- The 2024 Bitcoin halving takes place in almost exactly two years time
- The last three halving halfway points have resulted in months-long price depressions
- Will lengthening cycles make this time different?
The 2024 Bitcoin halving is projected to take place almost exactly two years today, making this the halving halfway point. This may seem like a time for celebration, but history tells us to be very wary – the last three halving halfway points have all precipitated months-long price collapses of between 33% and 67%. However, lengthening cycles may mean that this halving halfway spell can finally be broken.
History Holds a Halving Halfway Horror Story
Bitcoin’s halving takes place every four years and sees the amount of bitcoin awarded to miners for each block reduced by 50%. The first Bitcoin halving took place on November 28, 2012, with the halfway point following its launch date of January 3, 2009 being in June 2010. While we don’t have particularly accurate price action for those early days, what we do know is that Bitcoin spiked to $0.09 around this time before dropping 33% to $0.06 by October, an event that shook many out of the market before the start of the 2011 rally.
The next halving halfway points we can chart:
July 2014 was the halfway point between the 2012 and the 2016 halvings, a marker which came in the wake of the 2013 Bitcoin rally and precipitated a bear market, leading to a 67% drop in Bitcoin’s price during the following months. This shakeout led to the start of the 2016-2017 bull market.
The next halving halfway point came in May 2018 as Bitcoin was trying to recover the highs of its 2017 bull run. As the halving halfway point passed it instead set in a lower high, putting a lid on the bull market and setting up another similar sized drop, this time 65%, over the rest of 2018 and beyond.
What this data tells us is that, historically, Bitcoin always falls after a halving halfway point, a shakeout that precipitates the next rally. So why would things be any different this time?
Lengthening Cycles May Banish the Curse
The reason why the Bitcoin halving halfway curse may finally be lifted is due to the lengthening cycles theory. Before now, Bitcoin’s cycles have matched the four-year halving-to-halving cycle, with the market cap being small enough to fit in with this natural pattern. However, with Bitcoin’s market cap now being close to a trillion dollars it takes much more money to move the market, meaning that cycles will take longer to play out while the volatility will also reduce over time.
This means that the market doesn’t top and bottom out as quickly as it used to – the whole thing is essentially strung out over a longer period of time. In the past, a halfway halving has come off the back of a parabolic top out, but this is not the case this time round – that happened in April 2021, since when Bitcoin has fluctuated and found strong support in the $30,000-$33,000 region, which has been tested three times since early 2021 and held each time.
Hope For Bitcoin Bulls
Bitcoin has already experienced two 50%+ corrections since its April 2021 high and not collapsed, suggesting that a bear market is not imminent, backed up by the fact that it has just regained a key level of support.
Let’s hope that the Bitcoin halfway halving curse doesn’t return to bite Bitcoin bulls on the behind and start another months-long correction.
