Six signs a crypto winter is ending

5) Thermocap multiple: The thermocap multiple is a measure like price to book that compares bitcoin’s market capitalization to the cumulative dollar value ever paid to miners, with each coin valued at its market price when it was mined. Prior crypto winters ended at single-digit multiples, but this cycle it only declined to 13 times, according to Glassnode data as of June 30, 2026. These levels are not a guarantee of future price action.

6) Price action: A 50% rally from the low has historically coincided with prior market troughs, although no such relationship guarantees future outcomes.

Once the next cycle does begin, we expect two key debates to persist throughout:

Will bitcoin reach a new high before the next halving? During both the 2012 to 2016 cycle and the 2016 to 2020 cycle, bitcoin did not surpass its prior cycle high until after the halving. However, in the 2024 cycle, bitcoin surpassed the 2021 high one month before the April 2024 halving, according to Bloomberg data.

Has AI replaced crypto as the market’s leading speculative/disruptive-technology narrative? In 2020 and 2021, crypto was one of the clearest expressions of a high-liquidity, disruptive-technology market. Since 2024, however, AI has become the dominant growth story.