Saying that the market is not performing that well nowadays would be an understatement. Bitcoin is painting its worst monthly candle, XRP is on the verge of reaching $1 and going into “hard reset” mode and Ethereum is hiding some bullish potential.
Bitcoin’s ugly candle
It is not hyperbole to say that Bitcoin’s monthly chart is displaying one of the ugliest candles it has seen in more than 10 years. After peaking above $130,000 just weeks ago, Bitcoin is now moving back toward the mid-$80,000s due to a single monthly bar that has the potential to erase almost the entire 2025 uptrend.
From a structural perspective, this type of candle compels long-term investors to take a step back and reevaluate whether this is a violent but brief shakeout, or if the market has already peaked for the cycle. The current drawdown’s magnitude speaks for itself: it has been uncommon, in the past, for a monthly candle at all-time-high levels to collapse by about 23%.
In the past, bull markets experienced significant monthly corrections, but typically after the parabola reached its full maturity. This time, Bitcoin just started to accelerate before momentum broke. That brings up an important point: going into Q4, Bitcoin might not have been as structurally sound as the narrative suggested.
Technically speaking, the candle is in danger of closing below the peak region from 2021, which served as support during the initial stage of the new cycle. The next significant support cluster, which is located between $70,000 and $72,000, where the 20-month EMA and the previous consolidation zone intersect, would be reached if that level were to be lost on a monthly basis, effectively ending two years of bullish progress. The actual line in the sand is approximately $60,000, below that.
Additionally, RSI is rolling over sharply from overheated levels on the monthly time frame, which usually indicates exhaustion rather than continuation. Additionally, volume is unsupportive, exhibiting a classic reversal signature of declining on the way up and exploding on the way down.
XRP ready
The charts do not allow for much sugarcoating, and the current market structure for XRP is disintegrating more quickly than most participants anticipated. Since the local top around $3.50, the asset has broken deeper into the descending channel that has been governing price action. At this channel’s upper boundary, every attempt at recovery has been thwarted, and the most recent decline indicates that sellers are still in complete control.
XRP is currently trading on the lower trendline of the declining channel, slightly above $2. This area has historically produced brief bounces by acting as a makeshift trampoline. However, over the past few months, it has not once stopped the general trend. In other words, support is important here, but it has not yet resulted in a significant change in the trend.
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Whether XRP can maintain this support long enough to prevent a decline toward the $1 hard reset level is the actual question. That figure is not arbitrary but is based on the chart’s structure. Prior to its explosive rallies in late 2024 and early 2025, XRP consolidated in the high-liquidity, psychologically significant $1-$1.20 region. The market almost always moves in that direction if the descending channel breaks decisively to the downside. Since $1 is the line that many long-term participants consider to be fair value during corrections, it is technically the point at which buyers become very aggressive.
The fact that volume on the recent declines is rising — never a bullish signal — is concerning. Instead of panic-selling, strong red candles with increasing volume usually signify conviction selling. That increases the likelihood of a deeper retrace. Additionally, momentum indicators do not yet display a bullish divergence, indicating that the market is not signaling the end of the downtrend.
But it is not a given that XRP will plummet to $1. We may witness another rebound toward the $2.40-$2.60 region if buyers defend the channel’s lower boundary once more. However, any bounce is merely a counter-trend move rather than a reversal, unless the price breaks out of the channel and reclaims the moving average overhead.
Ethereum not that bad?
Although Ethereum is selling off quickly, the market continues to overlook a structural fact: the asset’s overall trend strength has not truly disappeared. What we are witnessing is a discrepancy between the underlying recovery structure that has been developing for months and Ethereum’s sharp short-term downtrend — a split that frequently precedes significant reversals.
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ETH has clearly shown a bearish trend on the chart by breaking sharply below the 50-, 100- and 200-day moving averages. The market simply broke through the $3,000 support level without hesitation, momentum has vanished and volume spikes are almost entirely sell-side. From a purely trend-following perspective, the situation is unsightly. A staircase of diminishing confidence has resulted from the rejection of every rally attempt over the previous two months at progressively lower highs.
This is where the discrepancy arises, though: Ethereum’s price is declining, while its long-term structural fundamentals keep getting stronger, and this mismatch rarely lasts for very long. Staking is still in a sharp, continuous uptrend. More ETH than ever before is being locked away, which lowers the amount of liquidity available during a time of significant capitulation. Although speculative volume has vanished, organic usage is still comparatively stable, so network activity has not collapsed, as the chart might suggest.