After a massive selloff last week, one of bitcoin’s BTC$62,945.93 closely watched onchain metrics is approaching a threshold that has historically marked bear market bottoms.

The metric is called the market value-to-realized value (MVRV) Z-Score. Every major bitcoin cycle bottom has coincided with the Z-Score touching or briefly dipping below zero (into the green zone, in the chart).

And right now, it is knocking on the door of the zone that has coincided with the lowest point of previous bear markets. It happened in 2011-2012 when bitcoin saw its first major crash. It happened again in 2014 and late 2018. Most recently, it fell below zero in the second half of 2022, marking a price bottom that paved the way for a three-year bull run.

What is the MVRV Z-Score

The metric compares the deviation of bitcoin’s market value – what the token is worth right now based on the current market price – from it’s realized price.

The second figure, widely considered close to fair value, is obtained by averaging the prices of every bitcoin since the last time it was transacted onchain.

When the market price is far above fair value, bitcoin is considered expensive relative to its own history. When the market price falls toward or below the fair value, bitcoin is cheap. The Z-Score takes the difference between those two numbers and measures how extreme it is statistically.

The result is a single line that cuts through the noise of day-to-day price action and shows where the price is relative to the broader market cycle. A high Z-Score means the market is running hot, and a low or below-zero score means the opposite.

According to BitBo, the Z-Score is currently at 0.24, just above the upper boundary of the historically significant “green zone,” which begins at approximately 0 and extends slightly below zero.

In other words, it’s very close to the “accumulation” zone. To be clear, this is not a price level, but only a measure of how stretched or compressed bitcoin’s market value is relative to its realized value.

Absolute bottom?

However, the bottom might not be in just yet, as the behavior of wallet holders suggests there might still be a bit more selling needed for it to be truly in.

Onchain data suggests that Long-Term Holder MVRV (LTH-MVRV), which measures the profitability of coins held for at least 155 days, and Short-Term Holder MVRV (STH-MVRV), which focuses on coins held for less than 155 days, haven’t converged yet.

When these two data points close the gap, historically, a major cycle low forms. This was previously seen in 2015, 2019, and 2022.

However, currently, STH-MVRV stands at 0.84, while LTH-MVRV remains elevated at 1.29. Meaning long-term holders are still sitting on relatively large unrealized profits, indicating that further downside in bitcoin may be required before a typical bear market bottom is established.

While it is impossible to time market bottoms, after the brutal selling last week that wiped hundreds of billions off crypto’s market value, conditions that have historically preceded recoveries are beginning to emerge.

Read more: Bitcoin, ether eye worst weekly rout since FTX collapse as cryptos shed $390 billion

Strive (ASST) picked up another 32 bitcoin for roughly $2.1 million at an average of $63,911, CEO Matt Cole disclosed Monday.

That is the exact number Strategy (MSTR) sold last week, its first bitcoin sale in four years, at an average of $77,135 to help fund preferred-stock dividends.

The buy adds to the 19,000 BTC the Dallas firm reported on June 2, a position built with no debt and run through its ASST and SATA at-the-market programs.

Bitcoin trades near $63,400, up about 1.3% over the past 24 hours and steadily climbing back from the slide that followed Strategy’s sale, per CoinDesk data.

Key Takeaways

• Eli Lilly shares climbed over 4% during early Monday session following weekend disclosure of promising clinical trial results.
• The company’s investigational obesity medication retatrutide demonstrated a 60.6% reduction in sleep apnea severity and up to 73.1% decrease in knee pain during Phase 3 studies.
• Foundayo, Lilly’s oral treatment, produced weight reduction outcomes in women throughout all menopause phases, supported by findings from 1,500 study subjects.
• Novo Nordisk announced Wegovy surpassed 3 million prescriptions since January rollout — yet shares dropped 3% in early European markets.
• Over the last twelve months, Eli Lilly shares have gained 47% while Novo Nordisk has declined over 40%.

Eli Lilly dominated the weekend news cycle with pharmaceutical updates. The pharmaceutical giant released a series of encouraging clinical trial findings throughout Saturday and Sunday, prompting an immediate market reaction Monday morning — LLY shares surged more than 4% before the opening bell, securing its position as the S&P 500’s second-strongest performer trailing only Micron.

