Bitcoin is down 20% from its all-time high and more than 9% this week, breaking its usual correlation with the S&P 500 and gold.
Reading the HODL Waves: Investor Rotation Beneath Bitcoin’s Price Decline
7 November 2025 - 16:30 CET
As investors question whether the four-year cycle has peaked, onchain data suggests the market is rotating, not capitulating.
Understanding coin age and HODL waves
Coin age tracks how long each Bitcoin, has remained unmoved since it was last transacted, serving as a behavioral proxy for investor conviction. The older a coin becomes, the less likely it is to move, a predictable decay that distinguishes short-term traders, who recycle holdings, from long-term traders, who rarely sell.
Bitcoin’s HODL Waves bring this metric to life. Each wavegroup's coins are defined by how long they’ve remained unspent, visually mapping the balance between short-term trading activity and long-term holding conviction across the network.
What the latest data shows
Recent HODL Wave data points to a market in transition, from long-term distribution to mid-term absorption, with short-term traders back in play.
Short-term holdings (less than one month) have rebounded to 9.78% after a sharp drop earlier in the quarter, signaling renewed trading activity as prices fell. Mid-term holders (one to six months) continue to expand, up 3.56 percentage points over this quarter. These are newer entrants whose coins are maturing rather than being sold, reflecting growing conviction even amid volatility.
Medium- and long-term holders (six months to five years) show controlled outflows, each down about 2.19points, suggesting orderly profit-taking rather than capitulation.
At the far end of the spectrum, very long-term or dormant coins (more than five years) keep inching higher, reinforcing the structural illiquidity of BTC’s oldest supply base.
Overall, veteran hands are distributing moderately, mid-term holders are absorbing that supply, and short-term traders are oscillating with volatility. Historically, surges in short-term holdings have marked late-cycle exuberance - about 25% of supply in 2017 and 19% in 2021. Today's levels, near 10%, remain far from those peaks, implying a market still consolidating rather than overheating.
