Bitcoin's Two-Year Decline Challenges An Old Market Rule

Bitcoin could end 2026 in the red after already losing 6.34% in 2025, a sequence never observed since its creation. However, this historic first does not mean the market is going through its worst winter. It mostly shows that the old four-year cycle is gradually fading in favor of a bitcoin more influenced by rates, ETFs, and Wall Street.

Two Red Years Would Break an 18-Year-Old Rule

Bitcoin trades around 74,300 dollars on November 11, a decline of about 15.7% since the start of 2026. To avoid a second consecutive negative year, it would need to rise above its annual opening price, near 87,500 dollars.

Such a rebound would require an increase of about 18.5% before December 31. The scenario remains possible given BTC’s usual volatility, but it becomes more difficult as ETFs experience outflows and markets anticipate another rise in U.S. interest rates.

The annual performances put this risk into context :

• 2024 ended with an increase of about 121% ;
• 2025 recorded a limited loss of 6.34% ;
• 2026 currently shows a decline close to 16% ;
• The cumulative loss over two years reaches about 21% ;
• No negative year had until now been followed by another annual decline.

Previous bear markets had always been followed by a rebound before the end of the next year. After its 73.6% collapse in 2018, bitcoin rose about 92% in 2019. After its 64.3% drop in 2022, it gained more than 155% in 2023.

A negative close in 2026 would thus end a seemingly well-established alternation. It would also weaken the conviction that each bitcoin down year automatically prepares for a powerful recovery in the following twelve months.

The Timeline Minimizes the Crash’s Severity

Two red years may seem more alarming than one large drop. Yet their cumulative loss of about 21% is far less than the collapses recorded in 2018 and 2022.

This annual reading depends largely on an arbitrary boundary: December 31. It compares the price at two fixed dates without describing the path taken between them.

Bitcoin reached a record close to 126,200 dollars in October 2025 before falling below 58,000 dollars during the summer of 2026. Its actual decline from the peak therefore exceeded 50%, while the two annual candles show only a cumulative loss near 21%.

This difference comes from the fact that the 2025 record was reached mid-year. Bitcoin started that year around 93,400 dollars and ended it near 87,500 dollars. The annual decline seems small, but it masks a drop of more than 30% since the October peak.

The reverse is also true for investors who entered earlier. BTC rose more than 120% in 2024. A person who bought at the beginning of that year would still hold a significant gain despite losses in 2025 and 2026.

The number of negative years thus measures the length of weakness, not its severity. A long erosion can produce several red closes without causing a destruction as brutal as a collapse concentrated over a few months.

Bitcoin’s Four-Year Cycle Loses Its Compass Status

The possible double annual decline mainly calls into question the pattern built around the halving. Historically, the year following the halving of mining rewards had always been positive: 2013, 2017, and 2021 all recorded gains.

The year 2025, which followed the April 2024 halving, broke this sequence by ending in the red. Another decline in 2026 would confirm that programmed scarcity is no longer sufficient alone to organize bitcoin cycles.

The market size partly explains this evolution. An asset weighing more than one trillion dollars requires much larger flows to double. Maximal performances have also decreased over the cycles, dropping from several thousand percent during the early years to 155% in 2023.

ETFs have also brought bitcoin closer to traditional markets. Managers now adjust their exposure based on bond yields, the dollar, technology stocks, and Federal Reserve decisions. In 2025, BTC behaved more like a risky asset, alongside U.S. stocks.

This institutionalization can reduce some annual drops thanks to deeper liquidity, without preventing significant corrections from peaks. It transforms a once explosive cycle into a potentially longer succession of moderate gains and losses.

The first double annual decline of bitcoin would therefore not prove that the asset has become more fragile. It would rather signal that its rhythm has changed. The halving remains a supply factor, but global liquidity and institutional flows now more strongly dictate the schedule.