How bad was the bear market that began in October 2025? If you only look at the distance from the high, the answer is: milder than any big fall before it. Bitcoin dropped 53 percent. In the cycles before, it was 77 to 93 percent.
Today bitcoin sits 35 percent below its record. That sounds like a discount. Whether it is one, this single number does not tell you.
There are two other ways to measure the same fall. With prices back to 2010, both can be calculated for every bear market in bitcoin's history, and each gives a different answer.
How far back is the price?
The first extra question is simple: when did bitcoin first reach today's price? The gap between today and that day is called time displacement.
On 14 October 2026, bitcoin closed at $81,335. It first reached that price on 11 November 2024. So the time displacement is 702 days, just under two years.
How to read it:
- Zero means a new all-time high.
- Sideways adds one day for every day that passes.
- When price falls, it jumps, because the new price matches a much older date.
- When price rises, it shrinks.
Drawdown measures the fall on the price axis. Time displacement measures it on the time axis.
Drawdown tells you how much is gone. Time displacement tells you how many years are gone.
Put both numbers side by side for every bear market, and the ranking flips.
The mildest big fall sent the price furthest back
Since 2010, bitcoin has fallen by more than half seven times. At each low:
| Bear market | Drawdown | Low matched a price from | Displacement at the low | High to low |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2011 | −92.8 % | April 2011 | 203 days | 162 days |
| 2013, spring | −71.4 % | March 2013 | 107 days | 88 days |
| 2013/15 | −89.5 % | April 2013 | 651 days | 406 days |
| 2017/18 | −83.4 % | August 2017 | 496 days | 363 days |
| 2021, spring | −53.0 % | January 2021 | 199 days | 96 days |
| 2021/22 | −76.6 % | December 2017 | 1,798 days | 365 days |
| 2025/26 | −53.2 % | March 2021 | 1,935 days | 267 days |
Bitcoin Research Kit daily closes, 16 Aug 2010 to 14 Oct 2026. Bear market = all-time high to the lowest close before the next record, falls of more than 50 percent only.
Among the five big cycles, 2025/26 has the smallest drawdown and the largest time displacement. The low of 30 June 2026 matched a price from March 2021, five and a quarter years earlier. No low before it reached that far back. In 2011 bitcoin fell 93 percent and still landed only seven months in the past.
The smaller the falls became, the further back they sent the price.
How does that fit together?
How far a fall sends you back depends on the rise before it
Time displacement at the low does not depend on how deep the fall is, but on how fast price rose before.
In 2011 bitcoin cost $2.14 at the low. That price was first reached at the end of April 2011, just 41 days before the high. In those 41 days, the price had risen elevenfold. A 93 percent fall therefore only undid a very steep, very short rise.
2026 was the opposite. From March 2021 to the high in October 2025, bitcoin needed 1,668 days to double. In between, it spent three years closing between roughly $16,000 and $69,000. A fall into that zone lands far in the past, even if it is small in percent.
Bitcoin rises more slowly than it used to. That is why smaller falls now cost more years.
Anyone who bought in mid-March 2021 was roughly back at zero at the low, more than five years later. Which leaves the question of whether bitcoin was at least cheap there.
Bitcoin was not cheap at any low since 2017
That takes a third number: on how many days of its history so far did bitcoin close lower than on that day? This is the share of days below.
| Low | Share of days below |
|---|---|
| 18 Nov 2011 | 55.7 % |
| 14 Jan 2015 | 67.1 % |
| 14 Dec 2018 | 83.7 % |
| 9 Nov 2022 | 83.3 % |
| 30 Jun 2026 | 84.8 % |
Since 2018, every low of a big cycle sat above more than 83 percent of all days before it. Each time, price was far below the record and still more expensive than the vast majority of its own history.
The reason is simple. Bitcoin has become so much more expensive since 2010 that the early years sit below almost every later price. The longer the series runs, the higher each new price ranks in the distribution. So the share of days below tells you how a price stands against the whole history, not against the last cycle.
A price can lie years in the past and still not be cheap.
So what do you do with three numbers instead of one?
Three numbers, three kinds of bear market
Each number answers a different question about the same fall:
- Drawdown: how much value was lost since the high?
- Time displacement: how many years of price progress were erased?
- Share of days below: how cheap is the price against its own history?
Together they separate bear markets that a single number makes look alike. History supplies an example of each kind:
- Deep, far back and cheap, 2013/15: −89.5 percent, 651 days back, only two thirds of days below. The market repriced bitcoin, and deeply.
