Bitcoin reclaims $62K, analysts say worst is ‘likely behind us’

The price of Bitcoin has reclaimed ground above the $62,000 mark, and analysts say the worst of the selling could be over with German BTC sales over and Mt. Gox payments all but priced in.

Bitcoin has rallied 5.2% in the last 24 hours, bouncing off two-month lows of $53,500 on July 4, and is currently changing hands for $62,550, per TradingView data.

Ben Simpson, the founder of crypto education platform Collective Shift told Cointelegraph that he believed Bitcoin’s “local bottom” had now been formed and believes BTC is now headed for an uptrend.

Simpson said the price of Bitcoin had been hammered by a deluge of “forced selling” — much of which stemmed from nearly $3 billion in sales from the German government and negative sentiment towards some $8.5 billion in Mt. Gox creditor repayments.

On July 12, when Bitcoin wavered around the $59,000 level, the Crypto Fear & Greed Index fell to its lowest level in 18 months, something Simpson said was at odds with a more fundamentals-based approach to the broader market environment.

“Generally, I just felt there was a very big mismatch between sentiment and fundamentals,” he said.

Moving forward, Simpson looked to several key catalysts as being bullish for Bitcoin’s price in the coming weeks and months.

“Jerome Powell is hinting towards potentially lowering rates at some point soon. We’ve also got the S&P 500 ripping to new highs amongst all of this as well as strong Bitcoin ETF inflows flowing back in.”

Just over $360 million in leveraged short positions on Bitcoin were liquidated as Bitcoin broke through the $62,000 mark, per Coinglass data cited by Apollo sats founder Thomas Fahrer in a July 15 post to X.

Similarly, eToro market analyst Josh Gilbert told Cointelegraph that the worst of Bitcoin’s price may be in the rearview mirror, citing Trump’s increased odds of clinching victory in the upcoming election as a key driver of positive price action in the coming months.

“We’ve seen weakness in the last few months, but I think the worst is likely behind us. Any short-term weakness is likely to be bought with this in mind, alongside the tailwind of an ETH ETF and, of course, a more pro-crypto US party potentially being elected.”

“The attack on former President Trump this week has positively impacted his reelection odds, with the former President’s pro-crypto stance lifting Bitcoin and crypto assets in the process,” Gilbert said.

Gilbert also noted that Trump and Republicans held a more friendly stance on crypto than Democrats.

“The closer we move to Trump potentially gaining his spot back in the White House, the higher we’re likely to see Bitcoin move,” he added.

A Bitcoin pump won’t happen overnight

Gustavo Schwenkler, director of Australian crypto exchange Cointree told Cointelegraph that the narrative around Mt. Gox creditors dumping their Bitcoin on the market had already been “processed and priced in” as of last week.

Schwenkler sees lower-than-expected inflation figures in the US and the suggestion of lowered rates as a strong catalysts for crypto markets moving forward.

“Inflation came out lower than expected and expectations that the Fed will start cutting rates got a boost. The market is now expecting first-rate cuts as soon as September,” he said.

Still, Schwenkler warned that any potential upward swing in the price of Bitcoin would likely not occur overnight.

“I also don’t think there’s going to be a lot of push for the price to go much higher in the short run. I think we will see BTC move around $55-65k at least until the Fed actually cuts rates.”

Mark Hiriart, the head of sales at crypto asset manager Zerocap, argues that despite Bitcoin breaking $62,000, it would need to flip the $60,000 resistance into support, meaning that the price would need to hold steady above the $60,000 mark for some time.

Additionally, he said Bitcoin would need to reclaim its key 50-day and 100-day simple moving averages before BTC could progress higher to $65,000 and beyond.

Meanwhile, Hiriart warned there could still be some adverse effects from the potential Mt. Gox Bitcoin repayments.

“With Mt. Gox’s creditors sitting on a ten-year profit, it would be naive to think there won’t be any profit taking,” he said.

“The question is how staggered are the distributions and what percentage of recipients want to cash in. I would suspect short-term pressure on the market to continue over the Summer months,” Hirairt added.

Source: https://cointelegraph.com/news/bitcoin-price-reclaims-62k-analysts-worst-behind-us