The Bitcoin (BTC) power law, which places BTC at a “fair value” of $142,000, suggests that the price of BTC is getting ready to burst to the upside, according to author and analyst Adam Livingston.
Bitcoin’s upper band price by December 31, 2025, is projected at about $512,000, while the fair-value price sits at about $142,000, with the low end of the range coming in just north of the $50,000 level, Livingston said.
Price “hugging” the fair value line since March 2024 is unusual and suggests that Bitcoin is ready to explode higher, Livingston said. He added:
“Every previous time BTC did this, one of two things happened: It exploded upward because it had been underpriced relative to its long-term power law, or it briefly dipped into the lower band and then ripped vertically, harder than before.”
BTC price analysis based on the Bitcoin power law. Source: Adam Livingston
Market analysts and crypto industry executives lower BTC price forecasts
Several investment firms have lowered their BTC price predictions following a historic market crash in October that took the price of BTC below $100,000, a critical psychological price level.
Galaxy lowered its 2025 end-of-year forecast for Bitcoin from $180,000 to $120,000 on Wednesday, citing the October market crash, lower volatility due to market maturation, and investors rotating into competing narratives like AI.
“If bitcoin can maintain the $100,000 level, we believe the almost three-year bull market will remain structurally intact, though the pace of future gains may be slower,” Galaxy’s head of firmwide research, Alex Thorn, said.
Thorn added that the crypto market crash in October “materially damaged” the bullish price trend in the short-term, but said he remains bullish on Bitcoin’s long-term price action.
Cathie Wood, the founder of investment firm Ark Invest, also lowered her long-term BTC price forecast by $300,000 due to stablecoins eroding Bitcoin’s market share by satisfying demand for a store-of-value asset in emerging economies.
Binance co-founder CZ said he was somewhat surprised at receiving a pardon from United States President Donald Trump and denied having a business relationship with the Trump family during an interview on Friday.
CZ told Fox News that he never physically met or spoke with Trump before or after receiving a presidential pardon in October, and only met with Trump’s son Eric once at the Bitcoin Middle East and North Africa conference in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates.
“There is no business relationship between me, Binance, and World Liberty Finance,” CZ said. He added that he was unaware of the status of his pardon during the process:
“I did not know when or if it was going to happen. I believe my lawyers submitted the petition in April, and it took a few months. I didn’t know the progress. There was no indication of how far it went along, etc. Then, it happened one day.”
Binance co-founder CZ pushes back against claims that his pardon was financially motivated. Source: Fox News
The pardon drew mixed reactions, with the crypto community celebrating it as a win for the industry and a reversal of the anti-crypto policies of the Biden administration, while Democratic lawmakers were critical of the pardon, accusing Trump of political corruption.
“He had a lot of support, and they said that what he did is not even a crime, it wasn’t a crime. He was persecuted by the Biden administration,” Trump said.
Democratic Rep. Maxine Waters accused Trump of entering into a “pay-to-play” agreement, pardoning CZ in exchange for crypto investments into projects and platforms associated with the Trump family, including World Liberty Financial (WLFI).
A letter from Democratic lawmakers scrutinizing the pardon. Source: US Senate
The allegations also prompted several Democratic lawmakers, including Massachusetts senator Elizabeth Warren and Vermont senator Bernie Sanders, to pen an open letter to attorney general Pam Bondi, scrutinizing Trump and the pardon.
The nation-state model is eroding and losing relevance, according to Jarrad Hope, author of “Farewell to Westphalia: Crypto Sovereignty and Post-Nation-State Governance” and co-founder of Logos, a project developing blockchain tools and decentralized digital infrastructure for network states, sovereign communities that exist in cyberspace.
“Modern nation-states are nearly 380 years old, predating even the scientific discovery of oxygen and gravity,” Hope told Cointelegraph, adding that the internet and blockchain present new tools for organizing society that allow people to build across geographies.
These tools include inflation-resistant decentralized digital currencies, immutable ledgers for tamper-free records, smart contract platforms for automated financial and legal agreements, privacy-preserving protocols, and decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs) for transparent community governance. Hope added:
“Traditional governance asks you to trust unelected bureaucrats, unfamiliar people, and opaque processes. Blockchain-enabled communities, by contrast, lean on transparent infrastructure that narrows the domain of trust.”
He also said that the biggest obstacle network states face is resistance from established nation-states and institutions, including multinational corporations, and pointed to the UK Online Safety Act as an example of centralized control over digital infrastructure.
