Bitcoin (BTC) price is up 22% in a week and nearing another breakout, and this one looks more dangerous than the last.
That last breakout came on August 19 and ran on trapped bears. The setup now is the reverse, with crowded longs and supply stacked overhead.
Momentum Runs Ahead of Price as Bitcoin Stays Down in 2026
Between May 14 and August 25, Bitcoin price carved a lower high on the 12-hour chart. The Relative Strength Index (RSI), a momentum gauge that tracks how fast price rises or falls, made a higher high.
That mismatch is a hidden bearish divergence. It does not call a top. It warns the older downtrend may resume.
Volume backs it. Buying has thinned since Bitcoin cleared $70,000 on August 19, and RSI at 81.70 has slipped below its signal line at 83.83, while being in the overbought zone. All these signs point to a possible pullback and the resumption of the downtrend.
The downtrend in question is this year. Bitcoin opened 2026 near $87,650 and trades 9.8% lower today.
Momentum shows the crowd’s energy, not who is paying for it.
The Money Behind the Last Breakout Has Switched Sides
The August 19 breakout ran on bears getting squeezed. Shorts lost $2.74 billion in a day against $256.66 million in longs.
That fuel is spent. Over 24 hours Bitcoin liquidations flipped, longs losing $310.03 million against $60.77 million in shorts. BTC alone lost $133.73 million, over a third of the market total.
The crowd has not stepped back despite this flush. Bitcoin open interest, the total value of active futures bets, sits near $25.35 billion against the month’s $25.7 billion high.
The BTC funding rate, a fee paid between traders in perpetual futures, reads 0.000091%. Positive readings mean bulls are still paying to hold.
A rally with no shorts to squeeze needs real buyers, and the coins held above decide if it finds them.
A Supply Wall Sits Where the Rally Would Stall
Glassnode’s UTXO Realized Price Distribution (URPD), a metric mapping the price at which each circulating coin last moved, shows where those owners bought.
The way up is clear at first. The $82,045 bucket holds 83,800 BTC, or 0.42% of supply, so few sellers wait there.
Then the wall arrives. The $84,569 bucket holds roughly 549,200 BTC with the $83,300 band standing first. Both these buckets cover nearly 5% of supply.
Those owners sit near break even, so many may sell into strength. However, seven days of Bitcoin ETF inflows would have to absorb them. Regardless of the buying and selling, the BTC chart marks where that trap would spring.
How High Can Bitcoin Price Go?
Bitcoin price trades near $79,054 after peaking at $81,343 on August 25. The run and tight pause form a bullish pole and flag, a pattern where a rally rests before another push.
A 12 hour close above the 0.382 Fibonacci level at $80,070 breaks the flag. Clearing $81,343 and the 0.618 level at $81,449 confirms a fresh high.
Above that, $82,430 opens the way to $83,681 (the $83,000 zone), the extension landing inside the 5% supply wall highlighted earlier. Buyers chasing that far meet sellers with no shorts left beneath them.
Underneath, the 100 period Exponential Moving Average (EMA), a trend line weighted to recent prices, at $67,367 is closing on the 200 period EMA at $67,666. That crossover favors buyers.
The flag has not broken yet, so BTC support levels matter while it holds. A drop under $77,837 weakens the structure, and $75,545 damages it badly. A 12 hour close above $80,070 separates a run at $83,681 from a slide back toward $75,545.
Analyst’s View: The bearish case has an expiry date. Push above May’s high near $82,041 and the lower high disappears, and the divergence goes with it. That leaves a narrow band where the bears are already wrong and the buyers have not yet met the sellers above, the most awkward place this Bitcoin price rally could end.
Bitrue