Ash Crypto

Are Institutions Crashing The Bitcoin Price On Purpose? Here’s What People Are Saying

Bitcoin, ETF, Institutional Ash Crypto, Bitcoin ETF, Bitcoin Price, BlackRock, Capital Rotation, CLARITY Act, Michael Saylor

Crypto pundit Ash Crypto has drawn attention to speculations about how institutions could be crashing the Bitcoin price on purpose. This comes as the Bitcoin ETFs continue to record massive outflows, which have caused this latest decline for the leading crypto.

Pundit Highlights Speculations Of Institutions Purposely Crashing Bitcoin Price

In an X post, Ash Crypto claimed there were rumors that institutions are purposely crashing the Bitcoin price so they can buy at lower prices before the Clarity Act is signed into law. The pundit noted that a similar pattern had played out in August 2022, when BlackRock filed for a private Bitcoin trust, and BTC later dropped about 36% before forming a bottom.

Following that, BlackRock then filed for a spot Bitcoin ETF, and the Bitcoin price later surged by 95%. Ash Crypto noted that BTC hit a new high in January 2024, when spot ETFs were approved. He added that insider institutions are repeating the same strategy with the Clarity Act narrative.

The Bitcoin ETFs have largely contributed to the decline in the Bitcoin price, with these funds recording outflows in 13 out of the last 14 trading days. During this period, their total net assets have dropped from around $104 billion to $82 billion. Strategy co-founder Michael Saylor also cited these outflows in his comments on the BTC crash.

In an X post, Saylor said that the capital markets are funding the AI buildout at a historic scale, with $400 billion deployed over six months, while BTC ETFs have seen $4 billion in outflows since May 14, pressuring the Bitcoin price. He declared that this is a capital rotation, not a BTC impairment, while adding that volatility creates opportunity.

BTC Simply Following The Four-Year Cycle

Crypto analyst Benjamin Cowen has reiterated that the Bitcoin price is simply following the four-year cycle. He also mentioned that the bull case for BTC is that if the economy is still doing well after the four-cycle low is put in, then it should have no problem starting its next bull market. Based on historical trends, the bear cycle low could happen by the fourth quarter of this year.

Meanwhile, Cowen noted that midterm years always feel really bad for crypto, and that this one is even worse, since the Bitcoin price topped on apathy. He opined that Bitcoin will survive, although many crypto assets may die out. Crypto analyst Ali Martinez warned that BTC is not looking good at the moment and that the leading crypto could drop to the next major area of support between $54,000 and $50,000.

At the time of writing, the Bitcoin price is trading at around $63,100, down in the last 24 hours, according to data from CoinMarketCap.

Bitcoin

Three Macro Signals Align for Altcoins: But Is It Alt Season?

Bitcoin, Blockchain ALT/BTC, Altcoins, Ash Crypto, Bitcoin Dominance, ISM Manufacturing PMI, MACD, Macro Signals

The ALT/BTC chart has printed four consecutive green MACD bars for the first time in nearly 6 years, according to popular analyst Ash Crypto.

The last time this happened, there was a 60% altcoin outperformance against Bitcoin over the three months that followed.

Three Signals Converging

In an April 2 post on X, Ash Crypto explained that for four years after the 2022 bear market, ALT/BTC was often in the red and oversold, reinforcing the feeling that altcoins have never truly recovered and Bitcoin is running alone.

However, they are now pointing to three developments happening at the same time that they said would make for excellent news for altcoin holders.

First and most eye-catching is the MACD signal, which measures momentum shifts by comparing two moving averages of price. The analyst says that the metric has now printed four green bars in a row on the ALT/BTC monthly chart. This last happened in August 2020, right before a big altcoin rally against BTC, when money moved from the main cryptocurrency to the smaller assets.

The second factor is the ISM Manufacturing PMI, a monthly index that measures activity in the U.S. manufacturing sector. A reading above 55 helped trigger two alt seasons in the past, in 2017 and 2021, and Ash Crypto noted that it has gone above 52 for three consecutive months, last seen in October 2022.

Furthermore, they noted that U.S. CPI inflation has fallen to a five-year low, which puts less pressure on the Federal Reserve to tighten monetary policy, therefore creating a more favorable environment for risk assets like altcoins.

“This is the most bullish macro backdrop for risk assets including alts in years,” the analyst stated.

Not Quite Yet Alt Season

Nevertheless, Ash Crypto stopped short of calling a full altcoin season, saying for that to happen, ISM will have to go past 55, and there must be broad liquidity expansion, as well as a sustained drop in BTC dominance, all happening at the same time.

What they described instead was the possibility of a meaningful two-to-three-month recovery, provided Bitcoin clears $76,000 and Ethereum follows toward the $2,800 to $3,200 range.

However, soon after the initial analysis, Ash Crypto followed up to point out that a highly anticipated speech from U.S. President Donald Trump regarding the ongoing conflict in the Middle East had already complicated the picture.

“No analysis is going to work when Trump can destroy the chart and setup with a single speech,” they noted.

With Trump warning that the U.S. will hit Iran “extremely hard” in the next couple of weeks, BTC retreated below $67,000, and ETH dipped back under $2,100, with the crypto market shaving over 3% from its market cap, per CoinGecko.

Meanwhile, data published on March 30 by analyst Darkfost showed that more than 40% of altcoins were trading at or near their all-time lows, a reading that was way worse than what was seen during the 2022 bear market.

In addition, XWIN Research Japan today flagged a bearish outlook for most major altcoins, including ETH, XRP, Solana, and BNB, with data from CryptoRank showing that only seven tokens posted positive returns in Q1 2026, and Tron’s TRX was the only one from the top 10 that ended the quarter in the green.

The post Three Macro Signals Align for Altcoins: But Is It Alt Season? appeared first on CryptoPotato.