Author: Jason Jiang, OKG Research

Miners play an important role in the Bitcoin network, but due to the impact of the halving event and the calming of concepts such as glyphs and runes, as well as the substantial reduction in fees, the income situation of the mining community has not been optimistic recently, and the unit computing power income has reached the lowest level in history. OKLink data shows that in the past two months, the unit computing power income of the Bitcoin network has repeatedly fallen below $0.05, although there have been brief rebounds during this period, it has now fallen back to a relatively low point.

Due to the worsening income situation, many inefficient miners have been forced to choose to exit the market, leading to a significant decrease in Bitcoin computing power. OKLink data shows that in the past two months, the overall computing power of Bitcoin has decreased by 15% from its peak, and in the past week, it has been in a continuous decline.

At the same time as the decrease in computing power, the mining community has also increased its selling pressure recently, becoming one of the largest selling pressures in the market. IntoTheBlock data shows that since 2024, Bitcoin miners have sold over 50,000 Bitcoins, and the Bitcoin reserves held by miners have gradually decreased to the lowest level in history. Compared with the excessive leverage and long-term holding tendencies of miners in previous cycles, miners are now more focused on short-term gains. This may be related to the fact that with the restructuring of computing power, many listed companies have become important drivers of the scale and mainstream development of the mining industry.

The announcement of the compensation plan by the Mt.Gox trustee on June 24 also brought about huge expectations of selling pressure. This is not the first time that Mt.Gox has repaid its debts, but it is the first time that it has done so in the form of BTC and BCH. This means that after the compensation begins, a large amount of BTC and BCH will flow into the market. However, the author believes that the selling pressure caused by the Mt.Gox compensation will be less than expected. The reasons are as follows:

The final amount of Bitcoin expected to flow into the market as a result of this compensation is estimated to be far lower than 140,000, with Galaxy Digital's research director Alex Thorn estimating it to be only around 65,000;

The selling pressure after the compensation is completed will be dispersed, theoretically, creditors will not sell at the same time in the short term, plus the market has already absorbed some of the selling expectations brought about by Mt.Gox, so the final impact will not be as great as imagined;

More importantly, considering the current stage of the market, rational creditors may be more inclined to continue holding rather than selling immediately.

Regardless of whether it is the mining community or the selling pressure that may be brought about by the Mt.Gox compensation, we believe that the impact on the cryptocurrency market is short-term and limited. Experience over the past decade tells us that despite many challenges, as the most robust consensus in the cryptocurrency market, the Bitcoin ecosystem has always had strong market resilience and elasticity, so short-term selling pressure will not change the long-term trend, but will enhance the adaptability of the Bitcoin ecosystem to large-scale flows. Compared to short-term selling pressure, what should be more concerned about at present is the "bleak" situation of Bitcoin on-chain transactions and liquidity.

Although Bitcoin has performed poorly recently, it has still achieved a positive return of over 40% since the beginning of the year, far exceeding most assets in the traditional financial markets. However, after hitting a historic high in March, Bitcoin network transaction volume (left chart) has continued to decline. This is partly due to the decline in demand for transactions due to the waning popularity of glyphs, runes, and the like, and partly because there has been no strong demand for trading in the current price range, neither from short-term speculators nor long-term investors, and the on-chain turnover rate has remained at a low level.

The number of active addresses on the chain (right chart) has also seen a significant decline after March, with the current number of active addresses being less than 700,000, a decrease of over 30% from the peak in 2024, and almost the same as in the same period in 2018.

In addition to the sluggish on-chain transactions, the performance of Bitcoin spot ETFs has also been relatively weak recently. As the main channel for the cryptocurrency market to obtain external liquidity in the current cycle, Bitcoin spot ETFs are also an important carrier of the optimistic sentiment for the future. Previously, JPMorgan estimated that the net inflow of funds into the cryptocurrency market this year reached $12 billion, with Bitcoin spot ETFs accounting for about $16 billion.

However, since June, Bitcoin spot ETFs have seen net outflows for several days, with a cumulative outflow of nearly 20,000 Bitcoins from June 7 to the present (as of June 25), equivalent to approximately $1.228 billion at the current price. Such performance is unsatisfactory for investors, and the "quiet" handling of seized Bitcoins by the governments of Germany and the United States has further tightened the market's nerves.

Although the above data seems to indicate that Bitcoin has fallen into a "predicament," there are also many positive signs in the market.

One of the important characteristics of previous cycles reaching the top is that the proportion of short-term holders (holding for less than 155 days) significantly increases, even dominating the market. This is because in the process of reaching the top, long-term holders will gradually choose to exit for profit, leading to the control of the market by short-term investors and newcomers. However, according to OKLink data, the Bitcoin market is still dominated by long-term holders, with Bitcoin held for less than 6 months accounting for less than 20%, a proportion much lower than that of short-term holders near the top of previous cycles. This market structure dominated by long-term holders provides stable support for Bitcoin in the current range, and considering that nearly 80% of the circulating Bitcoin is in a profitable state, most investors are still in a favorable position, so theoretically, there will be no large-scale selling in the short term.

On the other hand, the Bitcoin reserves of exchanges also hit a new low in June. Although it is a low point, the state of low reserves on exchanges actually sends a clear signal that the selling pressure on Bitcoin is not actually high. At the same time, the low reserves on exchanges also indicate that the Bitcoin market is in a period of rapid accumulation, although we do not fully understand the group structure that is taking Bitcoin away from exchanges.

Of course, the progress of the U.S. Ethereum spot ETF is also worth paying attention to. Although the correlation between Bitcoin and Ethereum has decreased, it still remains above 0.8, which means that the mutual influence between the two is very obvious. If the Ethereum spot ETF can drive a rebound in Ethereum after it officially starts trading in early July, Bitcoin may also gain some upward momentum from it.

免责声明：本文章仅代表作者个人观点，不代表本平台的立场和观点。本文章仅供信息分享，不构成对任何人的任何投资建议。用户与作者之间的任何争议，与本平台无关。如网页中刊载的文章或图片涉及侵权，请提供相关的权利证明和身份证明发送邮件到support@aicoin.com，本平台相关工作人员将会进行核查。