- Deep, but barely back and expensive, spring 2013: −71.4 percent, but only 107 days back, with 89.9 percent of days below. A fast drop from an overstretched high.
- Mild, but far back and expensive, 2025/26: −53.2 percent, 1,935 days back, 84.8 percent below. Price fell back into a zone where it had moved sideways for years.
By drawdown alone, you would have taken 2026 for the most harmless of the big falls. In time, it was the harshest.
Before you read time displacement, there is one quirk you should know.
Why time displacement sometimes barely moves
Time displacement reacts very unevenly to price. The list of first-reach dates around today's price shows it:
| Price | First reached |
|---|---|
| $90,000 | 13 Nov 2024 |
| $84,000 | 11 Nov 2024 |
| $80,000 | 10 Nov 2024 |
| $70,000 | 11 Mar 2024 |
From $90,000 to $80,000 is a good 11 percent, but only three days. After the US election in November 2024, bitcoin rose through that whole range within days. From $80,000 to $70,000 is 12.5 percent, but 244 days.
It is the same rule as with the bear markets, on a smaller scale: where price once rose fast, time displacement barely moves. Where it worked its way up slowly, it jumps far.
A drop below $80,000 does not cost three days. It costs eight months.
How rare is the state in which time displacement is zero at all?
Records are the exception
From 17 August 2010 to 14 October 2026, bitcoin closed at a new record on 257 of 5,903 days. That is roughly one day in 23.
On every other day, price sat below an earlier high. That is exactly the state time displacement describes, and as a holder you spend almost all your time in it.
Holding almost always means sitting below an old high.
Where bitcoin stands today
On 14 October 2026, bitcoin closed at $81,335:
- Drawdown: −34.8 percent, 373 days after the high.
- Time displacement: 702 days. That price was first reached on 11 November 2024.
- Share of days below: 92.1 percent of all days since 2010 closed lower.
Read together: the market has given back almost two years of progress. Even so, the price sits above more than nine tenths of its own history.
The 35 percent below the high is a distance, not a discount.
A low price is not yet a cheap one
- Do not call a price cheap just because it is far below the high. Check on how many days bitcoin closed lower. Today it is 92 percent.
- Do not compare bear markets by drawdown alone. 2026 was the mildest of the big cycles in percent and the harshest in time.
- Read time displacement with the price list next to it. Below $80,000 it jumps by months, above it barely moves.
None of the three numbers predicts the next price, and nothing has been tested for that. Anyone who wants to check it needs the same rules as for any other signal: separate episodes instead of overlapping days, a random comparison group, and returns against the normal upward drift, not against zero. With seven bear markets since 2010, that is few cases, but it is the next measurement.
The numbers for every day since 2010, with the price list and the share of days below, are in the chart: Price-Time Displacement
FAQ
Why was time displacement even larger after the low than at the low? Because sideways adds a day every day. After the low of 30 June 2026, bitcoin moved around $60,000. On 16 August 2026 it closed at $62,812, a price from April 2021, and time displacement reached 1,951 days, the highest value since 2010. 2022/23 was the same: the highest value came on 8 January 2023 at 1,854 days, two months after the low.
Is the share of days below the same as the share of coins in profit? No. The share of days counts every day equally, however much was traded. On-chain measures such as NUPL or MVRV weight by coins and their purchase price. The two numbers therefore differ.
Why do the two drops in spring 2013 and spring 2021 count? Because both took more than half off the all-time high before a new record came. But they ran in the middle of a rising cycle and were over within months. The statement about the big cycles rests on the other five.
Does this work for altcoins? It can be calculated, but it rarely says much. Most altcoins never reach their high again. Their time displacement then simply runs back to the start of their price history and stops measuring anything.
How it was measured
Daily closes from the Bitcoin Research Kit (market cap divided by circulating supply), 16 Aug 2010 to 14 Oct 2026, 5,904 days, retrieved on 15 Oct 2026 via bitview.space. The platform chart uses the same series. For each day, the earliest day with a close at least as high is found. Time displacement is the gap in calendar days. The share of days below counts all days up to that day that closed lower, so it never looks ahead. Prices from 2010 to 2013 come from a few thinly traded exchanges. With intraday prices, first-reach dates would come earlier and the numbers would be smaller.
Not investment advice, not a recommendation, not a forecast — historical patterns are no promise.
Study the Past — Improve your Future 🥋