The slow emergence of network states is a popular topic in the crypto community, built on the core ideals of decentralization, transparency, equal access, immutability, and the right to privacy, central to the cypherpunk ethos at the heart of cryptocurrencies.
Network states are being attempted, but they need more than blockchain to stay afloat
Several attempts have been made to establish a network state or form micronations that declare independence, including Bitnation in 2014, a project that attempted to create a borderless, blockchain-based state.
However, none of these efforts has yielded a successful and autonomous network state that functions as a sovereign nation in cyberspace.
An illustrated example of a network state. Source: The Network State
Hope, other blockchain experts, and crypto industry executives tell Cointelegraph that established nation-states will attempt to undermine emerging network states as they develop.
These established states can use regulations, litigation, or military force to prevent rising competition from an alternative organizational model, industry executives say.
Older Bitcoin whales are selling heavily, spending over 1,000 BTC/hour in 2025.
Bitcoin’s bear pennant pattern projects a potential drop to $89,600.
Bitcoin (BTC) was at risk of further losses as the oldest whales continued to spend their BTC stash.
Capriole Investments co-founder Charles Edwards said that “super whales are cashing out of Bitcoin,” in a post on X, raising concerns about the potential impact on BTC’s price.
Edwards shared a chart illustrating the extent of onchain spending from “OG” Bitcoin holders—those who have held their assets for seven years or more.
The chart features two color-coded categories: orange for $100 million dumps and red for $500 million dumps, clearly demonstrating the scale of selling by these long-term investors. This selling began in November 2024 and intensified in 2025.
“The chart is VERY colorful in 2025,” Edwards said, adding:
“OGs are cashing out.”
Bitcoin OG whale dumping. Source: Glassnode
Additional data from Glassnode shows that events where these whales have been spending more than 1,000 BTC per hour have been persistent since January.
“The key distinction in this cycle is that these OG whale high-spending events occurred more frequently throughout, signalling persistent distribution.“
Bitcoin OG whale spending events. Source: Glassnode
One such example is “Bitcoin OG Owen Gunden,” highlighted by onchain analytics platform Lookonchain. This whale has moved 3,600 BTC, worth about $372 million, on Saturday, with “500 $BTC($51.68) already deposited to Kraken.”
Despite this selling pressure, the market has exhibited unusual resilience, according to Willy Woo, who argues that “what constitutes an ‘OG dump’ is simply BTC moving out of an address that has been untouched for 7 years.”
Willy Woo suggested that BTC transfers by long-term holders may be intended for moving to taproot addresses for quantum-safe transactions. He notes that these could also involve custody rotations or seeding BTC treasury companies, rather than actual sales.
Bitcoin “bear pennant” targets $90,000
Data from Cointelegraph Markets Pro and TradingView shows BTC trading inside a bear pennant, suggesting that a significant downward move may be next.
A bear pennant is a downward continuation pattern that occurs after a significant drop, followed by a consolidation period at the lower end of the price range.
A break below the pennant’s support line at $100,650 could potentially lead to the next leg down for Bitcoin, measured at $89,600 or a 12% decline from its current price level.
This article does not contain investment advice or recommendations. Every investment and trading move involves risk, and readers should conduct their own research when making a decision.
Faruk Fatih Özer was found dead in his prison cell on Nov. 1. The former CEO of now-defunct crypto exchange Thodex was serving an 11,000-year sentence for running one of the largest crypto scams in history.
His death marks the latest turn in the Thodex saga, with ripple effects so significant they altered Turkish cryptocurrency laws.
The initial details of Özer’s death point to suicide, but the investigation is still ongoing. It has once more brought Thodex back into the spotlight.
Here’s a look back at Özer’s story, how the crypto exchange impacted Turkish law and how it may have contributed to the country’s increased crypto adoption.
$2-billion Thodex scam sees raids, arrest and CEO out on the lam
On April 21, 2021, Thodex cryptocurrency exchange suddenly shut down trading and withdrawals. The initial announcement read that this could continue for four to five days. As Cointelegraph Turkey reported at the time, the exchange claimed that this was to improve its operations with the help of “world-renowned banks and funding companies.”
But local media reported that Özer had fled to Thailand with over $2 billion in funds as part of an exit scam. There were also reports that police had raided the exchange’s offices in Istanbul.
Istanbul’s chief prosecutor’s office corroborated the reports the following day. It announced a probe into Thodex and said police had arrested 62 people allegedly involved in the scam. Özer denied the accusations, claiming his trip abroad was to meet foreign investors.