Eli Lilly and Company, LLY

The spotlight focused primarily on retatrutide, Lilly’s investigational next-wave obesity treatment. Phase 3 clinical trial data unveiled at the American Diabetes Association gathering in New Orleans demonstrated that the once-weekly injection achieved a 60.6% reduction in moderate-to-severe obstructive sleep apnea severity among obese adults.

The identical clinical study revealed retatrutide delivered up to 73.1% reduction in knee osteoarthritis discomfort.

These findings complement previously disclosed data where patients living with obesity achieved 28% body weight reduction using the medication, and adults managing type 2 diabetes experienced significant blood glucose improvements.

Retatrutide represents Lilly’s “triple G” therapeutic approach — it activates GLP-1, GIP, and glucagon receptors simultaneously, advancing beyond current dual-mechanism medications like Zepbound, which already holds approval for sleep apnea treatment.

Among the studies, 2% of diabetic patients receiving the minimum dosage experienced major adverse cardiovascular events. Lilly emphasized these incidents weren’t definitively attributed to the medication. Complete findings appeared in the Lancet on Saturday.

Foundayo Broadens Treatment Scope

The weekend wasn’t finished yet. Sunday brought additional updates when Lilly unveiled analysis demonstrating its oral medication Foundayo produced weight loss across women at all menopause stages. The data emerged from 1,500 female participants enrolled in the company’s ATTAIN-1 and ATTAIN-2 Phase 3 clinical studies.

This represents a substantial broadening of the medication’s addressable population, encompassing pre-menopausal, perimenopausal, and post-menopausal women.

Novo’s Positive Update Met With Market Indifference

Novo Nordisk delivered favorable news Monday as well. The Copenhagen-based pharmaceutical company announced its oral Wegovy obesity treatment has surpassed 3 million prescriptions since its pill formulation launched in early January — representing one new prescription approximately every five seconds.

Novo characterized it as among the most successful U.S. pharmaceutical product introductions on record.

Yet investors remained unimpressed. Novo shares declined 3% during early European trading hours, with American depositary receipts indicating a 1.8% drop ahead of U.S. market open. Denmark’s stock exchange was shuttered Friday, meaning Monday’s movement partly reflected catch-up trading.

Novo’s equity has endured a challenging period, tumbling more than 40% throughout the past year. Lilly, conversely, has advanced 47% during the identical timeframe.

LLY traded approximately 4% higher Monday morning as the newest data wave continued strengthening its competitive standing in the obesity treatment landscape.

Zcash developers are lining up a new shielded-pool upgrade, Ironwood, in response to a patched bug that raised concerns about the potential creation of counterfeit ZEC without detection. The upgrade would embed formal verification and independent audits into the Orchard privacy protocol, while changing how funds move between pools to provide a clearer accounting trail.

The Zcash Open Development Lab (ZODL) said it is coordinating with Tachyon, Valar Group, the Zcash Foundation and Shielded Labs on the plan. Under Ironwood, the Orchard pool would be closed to new deposits and internal transactions would be halted, with funds required to pass through a “turnstile”—an accounting checkpoint—before entering Ironwood.

The Zcash Foundation disclosed that auditors had identified a vulnerability in Orchard. Importantly, developers noted there is no evidence that user funds were affected or that ZEC’s total supply changed. Shielded Labs described the flaw as potentially allowing an attacker to mint an unlimited amount of counterfeit ZEC within Orchard, had it been exploited.

In the proposed design, Ironwood would not depend on proving retroactively whether the bug was exploited; rather, it would provide a mechanism to determine if counterfeit ZEC could have escaped the old pool. Shielded Labs explained that if users migrate to Ironwood and no excess ZEC leaves the original Orchard pool, that would be strong evidence the vulnerability was never exploited. Conversely, if excess ZEC attempts to depart the old pool, the turnstile would prevent it, effectively blocking counterfeit coins from entering the supply.

According to ZODL, activation of Ironwood is targeted for late July 2026, pending thorough testing, review, and coordination across the Zcash ecosystem. The upgrade represents a broader attempt to bolster confidence in shielded transactions at a moment when the community is balancing privacy with robust security guarantees.

