Bitcoin could be entering the latter stages of the bear market, with downside momentum beginning to slow down, according to Real Vision chief crypto analyst Jamie Coutts.
“I think we’re getting through most of the bear market action. It’s still not over, clearly. But you know, I think we’re approaching at least the second half,” Coutts said during an interview on Cointelegraph’s Trade Secrets.
Coutts described Bitcoin’s current price action as a “typical garden-variety bear market,” with BTC trading around the $63,000 mark, roughly 50% below its October 2025 all-time high of $126,100.
He noted that Bitcoin’s volatility has declined by about 50% compared with the previous market cycle, suggesting the current downturn may be less severe than previous bear markets.
Bitcoin is up 4.45% over the past 30 days. (CoinMarketCap)
However, Coutts warned that markets rarely follow historical patterns so neatly. “They just sort of do their own thing. And at the moment, all the trend indicators are obviously bearish,” Coutts said.
On the bright sides, Coutts said he is beginning to see early technical signs that selling pressure is easing.
“I’m starting to see a bullish divergence appear on the longer time frames on momentum. So that’s just telling me that the acceleration, or should I say, the negative momentum is decelerating, but that doesn’t mean that we’re out of this bear market from a technical perspective at all,” Coutts said.
While many market participants blamed Bitcoin’s fourth-quarter downturn on tightening global liquidity conditions, Coutts said that weakening onchain fundamentals also played a significant part.
“So onchain demand, which definitely drives price and is somewhat correlated to things like global liquidity and the business cycle, they started to deteriorate as well.”
Related: Bitcoin ETFs end ‘most overwhelming’ $2.7B sell-off amid new $85M net outflow
Jamie Coutts is skeptical of Bitcoin reaching $1 million by 2030
Coutts was cautious when asked whether he agreed with long range forecasts from Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong and ARK Invest CEO Cathie Wood that Bitcoin could reach $1 million by 2030.
“The models that I was working with did have about a million by 2032, 2033. It’s just a function of like how much money printing is gonna be required between now and then,” he said.
“I’m more comfortable with a forecast in the next sort of two to three years that Bitcoin should get to sort of $200,000 to 250,000,” he said. Outside of that timeframe, he added, it is “very hard to say.”
“I think it’s gonna be interesting what AI brings to the equation, as you know, we see more wallets spun up for agents, and what are they gonna essentially store their value in? Are they gonna make the same decisions as what humans have?” he said.
On longer term risks to Bitcoin’s valuation, Coutts said the community will need to take more decisive action by 2027 to address the potential threat posed by quantum computing.
“If there isn’t really firm movement on this, this will become an increasingly talked-about issue for the network because as much as everything is under risk from quantum, Bitcoin is a decentralized network. It’s going to take five years for it to actually implement a major protocol upgrade.”
Coutts said Bitcoin developers who dismiss concerns over quantum computing’s potential threat to the network are on the “wrong side of this.”
Features: Bitcoin’s quantum dilemma — Bigger blocks or STARK proofs?