Bitcoin Bounces, But Where Does It Go Next? Here’s What the Charts Say

Bitcoin is trading at $82,295, up 1.28% in 24 hours, after a Thursday slide below $80,000, its first dip under that level in more than a month. Ethereum gained 4.17% to $2,473.17, Solana rose 3.02%, and XRP added 2.03%.

Zcash is the strongest of the top 15 largest coins, jumping 10.29% to $1,222.02, lifting its market cap to $20.67 billion, and roughly erasing the almost 10% it lost on Thursday.

In general, the market is bouncing today after spending most of the week heading in the other direction.

Thursday's drop triggered $948 million in liquidations, 90.6% of them longs, per CoinGlass data. A liquidation is the forced closing of a trade placed with borrowed money after losses wipe out the collateral, and a long is a bet on rising prices, so the selling feeds on itself.

On the daily chart, Bitcoin hugs an important resistance market of $81,603, a level traders draw between a major low and high to estimate where pullbacks find buyers. Thursday's wick to $79,711 dipped under it and under the 50-day exponential moving average, or EMA, a line weighting recent prices more heavily, now at $80,407.

The 200-day EMA sits at $75,759, about 8% below the current price, and with the 50-day above it, the long-term trend still reads bullish.

The Average Directional Index, or ADX, which measures trend strength without direction, reads 25.5, barely above the 25 line that confirms a trend, and sellers (DI-) lead buyers (DI+). The Relative Strength Index, or RSI, is a 0-to-100 momentum gauge where 70 is overbought and 30 oversold. That’s at 48.9, neutral with a slight lean to sellers.

On Myriad, the prediction market built by Decrypt's parent company Dastan, traders are placing odds at 31% that Bitcoin hits a high of $87,500 in October down from 45% on Tuesday. In a separate market, Myriad traders say there's now a 43% chance BTC falls to $77,500.

The bullish scenario needs buyers to defend $81,603 and close above $84,246, opening $85,301, $86,644 and the $87,423 high, ideally with a rising ADX as confirmation.

The sideways scenario keeps Bitcoin between the $80,365 swing low and $84,246. The bearish scenario starts with a daily close below $81,603, putting $80,407 and $80,365 in play, then $78,003 and the $75,759 to $75,093 zone where the 200-day EMA meets the 50% retracement.