Yet another analyst

[exstasie]

The bulls are back in town!

The weekly candle is beautiful. Daily BB squeeze triggered and confirmed. If the daily candle closes in the mid/upper $8,300s (or higher) we'll have a three white soldiers pattern on the chart:



This high volume wicking might indicate temporary exhaustion. OBV looks super bullish though. I don't think bulls are done quite yet but there could be some consolidation in the cards:



Wave (iii) in this potential count has extended well past the 1.618 extension of (i) so it's highly likely this move is impulsive. Which means after another short term consolidation there should be more upside. Here's a squiggle, just an idea:



I think we're building towards this scenario. We've tagged the 20-week MA. Still looking for a test of this downtrend channel:

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[ft73]

Yes, we need to break through that descending channel with authority before making big plans for a new bull market.

Exactly.

[El duderino_]

I have a feeling this thread is gonna suck some merit out of me 

Nice and solid posting...

[exstasie]

This high volume wicking might indicate temporary exhaustion. OBV looks super bullish though. I don't think bulls are done quite yet but there could be some consolidation in the cards:

Well, we certainly got some consolidation out of that.

I'm unsure about the internal count as yet and the price action is weaker than I'd hoped. Strongly bouncing off the 0.382 would have made a better case for my local count. My bias is still bullish, but further dipping below the January 7th range ($7,723 low) will throw this count into question:



If bulls can break up from here, there is a boatload of reasons why they might get rejected in that red zone above:

• 1.618 extension of (i) ~ $8,600
• Descending channel top ~ $8,650
• Daily/weekly pivots in the $8,700s and $8,800s
• 1.618 extension of the December rally ~ $8,900

[El duderino_]

Curious how its gonna play out 

[Wexlike]

So that's my take for the halving season this year. Run up to 16300-17300 and then some consolidation phase maybe down to $12k before or shortly after the halving(green vertical line). First I was a little skeptical that there is not enough time to rise to that level, but after copy pasting the fractal from the $4k-$13k run-up(not even the whole fractal), it is actually not a problem.

[exstasie]

Longs have been selling into strength for the past month, down 26% in total. That's a bullish mid-term sign. I'd like to see them flushed out even more:

[exstasie]

This count is still holding on:



Given the structure and our position in the descending channel, we're at a very crucial point in the charts. A possible inflection point. I want to show how the above count might fit into the bigger picture.

This is the bullish impulse scenario. Price action is unlikely to play out exactly like this; the point is a valid 5-wave impulse that breaks the June-January downtrend:



The alternative scenario implies the rally since December 18th is not an impulse at all. We do not have sufficient evidence to rule this out yet:



Wave 3s typically extend to the 1.618 of Wave 1, if not further. So a higher high near/past the $8,900 level will make the bearish scenario above much less likely. That's the first baby step we want to see from here for the bull scenario to keep progressing.

In other news, the market continues to shed longs: down to 32,500 BTC on Bitfinex. That's down almost 32% from the peak last month. Bullish.

[exstasie]

Altcoins are starting to look frothy. BTC continues to consolidate below its January 8th high, but Monero, Litecoin, DASH and others have all expanded their ranges with new highs today. 10%+ breakouts everywhere you look. Monero is up a whopping 45% on the year so far!

This is another bullish mid-term sign for BTC. It signifies BTC supply is being diverted to altcoins. During BTC pullbacks, instead of selling BTC for fiat (pressuring price down), traders are selling their BTC for altcoins.

This is exactly what I would expect to see in the early stages of a bull market.

[exstasie]

This count is still holding on:

Time to retire that local count. It's not playing out. We're clearly not in a new minor impulse yet and time rules for Wave 4 have been broken.

This is not necessarily a bad thing for bulls. The market is consolidating bullishly above the 20-day MA, coming off daily and 4-hour uptrends. Daily candlesticks show no follow through to the downside. Based on classical metrics continuation is still likely, and after this length of consolidation, a move straight towards $10K like David is contemplating becomes more likely.

The short term is unpredictable though. I'm thinking we may still be in an irregular minor Wave 2, similar to the first teal scenario xxxx123abcxxxx has laid out here:

Longs on Bitfinex are down to almost 30K. They've dropped 36% in the past few weeks. Less longs = less downward pressure on price and more latent demand.

[exstasie]

Bulls on parade!

First breach of this long term downtrend line:



Loving the intraday price action: testing resistance and forming support every step of the way. So much stronger than the October short squeeze! As I've been saying since the $7,000s this is the strongest price action we've seen in several months. Every day that goes by, the $6,000s bottom looks more and more confirmed.

There is still resistance here; the levels mentioned in this post are still in play for the moment. Let's get a daily close above that downtrend line and continue closing up these downside wicks on the 4-hour before dancing in the streets.

The higher degree extended third count mentioned above is progressing nicely. This is a tad ambitious; it's the "ideal" bullish scenario. Still, the proportions and extension guidelines for Wave 3 look good:



Until we break the $10,350 Bitstamp / $10,540 Coinbase high, the chart is still all lower highs. I believe bears will make a strong stand near $10K, should we get that far. That will give the market an opportunity to test the 20-week MA and possibly the broken downtrend channel as support.

In commitment of trader news: Shorts on Bitfinex are up 63% overnight. Bears are shorting the rocket right now. More fuel for $10K?

[bitserve]

I like your analysis. Pretty clear and to the point comments. Easy to understand. Congrats!

