The silent shift in the Bitcoin market: when the monetary revaluation calculation of ETFs replaces the halving cycle

Within a few months, Wall Street’s consensus on bitcoin has disintegrated. Tom Lee and other bullish analysts have revised their year-end estimates downward, shifting from targets of $250,000 to much more conservative ranges. This is not a simple forecast correction: it is a symptom of a deeper structural change in how the bitcoin market forms and moves.

The Narrative That Built the 2025 Enthusiasm

At the beginning of 2025, the market was experiencing an almost unanimous consensus. The SEC-approved spot bitcoin ETFs in 2024—particularly BlackRock’s IBIT fund—represented a historic step toward mainstream adoption. The numbers were impressive: one of the best product debuts in the thirty-year history of the ETF sector.

From the institutional side, the arguments seemed solid. Tom Lee highlighted institutional allocation as the new driver of demand. Cathie Wood and her team focused on structural deflation and an unexplored valuation space. The 2024 halving had reduced the issuance of new coins, and the four-year cycle appeared as active as ever. The $200,000 target was not fringe speculation but an almost universally shared goal.

The Reality That Betrayed the Calculations

Bitcoin in 2025 did something unexpected: it rose, but in a confusing way. It reached new temporary highs of (122,000 dollars in July), but every rebound was halted by increasing volatility and repeated retracements. By year’s end, the price fluctuates around $90,220, far from the optimistic early estimates.

What is even more unsettling than the price is the sentiment. The Fear & Greed index hit 16 points—the lowest level since the 2020 pandemic. The gap between the actual price and the market’s emotional state reveals a deep internal fracture: something in the fundamentals has changed, but no one yet knows how to price it.

The New Driver: Institutions, Not Miners

This is the critical point. The traditional theory of the four-year halving cycle was based on a simple mechanic: less supply = less selling pressure = higher price. In 2025, this logic proved obsolete.

The numbers speak clearly. After the 2024 halving, the daily bitcoin issuance is about 450 units, worth roughly $40 million. Meanwhile, weekly ETF flows often exceed $1-3 billion. Institutional purchases in 2025 have reached approximately 944,330 bitcoins, while miners produced only 127,622 new coins: the volume bought by institutions is 7.4 times the new supply.

The monetary revaluation calculation of the market has shifted. The focus is no longer on miner production but on the average cost basis of ETFs. Currently, holders of US spot ETFs have an average cost of about $84,000. This level has become the new psychological anchor for the price.

The Biannual Cycle of Institutions: The New Market Rhythm

This structural change has generated a new cycle: no longer four-year but biennial. The engine is not the mining economy but management psychology and performance evaluation cycles.

Professional fund managers assess results over 1-2 year horizons. On December 31, performance fees are settled. This creates a specific behavioral incentive: if a manager does not have enough “locked-in” profits to support a decline at year’s end, they tend to sell the riskiest positions.

The resulting model is predictable:

• Year 1: accumulation and growth. New capital flows into ETFs, the price precedes the average cost basis, generating paper profits.
• Year 2: distribution and reset. Managers take profits before year’s end, the price corrects downward, establishing a new higher cost base.

This rhythm is already visible in late 2025 data. The pressure on year-end performance has triggered mechanical sales—not because bitcoin is fundamentally weak, but because red numbers in the balance sheets push defensive actions.

The Federal Reserve Is the True Market Maker

Beyond the transition from miners to institutions, there is a second macro factor that has overwhelmed forecasts: the liquidity environment.

The market had bet on a cycle of rate cuts by the Federal Reserve starting in the second half of 2024. This expectation fueled the initial bitcoin rally. But US economic data did not cooperate: employment and inflation eased, but not enough to justify a strongly expansionary policy. Some Fed officials even signaled “caution” regarding cuts.

When rate cut expectations diminish, the present value of future cash flows compresses. Risk assets—and bitcoin, the riskiest of the risky—are hit first. Global liquidity remains the true “market maker” of bitcoin, not Wall Street.

The Silent Redistribution: Weak Selling, Strong Accumulation

At the end of 2025, on-chain data tell a story of structural transformation. The market is not retreating; a rapid redistribution is occurring.

Medium-sized whales (between 10 and 1,000 BTC) have been net sellers in recent weeks. These are the “old players” with substantial profits cashing out. Super whales (over 10,000 BTC) continue to accumulate, especially during dips. Retail behavior is also bifurcated: less experienced investors liquidate in panic, while more experienced and patient ones are seizing the opportunity.

The consequence is that selling pressure mainly comes from the “weak,” while positions are concentrating in the hands of the “strong.” This is a bullish signal if we look beyond the next 6-12 months, but it will continue to pressure the price in the short term.

The Technical Crossroads: $92,000 Decides Everything

From a technical perspective, bitcoin is at a critical level. At the end of 2025, the price hovers around $90,000. The $92,000 level is the bottleneck: if it does not hold that support, the rebound could end.

Charts show an ascending wedge—a bearish pattern following a downtrend. A breakdown could test the November low at $80,540, and further declines could drop to $74,500 (the 2025 annual low).

Derivative markets add a note of deep division: many open puts at $85,000 and calls at $200,000. The market is deeply split on the direction.

The Shadow Effect of AI on the Crypto Narrative

One last factor that has compressed bitcoin valuations in 2025 is the global narrative competition. Artificial intelligence has become the central force in risk asset valuation, and its volatility directly influences bitcoin through risk budgets and available liquidity.

But there is an even subtler effect: the AI narrative has directly squeezed the crypto sector’s narrative space. Even when on-chain data is healthy and the development ecosystem is active, bitcoin struggles to regain a valuation premium. When the AI bubble enters a correction phase, it could return liquidity and risk appetite to the crypto sector. At that moment, bitcoin’s price might face a decisive opportunity.

The Lesson: The Monetary Revaluation Calculation Is Now Management-Driven, Not Miner-Driven

The collective failure of bitcoin forecasts in 2025 is not a coincidence or bad luck. It is a late realization of a paradigmatic shift.

When the market moves from mechanical miner sales to decision-making guided by spreadsheets and fund managers’ fiscal cycles, the key to predicting the price is no longer calculating the halving date or monitoring miner selling pressure. It is following the “monetary revaluation calculation” of institutions: their average cost basis, their performance cycles, their liquidation deadlines.

The new bitcoin price anchor ($84,000 as ETF cost basis) and the new biennial cycle (guided by institutional fiscal calendars rather than halving cycles) represent a transition from the “miner market” to the “fund manager market.”

Until this shift in power is fully integrated into analysts’ mental models, we will continue to see speculative forecasts that collapse in the face of reality. Bitcoin in 2025 has not failed; it is the predictive models that have aged.