When Bitcoin (BTC) finally escaped from its channel pattern and secured a multiple-day close above the $77,000 resistance, traders rejoiced and declared the downtrend over.
Fast-forward to the present and BTC has fallen below multiple support levels and appears at risk of retesting $70,000, a 16% decline from its range highs.
While billion-dollar spot BTC ETF outflows, resumption of combat between the US and Iran, concerns over rising inflation and growing fear that the CLARITY Act will not pass in the Senate are all factors in Bitcoin’s crumbling strength, the real question is whether spot and futures demand will kick in and stem the price decline.
Since falling below $75,000 in February 2026, the level has served as an important support/resistance level. With $60,000 agreed upon by analysts as the cycle bottom for BTC, longer-term leverage was built around the $70,000 to $75,000 zone, and much of that is being cleared out this week.
Liquidation heatmap data from Hyblock highlighted this dynamic, and in a post on X, the analysts said,
“On the higher lookback (1 month of liquidity), we continue stairwelling down, taking another large long liq cluster.”
BTC/USDT one-month liquidation heatmap data. Source: Hyblock
While revisiting the lower boundaries of Bitcoin’s 2026 range is far from ideal for bulls, a silver lining has emerged. As BTC fell below $73,000 on Thursday, the BTC/USDT bid-ask ratio metric at Hyblock printed candles above zero, a first since April 12.
Set to 10% order-book depth, the bid-ask ratio at 0.03 shows bids becoming dominant in order books as BTC price dropped below $73,000, an early indication that traders are buying in spot markets.
At the same time, the true retail longs-and-shorts accounts metric, which shows the percentage of retail futures accounts holding long positions, has risen above 64%.
BTC one-hour chart showing bid-ask ratio and retail longs/shorts accounts. Source: Hyblock
According to Hyblock analysts,
“If you long every single 15m candle that had true retail accounts long percentage above 64% (the current value), then 927 out of 1,056 (88%) of those candles results in positive 7d forward returns.”
Bitcoin forward returns data based on true retail accounts. Source: Hyblock
The data suggest that despite the negative sentiment surrounding negative news flow, the spot ETF dynamics and fragile geopolitics, the retail investor cohorts within the spot markets view the current pricing as discounted.
Related: Bitcoin funding spike shows longs defending $70K: Will ETF outflows reverse bulls’ efforts?
A similar view is displayed by the spot and futures aggregate cumulative volume data at Binance where “dip buyers” are seen generating $185.58 million and $62.8 million in volume over the last 10 hours.
BTC/USDT one-hour chart spot and futures cumulative volume delta. Source: TRDR.io