As of April 30, 2021, a Turkish court decided to jail six suspects, including family members of the missing CEO and senior company employees, pending trial. Interpol also issued a red notice for Özer.
“When he is caught with the red notice, we have extradition agreements with a large part of these countries. God willing he will be caught and he will be returned,” said Interior Minister Süleyman Soylu.
Özer managed to evade capture for over a year. Albanian authorities eventually detained him on Aug. 30, 2022. He attempted to appeal extradition in court, but the decision was upheld, and Özer was in Turkish custody by April 30, 2023, two years after the scandal began.
Özer was detained by Turkish authorities after being extradited from Albania. Source: AA
The case against Özer was swift. In July 2023, just three months after arriving in Turkey, he was sentenced to seven months and 15 days in prison for failing to submit certain documents requested by the Tax Inspection Board during the trial.
In court, Özer claimed that he and his family were facing false accusations. He said, “I am smart enough to manage all institutions in the world. This is evident from the company I founded at the age of 22. If I were to establish a criminal organization, I would not act so amateurishly. … It is clear that the suspects in the file have been victims for more than 2 years.”
Özer was serving his sentence at the Tekirdağ No. 1 F-Type High Security Closed Penal Institution when he died. F-Type prisons are high-security institutions reserved for political prisoners, members of organized crime syndicates and other armed groups serving an aggravated life sentence.
Human rights advocates have repeatedly raised concerns about the conditions at F-Type prisons. In 2007, Amnesty International noted “harsh and arbitrary” disciplinary treatments, as well as isolation.
Turkey changes its laws to protect investors
The Thomex scandal and its ensuing fallout were so significant that they drove the Turkish government to change its policies toward cryptocurrencies.
Immediately following news of Özer fleeing the country, the Central Bank of the Republic of Turkey banned crypto payments and prohibited payment providers from offering fiat on-ramps for crypto exchanges. The official notice outlawed “any direct or indirect usage of crypto assets in payment services and electronic money issuance.” Notably, the ban excluded banks, meaning that users can still deposit lira onto crypto exchange accounts using bank transfers.
The ban aimed to ensure financial stability, while other agencies like the Capital Markets Board (CMB) and the Financial Crimes Investigation Board (MASAK) moved to legitimize trading activities. In May 2021, MASAK amended money laundering and terrorism financing laws to include provisions for cryptocurrency.
By 2024, the “Law on Amendments to the Capital Markets Law” came into effect. This built on the initial changes in 2021, which included extensive consumer protection measures in addition to provisions on licensing and reporting.
These new measures, which also aimed to move Turkey off the Financial Action Task Force’s “gray list” of countries with inadequate Anti-Money Laundering measures, have in turn helped spur the local crypto industry.
Chainalysis’ “2025 Geography of Crypto Report” found that Turkey led the Middle East and North Africa in value received in crypto. Trading activity also spiked last year.
In the long term, the Thodex scandal may have led to increased crypto adoption in the country, but only after it rocked the Turkish crypto industry and left many investors out to dry. It also resulted in the imprisonment and death of its orchestrator and CEO.
Bitcoin reaching a quarter of a million dollars this year may be more trouble than its worth, according to a macro analyst.
“One of the worst things that could happen is Bitcoin shoots up to $250,000, and the S&P to 8,000 in like a 3-month period,” macro analyst and investor Mel Mattison told crypto entrepreneur Anthony Pompliano in an interview published to YouTube on Friday.
“And you get this blow-off top, and everybody rushes to the exits to take profits, and it starts going down,” Mattison said.
Bitcoin (BTC) jumping to $250,000 would represent an increase of around 142% from its current price of $102,870, according to CoinMarketCap.
Bitcoin is having “healthy rotations,” Mattison says
It comes just days after Bitcoin fell below $100,000 for the first time in four months on Nov. 4. Mattison said, “We’re having healthy rotations, healthy movement, and we are getting at some very interesting points at some of the channels that I look at.”
Bitcoin is down 16.39% over the past 30 days. Source: CoinMarketCap
Just a month earlier, BitMEX co-founder Arthur Hayes and BitMine chairman Tom Lee had reaffirmed their bullish outlook for Bitcoin, suggesting Bitcoin could still reach $250,000 before the end of the year, despite the narrowing time frame.
November has historically been the highest-performing month on average for Bitcoin, with an average return of 42%. At Bitcoin’s current price of $103,000, this would mean the asset would reach $145,000 by the end of the month, if the average holds, according to CoinGlass.
