The pool of long-term Bitcoin holders is still expanding, but a key profitability measure has fallen below neutral, creating a more cautious reading of the market structure even as the older supply continues to exit trading.
In a market note dated April 17, on-chain analyst Axel Adler Jr. said LTH’s realized supply of Bitcoin rose from 5.26 million BTC in January to 8.32 million BTC as of April 16, an increase of 3.06 million BTC in three months. At the same time, the LTH SOPR indicator, measured on a seven-day moving average, fell to 0.979 and has now remained below 1.0 for five consecutive days.
Data from long-term Bitcoin holders has become cautious
“The pool of long-term shareholders continues to expand.” books. “This combination is important: the volume of coins in the LTH pool is growing, but a portion of the old spent coins is already coming out at a loss.” In other words, more coins age into long-term holders, but some of the coins spent by this group are no longer sold profitably.
The supply side of the equation still looks structurally constructive. Adler said the Bitcoin LTH realized supply chart shows “a sharp increase in the volume of coins in… LTH cohort“, rising from 4.16 million BTC to 8.32 million BTC over the past year. He said this trend indicates “an expansion of long-term holding and a compression of liquid supply,” while also noting that part of the increase reflects existing coins simply maturing at the 155-day threshold rather than new purchases alone.
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An increasing LTH realized supply chain does not automatically mean new demand, but rather indicates that more supply becomes idle for longer periods. Adler compared the current setup with Bear market 2022when the realized supply of LTH reached 15.31 million BTC in November before starting to decline as legacy coins were spent. He said the current profile at the moment is more consistent with consolidation near $75,000 than with a broad distribution event.
The warning sign comes from the owner’s behavior at the point of sale. Adler described repeated declines LTH Super Less than 1.0 since February, a sign that long-term coin holders who spend coins are periodically doing so at a loss. The latest reading, 0.979, follows a deeper episode in late March and early April, when the index fell to 0.798 and remained below 1.0 for seven straight days before recovering briefly between April 5 and April 11.
Adler stopped short of calling for this surrender. “The current picture is a series of repeated shallow declines below 1.0 with a quick recovery, not a prolonged capitulation,” he wrote. “The key question now is whether the current series will hold above the March lows (0.798) or the SOPR will break below them. A repeat of the move deeper, combined with a simultaneous reversal of realized supply to the downside, is the real red flag for a regime change.”
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This framing is important because it sets clear terms for what could transform the current signal from local tension into something more serious. As long as the SOPR remains in what Adler called a shallow loss zone and rebounds quickly, it implies a short-term squeeze rather than a full bearish reset. In the FAQ section of the note, he said such short disruptions served as entry points rather than confirmation of the broader downtrend.
A bearish case, by Adler’s own definition, requires two things to happen together: the LTH SOPR remaining meaningfully below 1.0 and deepening, while the LTH SOPR rolls down. This does not indicate merely loss making through old hands, but rather a broader shift from mass expansion to active distribution.
For now, Adler’s conclusion falls in the middle. The backdrop remains structurally positive because long-term holder supply is still rising, but the new sell-loss signal means the market is no longer cleanly constructive. The next move in SOPR, especially relative to the March low, may determine whether this is just another local squeeze episode or the beginning of a more significant shift in Bitcoin’s holder ecosystem.
At press time, Bitcoin was trading at $77,880.
Featured image created with DALL.E, a chart from TradingView.com
