Bitcoin was trading around $64,710 on Sunday, up 0.9% over the previous 24 hours and roughly 0.3% for the week, but at least one analyst thinks that calm is masking a much rougher path ahead. In a TradingView post shared on July 24, market analyst TradingShot laid out a case for Bitcoin falling to $45,000 by the start of October 2026 — a decline of more than 30% from current levels.
The call rests on a historical pattern rather than a single indicator. TradingShot's analysis lines up the present market cycle against the aftermath of three prior exchange collapses: Mt. Gox in 2014, BitGrail in 2018, and FTX in 2022. In each of those cases, the analyst argues, the failure landed during a bear-market phase and coincided with a major cycle low. The trigger this time, according to the post, is BitMEX's announced closure after 11 years of operation — an event TradingShot frames as fitting the same pattern of an exchange-related shock arriving near a cycle turning point.
The Technical Case for $45,000
On the charts, TradingShot points to Bitcoin currently trading above its Realized Price Buy Zone, a support band the analyst treats as a key structural floor. The rising 100-month moving average is cited as another layer of support underneath that zone, with the 2022 bear-market bottom having formed just above the same level. If history repeats and Bitcoin works its way down toward that moving average, $45,000 is roughly where the two lines intersect heading into early Q4.
Keep an eye on Bitcoin $BTC at $63,800.
— Ali Charts (@alicharts) July 25, 2026
If this level holds as support, I'm watching for a rebound toward $67,000. But if it breaks, the next downside target sits around $60,000. pic.twitter.com/kAn0hDIEmc
Related: Bitcoin ETF Trading Volume Sinks to Lowest Since October 2024 as Ether Funds Keep Outpacing Inflows
A More Bullish Read on the Short Term
Not every analyst is reading the chart the same way over a shorter time frame. In a post on X on July 25, trader Ali Martinez flagged $63,800 as the level to watch on the four-hour chart, right around where Bitcoin has been trading.
"If this level holds as support, I'm watching for a rebound toward $67,000."
Martinez added that a break below $63,800 would open the door to a slide toward $60,000 instead — a far narrower range than TradingShot's Q4 target, and one that reflects near-term positioning rather than a multi-month cycle call.
Demand From ETFs Complicates the Picture
Underneath both technical arguments sits a demand story that cuts against an imminent breakdown. U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs have just logged their strongest inflow streak of 2026, pulling in nearly $1 billion and helping drive the recovery from the roughly $58,000 lows Bitcoin touched earlier in July. That kind of institutional buying is exactly the sort of support that could blunt — or at least delay — the type of cycle-low decline TradingShot's historical comparison anticipates. Whether that demand holds up through the Q4 window the analyst flagged may end up being the deciding factor.