Bitcoin bear market in 2026 is up for debate in the industry
That would align with Canary Capital CEO Steven McClurg’s forecast that Bitcoin will climb to between $140,000 and $150,000 by the end of this year, before entering a bear market in 2026.
However, not everyone agrees with the bearish outlook for 2026.
Mattison said that Bitcoin may reach $150,000 for the first time in February 2026.
Bitwise CIO Matt Hougan recently predicted that 2026 will be another “up year” for Bitcoin, running counter to the traditional four-year cycle narrative.
Meanwhile, Galaxy Digital CEO Mike Novogratz said in late October that planets would almost need to align for Bitcoin to reach $250,000 by the end of the year.
A New York jury was unable to reach a verdict in the case of Anton and James Peraire-Bueno, the MIT-educated brothers accused of fraud and money laundering related to a 2023 exploit of the Ethereum blockchain that resulted in the removal of $25 million in digital assets.
In a Friday ruling, US District Judge Jessica Clarke declared a mistrial in the case after jurors failed to agree on whether to convict or acquit the brothers, Inner City Press reported.
The decision came after a three-week trial in Manhattan federal court, resulting in differing theories from prosecutors and the defense regarding the Peraire-Buenos’ alleged actions involving maximal extractable value (MEV) bots.
A MEV attack occurs when traders or validators exploit transaction ordering on a blockchain for profit. Using automated MEV bots, they front-run or sandwich other trades by paying higher fees for priority.
In the brothers’ case, they allegedly used MEV bots to “trick” users into trades. The exploit, though planned by the two for months, reportedly took just 12 seconds to net the pair $25 million.
In closing arguments to the jury this week, prosecutors argued that the brothers “tricked” and “defrauded” users by engaging in a “bait and switch” scheme, allowing them to extract about $25 million in crypto. They cited evidence suggesting that the two plotted their moves for months and researched potential consequences of their actions.
“Ladies and gentlemen, bait and switch is not a trading strategy,” said prosecutors on Tuesday, according to Inner City Press. “It is fraud. It is cheating. It is rigging the system. They pretended to be a legitimate MEV-Boost validator.”
In contrast, defense lawyers for the Peraire-Buenos pushed back against the US government’s theory of the two pretending to be “honest validators” to extract the funds, though the court ultimately allowed the argument to be presented to the jury.
“This is like stealing a base in baseball,” said the defense team on Tuesday. “If there’s no fraud, there’s no conspiracy, there’s no money laundering.”
What’s at stake for the crypto industry following the verdict?
Though the case ended without a verdict, the mistrial has left the crypto industry divided, with many observers debating the legal and technical implications of treating MEV-related activity as a potential criminal offense. Crypto advocacy organization Coin Center filed an amicus brief on Monday after opposition from prosecutors.
“I don’t think what’s in the indictment constitutes wire fraud,” said Carl Volz, a partner at law firm Gunnercooke, in a Monday op-ed for DLNews. “A jury could conclude differently, but if it does, it’ll be because the brothers googled stupidly and talked too much, for too long, with the wrong people.”
Some traders who are warning about an upcoming Bitcoin correction might be driven more by self-interest than by an unbiased view of the market, according to a Bitcoin analyst.
“If you sold, you really want lower prices,” Bitcoin analyst PlanC said on the Mr. M Podcast published to YouTube on Friday, reiterating that those who’ve recently sold Bitcoin (BTC) may become more vocal on social media, promoting the idea of Bitcoin’s price falling in hopes of seeing the market move in their favor.
“The whole point of you selling is to think that the bear market is coming,” he said. “So you’re going to get on social media,” he added.
Bitcoin social media sentiment is still leaning positive overall
Many market participants turn to social media to gauge overall sentiment about Bitcoin, paying close attention to community interactions and prediction posts.
It comes as sentiment among the broader crypto market has plunged, with the Crypto Fear & Greed Index, which gauges overall market sentiment, posting an “Extreme Fear” reading of 20 in its Saturday update.
The Crypto Fear & Greed Index posted an “Extreme Fear” score on Saturday. Source: Alternative.me
However, data from sentiment platform Santiment shows overall social media sentiment for Bitcoin (BTC) is 57.78% positive, 15.80% neutral, and 26.42% negative.
PlanC said that Bitcoin’s recent price decline below the psychological $100,000 price level to $98,000 may have been the local bottom for now.
