Bitcoin traded near $62,000 on Thursday, holding most of an 11% recovery from last week's bear-market floor of $57,700. The bounce kept the asset above the $60,000 support level, though the pullback underscores a question hanging over the move: whether this is a genuine reversal or just air being let out of a damaged market.
CryptoQuant's Weekly Crypto Report, shared with Bitcoin Magazine, frames the recovery as a bear-market recovery, not a trend flip. The firm's Bull Score Index, an aggregate of on-chain, market, and valuation conditions scored 0 to 100, sits at 20—well inside the bearish zone (40 and below) and far short of the 60 mark tied to a sustainable bull run. That gap matters. Without it, the current gains look vulnerable to another leg down.
Where CryptoQuant sees plausible near-term upside is seasonality. Across the past decade, July has ranked among Bitcoin's stronger months, closing higher in most years studied. The pattern held even in 2018 and 2022, when Bitcoin gained roughly 20% and 17% during the month despite the broader downtrend. Entering July 2026 off a bear-market low stacks the odds toward near-term gains, according to the report.
The firm's bullish reads rely on shifting demand metrics. The 30-day change in total demand (spot plus perpetual futures) collapsed to roughly negative 650,000 BTC in early June as prices fell toward $58,000, the deepest negative reading since 2022. It has since crawled back toward neutral. Futures demand turned positive and spot selling decelerated to its slowest pace since mid-May. A sustained move into positive territory would confirm demand is re-igniting.
U.S. institutional buyers show signs of stabilizing too. Coinbase's Premium Index, a proxy for U.S. spot appetite, dropped below zero in early June near the $57,700 low—one of the year's weakest readings. It remains underwater but has tracked Bitcoin's climb off the bottom, suggesting steadier institutional interest.
Valuation also offered a floor. The on-chain trader unrealized profit/loss margin for coins held one to three months dropped below negative 24% in early June, below the negative 12% threshold CryptoQuant treats as undervalued. Extremes at that level tend to mark capitulation and local bottoms. As price bounced, the margin recovered.
Today's slip to $62,000 underscores CryptoQuant's own caveat. The firm sees the market off its lows with improving internals but a bearish regime intact. A durable rally, it concluded, requires the Bull Score Index to climb above 60. Until then, this move reads as recovery within a bear market, not a breakout—a framing Thursday's pullback does little to challenge.