Bitcoin has lost less than 2.5% in December as traders look toward the monthly and yearly candle close.

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BTC/USD 1-month chart. Source: Cointelegraph/TradingView

BTC price down less than 2.5% in December

Data from Cointelegraph Markets Pro and TradingView confirms that despite strong selling in recent days, BTC/USD remains up almost 50% in Q4.

Bitcoin ( BTC ) remains a winning investment in 2024, and zooming out from short-term BTC price moves, the bull case looks firmly intact.

While currently down about $15,000 from last week’s all-time highs, BTC/USD is, in fact, only 2.4% lower than its December opening level.

As a highly varied month, December can produce both significant upside and brutal downside, data from monitoring resource CoinGlass shows. By historical measures, 2024 appears average.

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BTC/USD monthly returns (screenshot). Source: CoinGlass

“The monthly candle may not look bullish now, but there’s still one week left before it closes,” trader and analyst Titan of Crypto wrote in his latest analysis on X.

Titan of Crypto flagged a rising trend line, which should stay in place as support.

“As long as BTC stays above this trend line, there’s no reason to worry,” the post added, calling the trend line Bitcoin’s “most crucial.”

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BTC/USDT 1-month chart with Ichimoku cloud data. Source: Titan of Crypto/X

CoinGlass meanwhile reveals that BTC price action has work to do in order to match performance from December 2023.

As Cointelegraph reported , some market participants are currently focusing on copycat market behavior from last year, with BTC/USD closely following a fractal from the end of Q4.

“All of 2024 was a copy of 2023,” fellow trading account Nestay argued last week. 

“Each structure in the sequence has been printed again. This market is fractal, just press play.”
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BTC/USD fractal. Source: Nestay/X

Bitcoin short-term holders back on the radar

Trading account Bitcoindata21 suggested that, as with two previous market downturns, Bitcoin may reverse upward once it hits the realized price for the short-term holder (STH) investor cohort.

Related: BTC price risks $20K crash: 5 Things to know in Bitcoin this week

Currently near $86,000, the STH realized price reflects the aggregate price at which more speculative Bitcoin investors break even on their holdings.

“It might not hit 86k, but if it does, I will be aggressively adding risk,” Bitcoindata21 told X followers.

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BTC/USD 8-hour chart comparison. Source: Bitcoindata21/X

On that topic, analyst On-Chain College nonetheless had a word of warning.

“Any price drop above the Bitcoin STHCB is simply noise,” his own X post stated, referring to the STH cost basis, another term for realized price. 

“If the STHCB is lost and can't be reclaimed, then I reevaluate.”

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.