Bitcoin’s bull market: A slowdown, not a breakdown

What’s lost throttle — the three demand engines

If Bitcoin were a road trip, a lot of passengers who’d been furiously gassing it up have eased off the pedal. For months the rally felt like it had an automatic accelerator: huge purchases via spot ETFs, a growing pile of stablecoins parked and waiting, and traders piling on leverage in futures. Lately those three fuel tanks have stopped filling the same way.

First up: ETFs. Since they showed up, spot Bitcoin ETFs sucked in enormous sums from advisers, funds and retail accounts. That steady inflow acted like a mattress under price. Recently, though, that weekly rhythm broke — there have been days of meaningful redemptions and some funds that used to be nonstop buyers flipped to net sellers. The big picture still shows lots of cumulative buying, but the marginal money — the new cash that kept propping up rallies — has thinned out.

Next: stablecoins. These are the crypto world’s ready cash, the quick-deploy dollars that often fuel sudden rallies. Their supply grew alongside Bitcoin’s ascent, but growth has stalled and even dipped a bit. Some of that is people pulling funds off exchanges or rotating into safer stuff like bonds. Bottom line: the pool of instant-buying power on exchanges isn’t expanding like it was.

Finally, derivatives and leverage. Funding rates on perpetuals and the premium on regulated futures used to signal eager leveraged buyers. Those gauges have cooled — funding has swung neutral-to-negative at times, futures premia have compressed, and overall open interest is lower than during the peak. In plain English: leveraged longs who used to crank the rocket boosters have been clipped or are hiding out on the sidelines.

What it means for price and the bull market

Does all of that mean Bitcoin’s bull run just died? Not remotely. It means the automatic escalator that made rallies feel inevitable has stopped running so smoothly. Instead of one giant, predictable bid under price, you get a patchwork of buyers: some long-term holders taking profits, some smaller wallets quietly accumulating, and occasional retail buying on sharp dip days.

That mix makes moves choppier and slower. When leverage is scarce, you don’t get those sudden, vertical melt-ups — and you also avoid hair-raising crash sequences caused by cascading liquidations. So expect more grinding rallies, jumpy pullbacks, and fewer headline-grabbing one-day explosions.

Importantly, this is a normal part of market cycles. Big inflows push things high, then flows cool and the market “resets” while new buyers step in at lower prices. The core structural case for Bitcoin — fixed supply and more institutional places to park it — hasn’t vanished. What changed is the path: less autopilot buying, more selective, patience-rewarding accumulation.

In short: the engines are sputtering in places, some are even reversing, but the machine isn’t broken. Traders who expect the easy mode to return overnight may be disappointed. Investors who can tolerate noise and sit through slower, choppier advances might still come out fine. Either way, buckle up — it’s likely to be a bumpier, more tactical ride from here.