[El duderino_]

#thedudeapprovesABIDES

[exstasie]

The intraday price action and volume shows there is a lot of resistance in this upper $8,000s range. Fortunately, the market is holding up quite well. It looks like the selling is being absorbed. 4-hour OBV is incredibly bullish; I haven't seen performance like this since April-May 2019!

Here's a squiggle of possible price action as we continue to build out the primary EW count from the last post:



To keep this count on track, we want to see a test of the orange 200-day MA ~ $9,100 and continued consolidation above the wave (i) high at $8,463. This sets up a situation where we could test the $10K+ area, and then come down to confirm the green 20-week and/or orange 200-day MAs as support.

A break below $8,463 will invalidate this count and send us back to the drawing board.

Longs are closing and shorts are opening into every spike, which supports the idea of bullish continuation:

[exstasie]

To keep this count on track, we want to see a test of the orange 200-day MA ~ $9,100 and continued consolidation above the wave (i) high at $8,463. This sets up a situation where we could test the $10K+ area, and then come down to confirm the green 20-week and/or orange 200-day MAs as support.

To be honest, this is not quite the follow through I had hoped for. The market pushed a higher high past $9K but it was with fairly weak momentum, falling short of the 200-day MA:



I am unsure whether this local wave up is sub-dividing (in which case we are still on track) or if this is the beginning of a larger failure. Absent more evidence, I am still leaning towards the former.

We definitely prefer a push to the $9,300-$9,500 area, to give us more cushion above the 20-week MA and $8,463 local high. We want to keep bears trapped below those key levels to keep building up buy pressure.

4-hour OBV is plateauing and Bitfinex shorts dropped on last night's upside breakout, two signs the market might be hitting a wall short term. To keep 4-hour momentum alive, bulls want to see another attack on the highs as we head into the daily close.

This condition is still in play:

A break below $8,463 will invalidate this count and send us back to the drawing board.

Go bulls!

[exstasie]

This post explores the idea of wave alternation, AKA "why this bull cycle doesn't look like the last one." I think it's worth cross-posting here:

I have an alternate theory. It's based on this idea in Elliott Wave Theory called the "guideline of alternation":

The guideline of alternation states that if wave two of an impulse is a sharp retracement, expect wave four to be a sideways correction, and vice versa.

Sharp corrections never include a new price extreme, i.e., one that lies beyond the orthodox end of the preceding impulse wave. They are almost always zigzag (single, double or triple); occasionally they are double threes that begin with a zigzag. Sideways corrections include flats, triangles, and double and triple corrections.

Let's apply this idea to both the 2015-2017 bull market and the current one:



Working from left to right:

Last cycle's primary (ii) was a long sideways correction. Without going into details, I would term it a "double sideways correction" (for more info, see the section on "double and triple threes"). It did not reach the 50% retracement level and it took very long (5 months) compared to the primary wave (iv), which was a short-lived zig zag.

These distinctions become much more obvious when we switch to linear view:



Applying this idea to the current cycle: I would characterize the primary (ii) as a zig zag. Combined with the deep retracement of nearly 70%, I would definitely consider this to be a "sharp retracement." Thus, after a sufficient wave (iii) (which should surpass the 2017 ATH by a good margin) I expect wave (iv) to be a long, sideways correction.

In other words, I don't think the long term cycles are necessarily changing, becoming smaller in magnitude, accelerating, etc. I believe the corrections are just playing out differently (in alternated order) than they did during the 2015-2017 bull market. To me, nothing has really changed yet.

[exstasie]

Well, it's another bull pennant until proven otherwise. Not much else to say:



Not sure how this fits into our local count but.....stair stepping is usually indicative of a strong trend. In this case, a bullish one. I'm still looking for a thrust above the 200-day MA which is currently at $9,056.

[exstasie]

Well, it's another bull pennant until proven otherwise. Not much else to say:



I'm still looking for a thrust above the 200-day MA which is currently at $9,056.

There's the expected thrust above the 200-day MA!

.....followed by an abrupt failure. This is the trouble with triangles. The thrust is powerful but often very short-lived:



We may have just seen the first extreme of a larger sideways consolidation. As long as we are trading above the January 8th high ($8,463 Bitstamp) then this count is still in play, which puts us in Wave (iv) of 3:

[fabiorem]

This abrupt failure is just a single whale shorting bitcoin and manipulating the price.

[exstasie]

This abrupt failure is just a single whale shorting bitcoin and manipulating the price.

There's a more rational explanation. Longs were piling on for days heading into the last breakout. There were big expectations for a rally above the 200-day MA. When that rally never materialized, supply came back in and longs began to unwind. Then stops were triggered.

This is all normal price action, bouncing off expected resistance. The 200-day MA was obviously going to be sold. The question was/is whether it would be just a temporary, local top.

The vast majority of sell volume occurred below $8,600 so "the manipulators" (if they exist) will only make money if price actually downtrends from here. If bulls can hold onto this range and eventually return to the highs, the market will just have trapped more bears.



That's how whales get harpooned:

Yes, but the mistake people make is assuming whales are always successful when they try to push the market around like that. I've seen many whales attempt large spot dumps that were instantly swallowed by the market before a move up. Those whales lost a shitload of coins. Some of them likely ceased to be whales altogether because of it.

Consider the Bitstamp bear whale. He dumped 30,000 BTC at $300 when the rest of the market was trading ~$50 higher. The market bought all his BTC then rallied to $450. He returned in 2017 as a bull, signing messages to prove it. So he dumped everything at $300 and bought back during the 2017 bubble.

He's not the only whale to make mistakes like that. They are not infallible!