Meanwhile, market context remains in flux. ZEC traded around $429 at the time of reporting, after dipping from above $600 in the wake of the vulnerability disclosure. CoinGecko tracks that swing, underscoring how security concerns can quickly influence sentiment even as protocol-level mitigations are pursued. CoinGecko data reflect the volatility surrounding Orchard’s patch and the ensuing upgrade discussions. A related piece exploring the market impact of the Orchard bug noted a pronounced decline in ZEC before and after the patch.

In public discussions on X, Shielded Labs noted Ironwood’s potential to shed light on whether the Orchard vulnerability was exploited, while stressing the upgrade’s design does not hinge on retroactive proof. Some community members have debated whether post-mortem proof could imply backdoors or obligations, while others argued that deprecating Orchard and mandating a turnstile would trap any excess coins regardless of exploitation history.

Ripple’s former chief technology officer, David Schwartz, contributed to the conversation by suggesting that if there were no exploits, users would be safe regardless of their migration choices. He emphasized that those who stay in the old pool would remain safe and have continued access to their funds, even if the long-term path for Orchard is shifting toward Ironwood.

What Ironwood changes mean for users and builders

Ironwood represents more than a single upgrade; it signals a shift toward formal verification and third-party audits as a core component of shielded protocol security. By introducing an explicit called-out checkpoint—the turnstile—Zcash aims to reduce ambiguity around the flow of funds between pools and to provide a clearer signal about the integrity of the system as a whole.

For users, the key question is whether to migrate to Ironwood or stay in Orchard during the transition. If Ironwood activation goes ahead and no counterfeit ZEC leaves the Orchard pool, it would indicate a low likelihood of exploitation. If, however, the turnstile blocks abnormal withdrawals, that would confirm the mechanism’s effectiveness at preventing counterfeit coins from affecting supply. Either outcome would refine risk assumptions for users and validators moving forward.

From a network-security perspective, the collaboration among ZODL, Tachyon, Valar Group, the Zcash Foundation and Shielded Labs highlights a broader trend toward more transparent, auditable privacy primitives. The emphasis on formal verification and independent audits aligns with growing expectations in the crypto space that privacy-focused components must withstand rigorous scrutiny before deployment at scale.

Related reading: Why ZEC fell 40% even after Zcash patched a shielded pool bug

As Ironwood’s July 2026 target approaches, observers will be watching three main threads: the thoroughness of the formal verification and audits, the results of testing across the Zcash ecosystem, and the community’s consensus on how to interpret any post-migration signals regarding vulnerability exploitation. The outcome could influence how other privacy-preserving networks approach vulnerability remediation and upgrade governance in the months ahead.

Readers should stay tuned for updates on audit progress, test results, and any further middleware changes as the community weighs the balance between robust privacy and verifiable security.

TLDR:

• Bitcoin dropped from roughly $82,000 to the low-$60,000 range amid broad market selling pressure. 
• The crypto market has corrected nearly 53% from its peak as fear overtook sentiment rapidly.
• ETF outflows, Mt. Gox transfers, and macro uncertainty converged to trigger the sharp decline. 
• Analysts say the selloff reflects a leverage and sentiment reset, not a cycle-ending breakdown. 

Bitcoin and the broader crypto market are under pressure as a wave of selling has erased gains accumulated over recent months.

The total crypto market has corrected nearly 53% from its peak, while Bitcoin slipped from around $82,000 to the low-$60,000 range.

The Fear & Greed Index collapsed from greed to extreme fear within days. Analysts warn that sentiment has fallen faster than prices, creating conditions that historically precede major market recoveries.

Multiple Catalysts Converge to Spark Selloff

Several events struck simultaneously, creating an environment that accelerated the downturn. MicroStrategy sold a portion of its Bitcoin holdings, breaking a widely held belief that the firm would never liquidate. That alone rattled investor confidence in one of the market’s most prominent institutional narratives.

A large Mt. Gox wallet transfer added to the anxiety, triggering fears of incoming sell pressure from long-dormant coins.

At the same time, Bitcoin ETFs recorded billions in outflows after months of sustained inflows that had helped drive the bull run.

