins, are digital currencies beyond BTC that offer something useful, unlike memecoins which are usually just for fun and community engagement.

The analyst also noted that there's a possibility Bitcoin will plummet further to around $86,000 and $88,000, but it would be "just a normal bull cycle correction."

$BTC Begins Recovery

Meanwhile, Bitcoin has started a slow recovery, seemingly as Axel Bitblaze projected. It is up 0.7% in the day but remains down in the week, with a 6.6% decrease.

Based on CoinGecko's seven-day chart, the crypto asset is still down some $6,000 from its nearly $102,000 price in Jan. 7. On the other hand, the digital coin is outperforming some major altcoins in the past week, including Ethereum (13.9% down) and Solana (15% down).

It remains to be seen how Bitcoin will behave in the coming days and whether it will repeat history, but for analysts who have been observing BTC for more than a decade, U.S. President-elect Donald Trump ascending the White House throne will have a positive impact on the digital currency and the broader crypto market.