PlanC forecasts a “decent chance” that Bitcoin just reached a bottom
“I think there is a good chance, again, it is hard to quantify exact probabilities, but from my perspective, there is a decent chance that was the major bottom,” PlanC said.
Bitcoin is down 16.15% over the past 30 days. Source: CoinMarketCap
“If it wasn’t, I don’t see us going down much lower,” he added. Bitcoin has since rebounded to $103,562, according to CoinMarketCap, but PlanC cautioned that another brief pullback could still occur.
Jurors who will decide whether two brothers are guilty beyond a reasonable doubt in a case involving maximal extractable value (MEV) bots on the Ethereum blockchain are no closer to reaching a verdict going into the weekend.
According to reporting from Inner City Press at a New York City court on Friday, the jurors in the US government’s case against Anton and James Peraire-Bueno requested additional clarification from the judge regarding the intentions behind their actions. Despite the instructions from the judge, the jurors were reportedly “having an issue reaching a unanimous verdict” in the case.
The reporting suggested that the jury could find the brothers not guilty on at least one of the charges for conspiracy to commit wire fraud, money laundering and conspiracy to receive stolen property. Judge Jessica Clarke denied the defense lawyers’ requests for a mistrial and directed the jury to order dinner and continue deliberations.
The deliberations, having taken almost three full business days as of Friday afternoon, have been far longer than comparable cases involving cryptocurrency and fraud. In contrast, the jury for the criminal trial of former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried, in the same district court, took about five hours to find him guilty of seven felony charges.
The charges against the brothers stemmed from allegations that they used MEV bots to extract about $25 million in crypto from the Ethereum blockchain in 2023. The prosecutors’ theory of the case, presented to the jury, was that the two individuals had “tricked” the system by presenting themselves as “honest validators” on the blockchain.
How long can juries deliberate?
At the time of publication, it was unclear whether the jury would reach a verdict by the end of the day. In a note to the judge on Thursday, they said they could stay until 7:30 pm ET on Friday.
While there is generally no law limiting the amount of time a jury may take to deliberate, a judge can intervene to expedite proceedings or grant a motion for a mistrial if the jury indicates that it is deadlocked. In the Peraire-Buenos’ case, Clarke has not issued an Allen charge — “instructions given to a hung jury urging them to agree on a verdict,” according to Cornell Law School’s Legal Information Institute.
Bitcoin’s mining sector is under mounting pressure as the hash price, the industry’s key profitability metric, slips toward levels that could force smaller operators offline and strain the wider supply chain.
Hash price, which measures expected daily revenue per unit of computational power, is currently around $42 per petahash per second (PH/s). The metric has been in steady decline since July, when it surged above $62 per PH/s.
The push toward the $40 level leads Bitcoin mining operations, which are already facing razor-thin profit margins, to consider shutting down their rigs, according to TheMinerMag.
The decline in hash price is also affecting the mining supply chain. Hardware providers are filling fewer orders to struggling miners and are also taking a hit on any BTC-denominated sales due to the drop in price after the October market crash, the report said.
Hash price plummets and nears a critical level. Source: TheMinerMag
Mining hardware manufacturers, such as Bitdeer, have turned to self-mining to offset the shortfall in demand for mining machines.
The razor-thin profit margins, high capital expenditure on upgrading hardware and rising energy costs have caused many Bitcoin miners to pivot to AI and high-performance computing data centers to generate revenue as Bitcoin mining becomes more competitive.
Miners pivot to AI amid constantly increasing hashrate
Bitcoin miners are guaranteed to have their rewards slashed by 50% every four years during the Bitcoin halving, as the computational power and electricity needed to mine blocks continue to climb.
The Bitcoin network hashrate continues to climb and has broken past 1 zetahash per second (ZH/s). Source: CryptoQuant
The initial block reward for successfully mining a block in 2009 was 50 BTC, and node runners were mining BTC using CPUs on personal computers.
Following the April 2024 halving, the BTC block reward decreased to 3.125 BTC, and today, specialized mining hardware known as application-specific integrated circuits (ASICs) is required to mine BTC.
These challenging economics have forced many miners to diversify into adjacent AI data center and compute businesses, which have generated billions of dollars in revenue for companies that made the switch.
In October, Cipher Mining inked a $5.5 billion deal with tech giant Amazon to provide compute power to Amazon Web Services over a 15-year period.
IREN, a Bitcoin mining company, signed a similar deal with Microsoft in November to provide GPU computing services, valued at $9.7 billion.
