Benjamin Cowen: 75% Chance Bitcoin Makes a New Low in 2026—October and $39,000 Are the Numbers to Watch

Key Highlights:

• The Call: 75% probability Bitcoin makes a new low in 2026. Target: ~$39,000–$40,000 (70% drawdown) by October 2026.
• The Framework: Three on-chain conditions (supply profit/loss cross, MVRV Z-Score below zero, price below realized/balance price) have triggered at every prior cycle bottom. None have triggered yet.
• The Bull Case (25%): The 2019 analog—a low in February, a higher low in April, then recovery. Cowen gives it 25%, arguing the digestion phase likely needs more time.
• Today's Chart: Bitcoin at $72,829, holding above the rising 50 SMA at $72,458. The US-Iran peace talks this weekend are the near-term variable that moves price before October.

Benjamin Cowen, the crypto analyst who publicly called the Bitcoin top in Q4 2025 when price was above $110,000, returned to Altcoin Daily to lay out where the current cycle goes from here. His position is direct: there is a 75% probability the Bitcoin bottom is still ahead, and he has a checklist of conditions that have appeared at every prior cycle low to justify that view.

The Framework: Three Conditions, Zero Triggers

Cowen is not working from intuition. He is working from a pattern that has repeated across every Bitcoin bear market in history—2011, 2015, 2018, 2020, and 2022. At each of those lows, three specific on-chain conditions appeared before the market turned. None of those three conditions have triggered in the current cycle. Until they do, his framework does not support calling a bottom.

The first condition is the crossing of the supply in profit metric and the supply in loss metric. That cross has preceded every prior cycle low without exception. It has not happened yet.

The second is the MVRV Z-Score dropping below zero. Every prior midterm year bear market saw that reading go below zero before recovering. The current reading is approaching zero but has not crossed.

The third is Bitcoin trading below both its realized price, currently around $54,000, and its balance price, currently around $39,000. Every prior cycle bottom occurred after Bitcoin went below both levels. It has not breached either in the current cycle.

Three conditions. Zero triggered. That is the basis of the 75%.

October and $39,000

The most likely timeframe for the bottom, in Cowen's assessment, is October 2026. The pattern that informs that view is consistent across prior cycles: the 2018 bear market ran from December 2017 to December 2018—twelve months. The 2022 bear market ran from November 2021 to November 2022—twelve months. If this cycle follows the same duration from its October 2025 top, October 2026 is the natural landing point.

The price target he arrives at is approximately $39,000 to $40,000, a roughly 70% decline from the all-time high. That figure is not arbitrary. It is where the balance price sits, and going below it would reset every major on-chain indicator simultaneously. The MVRV Z-Score would drop below zero. The supply in profit and loss metrics would cross. Bitcoin would trade below both the realized price and the balance price. Every item on the checklist would complete at roughly the same level.

Cowen notes that each prior Bitcoin bear market has been marginally less severe than the last, from 94% in the first cycle to 87%, 84%, 77%, and now potentially 70%. A 70% drop is the smallest bear market in Bitcoin's history. It is also the one that fits the pattern of diminishing severity.

He is careful to add that May 2026 is a possible earlier floor if a crisis event materializes, and that if Bitcoin does not make a new low by October, he would concede the cycle low is already in. The bear market resistance band, he notes, currently sits around $78,000 to $79,000—the level that was prior bull market support and has now flipped to resistance. That is the line in the sand for the current rally.

The 25% He Gives the Bulls

Cowen presents the bull case himself. The 2019 analog is the framework: Bitcoin dropped roughly 50% from its peak, formed a low, then began recovering before the pandemic created a second flush. The current structure mirrors that setup—a low in February 2026 followed by a marginally higher low in April, exactly the sequence 2019 produced.

He gives it 25%, not because the analog is wrong but because the uptrend in 2019 and the downtrend in 2019 lasted roughly equal durations. If this cycle's bull market ran significantly longer than 2019's, the digestion phase should also take longer proportionally. A few months of recovery does not complete that digestion by his measure.

The practical implication he draws from both scenarios is the same. He does not advise waiting for the exact bottom. By summer of a midterm year, he argues, it starts to make sense to accumulate, because the money in Bitcoin is made in the middle of trends, not at the extremes. Missing the precise bottom does not mean missing the return.

What the Chart Shows Today

Bitcoin is at $72,829 on Binance as of April 11, pressing toward the $73,000 resistance level that has capped recent sessions. The 50-period SMA on the 1-hour chart sits at $72,458, rising steadily since April 5 and providing the floor beneath each pullback. The RSI is at 53.54 with the signal line at 54.06—neutral, with no overbought signal present despite the sustained move higher.

The structure since April 5 has been a textbook sequence of higher lows: $67,000, then $68,200, then $70,800, then $71,800. The ceasefire announcement on April 8 produced the largest volume candle on the chart and drove price to the current range. Unlike the broader altcoin market which retraced those gains aggressively, Bitcoin has held them—consistent with Cowen's view that in a late business cycle environment, lower risk assets absorb liquidity while higher risk assets bleed.

The Near-Term Variable

The US-Iran peace negotiations in Islamabad scheduled for this weekend represent the most significant near-term price variable. A ceasefire framework that holds would remove the geopolitical premium currently embedded in oil prices, easing one of the inflationary pressures Cowen cites as a late business cycle signal. A breakdown in talks would add downside pressure across risk assets.

Either outcome will move Bitcoin before Cowen's October timeline arrives, and the chart at $72,829 pressing toward $73,000 is the market pricing the possibility that the talks succeed before pricing the possibility that Cowen is right.

The Bottom Line

Three conditions. Zero triggered. A 75% probability of a new low. October 2026 and $39,000 as the numbers to watch. And a 25% bull case that Cowen himself lays out because the 2019 analog is real, even if he thinks the timing is off.

The bear market resistance band at $78,000–$79,000 is the line that decides which framework wins. Bitcoin either reclaims that level and invalidates the bear case, or it fails, and Cowen's checklist becomes the market's timeline. The Iran talks this weekend move first. October moves next. And somewhere between them, the bottom either arrives or does not.