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CryptoQuant head of research Julio Moreno stated on March 5, 2026 that Bitcoin remains in a bear market despite a short-term price recovery, warning that recent gains reflect eased selling pressure rather than renewed demand. The assessment, supported by multiple on-chain indicators, puts a realistic bottom window somewhere in the third quarter of this year. For retail crypto users across Africa and South Asia, who rely on Bitcoin for remittances, inflation hedging, and currency access in ways that differ sharply from Western market participants, the distinction carries direct practical weight.

Bitcoin has dropped roughly 22% in Q1 2026 alone, its worst quarterly showing since 2018. The asset peaked above $126,000 in October 2025 and has since fallen more than 45% from that peak. The current decline bears a structural resemblance to early 2022, when Bitcoin dropped below its one-year moving average and entered a prolonged contraction that lasted the better part of a year.

Moreno was direct about what that means for traders sizing up the current move: "There will be price rallies but don't confuse that with the start of a bull market."

What the on-chain data actually shows

The core metric behind CryptoQuant's bearish reading is its Bull Score Index, a composite 0-to-100 measure that has been stuck between 0 and 10 for roughly six weeks. Moreno described the reading plainly: "There's too much weakness in either the data or in the markets."

A score in that range reflects what CryptoQuant characterises as extremely bearish territory, historically associated with continued price weakness rather than sustained recovery.

The spot demand picture tells a similar story. In early January, spot demand contraction sat at approximately negative 136,000 BTC. By March that figure had narrowed to around negative 25,000 BTC, which explains why prices have bounced.

However, shrinking selling pressure is not the same as fresh capital entering the market. Supporting that point, USDT market cap growth has been essentially flat since mid-October 2025, meaning the pool of new money available to buy Bitcoin has stalled.

US spot Bitcoin ETFs, which were a major driver of the 2024 to 2025 bull run, flipped to net sellers in Q4 2025 and offloaded more than 10,000 BTC on a net basis in January 2026 alone. That compares to net purchases of roughly 46,000 BTC during January 2025.

Some signals point the other way

Not every data point supports the bear case. The Coinbase Bitcoin Premium Index turned positive on March 5 for the first time in about 40 days, reaching a reading of +0.0227%, a sign that US institutional buyers may be returning.

A single day on March 4 saw $506.5 million flow into spot Bitcoin ETFs, and the week ending late February closed with net ETF inflows of $787 million.

Long-term holder selling has also collapsed by 87% since early February, from a net position change of roughly negative 244,000 BTC down to negative 32,000 BTC by March 1. Net position change is a specific long-term holder accounting measure in on-chain analysis, not a simple count of coins sold.

Selling exhaustion of that scale is typically a necessary condition for a bottom, even if it is not sufficient on its own.

Analysts at Glassnode remain cautious despite those signals. "Until larger wallets shift toward sustained accumulation, the probability of further downside contraction remains elevated," the firm noted, according to reporting by Sherwood News.

Coin Bureau co-founder Nic Puckrin added historical context, also cited via Sherwood News: bear markets typically run for about a year, and only six months have passed since Bitcoin's October 2025 peak. Puckrin warned that relief rallies of 20 to 30% before a final sell-off are entirely normal in that environment.

What this means for Africa and South Asia

For users in Nigeria and across Sub-Saharan Africa, the stakes here are different from those in Western markets. According to data from Chainalysis and Breet.io, Nigeria recorded over $92 billion in crypto flows in the most recent 12-month period, with an estimated 22 million Nigerians, roughly 10% of the population, holding crypto.

Bitcoin accounts for 89% of purchases in Nigeria and 74% in South Africa. Across the region, the asset functions primarily as a store of value, a remittance tool, and a means of accessing foreign currency, rather than as a speculative trade. That last function is especially significant in markets such as Nigeria, where capital controls on the naira have made crypto one of the few accessible routes to foreign exchange for ordinary savers.

Crucially, 85% of Nigerian crypto transactions fall below $1 million, marking the market as overwhelmingly retail. Those small-value users are the most exposed to extended bear conditions.

One resilience pattern worth watching: in previous downturns, small retail transaction counts in Sub-Saharan Africa grew even as large transfers fell, suggesting that necessity-driven usage including remittances, inflation hedging, and currency access continues regardless of price. Adding pressure to this picture, African crypto exchanges and brokers face tightening licensing requirements in 2026, raising compliance costs at a moment when bear-market conditions are already squeezing retail margins.

In India, CoinDCX reported in February 2026 (via CoinDesk) that customers are buying the dip in Bitcoin and Layer 1 tokens, reflecting what the exchange described as a maturing investor base that has moved away from speculative memecoins. CoinDCX holds approximately 6.6% of the Indian retail crypto market. For context, WazirX, which held roughly 11.1% market share before its 2024 security breach, remains in an uncertain operational state, making CoinDCX one of the primary available data sources for retail sentiment in India today.

The structural drag remains, however. India's 1% tax deducted at source on crypto trades, introduced in 2022, compounds the pain in a bear market by hitting frequent traders with accumulated friction on every transaction. That burden appears set to intensify rather than ease: the Union Budget 2026 proposes strengthening compliance enforcement for crypto platforms on transaction disclosures, signalling continued regulatory pressure on the sector.

Looking ahead

Moreno's base case puts the first credible bottoming window at Q3 2026, conditional on demand recovering, US institutional flows turning consistently positive, and stablecoin liquidity resuming growth. The Coinbase Premium Index turning positive is one early indicator of returning US demand, though a single day's reading does not yet constitute the sustained trend the recovery case requires.

Key resistance levels to watch on any further rally sit at $79,000 and $90,000, price zones that correspond to the average on-chain cost basis for large groups of traders (known as realized price bands in on-chain analysis) and have historically acted as ceilings in bear markets.

Support is concentrated in the $60,000 to $62,300 range, according to data cited by BeInCrypto.

As of March 5 and 6, 2026, the Bitcoin Fear and Greed Index reads 15 out of 100, a level the index labels extreme fear. That figure updates daily; readers checking after publication should consult the live index for the current reading.

Moreno's summary for traders still holds: "First of all you have to accept this. We are in a bear market. So plan accordingly."