Bitcoin (BTC 1.16%) is down by 6% over the last 12 months and 43% from its all-time high of just above $126,000, set in October 2025. If you're thinking of selling it after such a prolonged and steep decline, you aren't alone. In fact, at its current price, about 47% of all Bitcoin in circulation is now held at a loss.
That's a vast amount of pain for investors to be carrying, and the urge to cut losses is natural. But selling into the market's fear has historically been a losing strategy with this asset far more often than not. Here's what the data says about what you should do.
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Even some evangelists are cracking
One important detail is that Bitcoin's long-term holders, which includes all kinds of wallets with balances unmoved for six months or more, are bearing the heaviest burden.
Over 4.6 million of their coins, roughly 30% of their holdings, are now underwater, the largest share since 2023. Some are selling at their deepest losses in three years. So if you're suddenly feeling a lot less convinced about the investment thesis for Bitcoin, know that some of its most loyal and longtime boosters are now feeling the same doubt.
Fresh anxiety arrived in the last week of March when Alphabet's Google Quantum AI published a new paper outlining a smattering of theoretical attack paths against the cryptography underpinning Bitcoin, including scenarios where quantum computers could crack its encryption significantly faster than previously estimated. The practical threat from such quantum computers still remains at least a handful of years away, but the news compounds the ongoing unease about the coin, stemming from geopolitical conflict and a very questionable macro environment.
CRYPTO: BTC
Key Data Points
Nonetheless, Bitcoin's holders are not, on average, flooding the crypto exchanges with panicked sell orders, so investors should appreciate that despite the grim sentiment right now, the sky is not actually falling.
The long game heavily favors staying put right now
You shouldn't sell your Bitcoin because of its recent price action, nor because of the new paper from Google.
Historically, the periods where long-term holders have been this deep underwater have tended to last around nine months at the very most. And the price rebounded sharply afterward in every case.
More generally, across Bitcoin's full trading history, every rolling period of approximately 41 months or longer has produced a positive return. That's not a guarantee about your purchases becoming profitable if you wait long enough, but the structural forces that created that outcome in the past are still in full force. The coin is still scarce, increasingly difficult to mine over time, and in demand from countries, corporations, financial institutions, and individuals.
Could prices fall below $50,000? Nothing structural prevents that from happening if macro conditions worsen or if there's another major escalation of the conflict with Iran. Still, Bitcoin is an asset that's intended for long-term holding -- every dip is a gift, and it's usually the case that the times it feels the worst to buy it end up being the best times in hindsight.