Macro conditions also played a role. Rising inflation concerns, unclear Federal Reserve policy, and escalating geopolitical tensions pushed investors away from risk assets broadly. Crypto, often treated as a high-beta risk asset, absorbed a disproportionate share of that retreat.

Excessive leverage across the market then became a compounding factor. As prices fell, forced liquidations triggered cascading sell orders that deepened losses and accelerated downside volatility beyond what fundamentals alone would justify.

Sentiment Reset, Not Structural Failure, Say Analysts

Crypto analyst Crypto Patel offered a measured reading of the situation. “The current correction is primarily a reset of sentiment and leverage—not a collapse of the underlying asset class,” he noted.

He pointed to the historical pattern where weak hands exit and overleveraged positions unwind before prices stabilize and trend higher.

Patel identified the $60,000 region as a key psychological support level to monitor. He also flagged ETF flow data as a critical indicator of whether institutional demand is returning. Sustained inflows would suggest smart money is accumulating at lower levels.

Beyond price levels, Patel stressed that macro data remains the dominant catalyst. Inflation figures and Fed decisions will carry more weight than social media speculation in determining the market’s next direction. Traders focusing on those variables will have a clearer read on conditions.

His broader advice centered on discipline. Defining accumulation zones before emotions take control, managing risk to survive deeper corrections, and separating short-term volatility from long-term market structure are practices that separate experienced investors from reactive ones. Markets rarely bottom in optimism — fear-driven environmen

A Chinese court sentenced a man to 10 years and nine months after he memorized a wallet recovery phrase and stole 107 Bitcoin.

The case began in July 2023, when a Bitcoin holder identified as Feng asked an acquaintance, Zhang, to help convert 117 Bitcoin. Zhang had assisted with an earlier transaction, so Feng trusted him to set up a new digital wallet and handle the process.

Feng wrote down the wallet’s 12-word recovery phrase while Zhang watched. Prosecutors said Zhang memorized 11 words and the first letter of the last one. He later tested possible words, gained control of the wallet and transferred 107 Bitcoin to addresses he controlled.

Electronic evidence challenged the “protective takeover” claim

Feng noticed the missing Bitcoin the next day and contacted a blockchain security company before reporting the theft. Police opened an investigation in October 2023. Investigators used wallet records, transaction data and linked IP addresses to connect Zhang to the transfers.

Zhang admitted moving the Bitcoin but called it a “protective takeover” intended to prevent another theft. He also claimed he lost money while speculating and had not cashed out. Transaction records contradicted that account. Investigators traced the assets through several wallets and found more than 660,000 yuan, or about $97,000, in proceeds sent to a friend’s bank account.

Prosecutors treat Bitcoin as property under criminal law

“Current policies deny virtual currencies legal-tender status, but do not deny their property attributes,” the prosecutor handling the case said.

The Licang District People’s Procuratorate argued that Bitcoin carries economic value and gives holders exclusive control through private keys and recovery phrases. Prosecutors said those features meet the criminal-law definition of property, allowing Bitcoin to serve as the object of theft.

They used the realized cash proceeds to calculate the theft amount because China has no official Bitcoin exchange rate. The approach avoided assigning a market value to all 107 Bitcoin when determining Zhang’s sentence.

The Licang District People’s Court convicted Zhang of theft on April 28, 2025. It sentenced him to 10 years and nine months in prison and imposed a 100,000-yuan fine. The Qingdao Intermediate People’s Court rejected his appeal and upheld the ruling on Nov. 10, 2025.

The decision does not reverse China’s restrictions on cryptocurrency trading and related financial services. Bitcoin still lacks legal-tender status, and mainland regulators continue to classify many crypto business activities as illegal financial operations.

As previously reported by crypto.news, China’s Supreme People’s Court said in May that it would study clearer judicial rules for virtual-currency disputes. Local courts have already treated Bitcoin as virtual property in cases involving theft, ownership and recovery.

The Qingdao case adds another example of courts protecting crypto ownership while regulators restrict trading. It also shows how brief physical exposure to a recovery phrase can give another person full control of a self-custody wallet.

Bitcoin BTC$62,945.93 held above $63,000 on Monday, looking to build on a 4% Sunday rally spurred by Strategy (MSTR) Executive Chairman Michael Saylor hinting at further purchases of the largest cryptocurrency. Saylor’s stance is a signal markets take seriously given the company’s track record of aggressive accumulation.

Bitcoin’s stability is breathing life back into lesser-tracked corners of the market. Audiera’s BEAT token has surged 78% in the past 24 hours and Siren’s SIREN added 33%, making them the two best-performing coins among the top 100 by market cap. Audiera is a Web3 entertainment and rhythm gaming platform built on BNB Chain that treats AI characters and virtual idols as economic participants. Siren is also a BNB-based Web3 AI project. The catalysts for the moves are unclear.

The broader market recovery hinges on what bitcoin does next. It is currently trading near its 200-week simple moving average, a level that has historically acted as a long-term support and a key battleground between bulls and bears at major cycle turning points.

“The sentiment index plummeted to 8, once again showing single-digit values on Monday, following a two-month hiatus and failed attempts to consolidate in positive territory. Judging by the dynamics near Bitcoin’s 200-week moving average and the sentiment index, the situation resembles mid-2022,” Alex Kuptsikevich, the chief market analyst at FxPro said in an email.

“Under similar conditions at that time, the downward momentum weakened, but a full-fledged reversal did not occur until many months later,” he wrote.

Derivatives positioning

• Bitcoin’s futures open interest collapsed to 716,000 BTC from a record 901,000 BTC just four days ago, a stark illustration of how brutally last week’s price crash wiped out leveraged positions across the market.
• One silver lining: the decline in open interest suggests traders largely didn’t pile into new shorts during the selloff, meaning the move was driven by forced long liquidations rather than aggressive bearish conviction.
• Ether (ETH) tells a similar story. Open interest has pulled back to 14.58 million ETH from 15.98 million ETH late last month.
• BCH$222.19 is the standout coin of the past 24 hours. Open interest has jumped over 13% in the past 24 hours to 1.64 million BCH, the highest level since July 2023, even as its price bucked the recovery with an 8.3% slide. Rising open interest against a falling price typically signals short accumulation, and BCH’s negative 24-hour cumulative volume delta confirms it: Traders are actively shorting at market prices rather than placing limit orders. The setup points to persistent bearish sentiment and potential for further losses.
• Canton Network’s CC token is also seeing an uptick in open interest.
• On the volatility front, the stabilization in bitcoin is showing up in so-called fear gauges. The 30-day annualized implied volatility index BVIV has retreated to 50% from a peak of nearly 59% on Friday, suggesting the acute stress is fading and conditions are supportive of at least some consolidation. Ether’s implied volatility pulled back to 69% from 75%.
• Options market sentiment has shifted noticeably. The five most actively traded instruments on Deribit in the past 24 hours are all calls, including a $170,000 strike expiring Dec. 25. That’s a bet bitcoin will rally above that level before year-end. These deep out-of-the-money calls function as cheap lottery tickets: small premium, long odds and a massive payoff if the trade comes good.
• One risk factor remains. The dealer gamma profile around $60,000 continues to point to a setup where market makers may be forced to trade in the direction of price moves to rebalance their books, a dynamic that could amplify swings in either direction.

Token talk

• Zcash (ZEC) has rebounded 45% from last week’s low after developers proposed a fix for a critical counterfeiting bug in its privacy-focused Orchard pool.
• The Ironwood proposal would move users to a new, repaired privacy pool and let anyone running Zcash software verify that no more than the correct amount of ZEC exists.
• As coins migrate out of the old pool, any counterfeit ZEC would either be exposed or stranded and destroyed, potentially revealing whether the flaw was ever exploited, though developers say abuse is unlikely.
• Elsewhere, Tether’s dollar-pegged stablecoin USDT briefly overtook ether (ETH) in market capitalization over the weekend as the latter fell alongside the broader market.
• Ether slid from $2,000 to just over $1,500 from Friday to Sunday, bringing it to a $183 billion market cap compared with USDT’s $186 billion. The token has recovered since, bringing it back above USDT, though it remains far below bitcoin BTC$62,945.93‘s $1.2 trillion level.