Bitcoin Bulls Get A Boost From Coinbase's Armstrong – But BOJ Move Could Test The Rally

• Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong said he was "long on Bitcoin" and expects a "much higher" price by 2030.
• Analyst Benjamin Cowen said "time-based capitulation" matters more than price, as the decline occurs around week 35 of a 50–60-week cycle.
• A hawkish surprise might unwind yen-funded carry bets and hit Bitcoin, repeating the BOJ's January 2025 increase, which dropped BTC 25% to 31%.

Bitcoin (BTC) has likely bottomed, said Coinbase Global Inc. (COIN) Chief Executive Officer Brian Armstrong, even as traders are bracing for a Bank of Japan (BOJ) rate decision that could affect crypto markets this week.

Armstrong said in an interview on Friday that his "instinct is we probably have bottomed at this point, maybe at the 60k number," while cautioning that "nobody can say for sure." He reaffirmed that he remained "long Bitcoin, just like always" and described the asset as "the new digital gold," predicting a "much higher" price by 2030.

Armstrong added a bullish tone to a market that has been grinding lower through 2026. But not everyone believes the bottom is in. Benjamin Cowen, founder of Into the Cryptoverse, said that the more important signal is not price but “time-based capitulation.”

Analyst Hints At Time-Based Capitulation

Cowen said the last two midterms were bear markets, from December 2017 to December 2018 and from November 2021 to November 2022, each lasting about a year, and historical bear markets typically play out over 50 to 60 weeks. He said that we are about week 35 in the current downturn, which leaves room for a later bottom.

One exception he flagged was the bear market of 2019 to 2020, which ended abruptly when the pandemic triggered a "price-based capitulation" and reset on-chain indicators such as realized price and terminal price. 

If Bitcoin were to capitulate sharply in June the way it did in March 2020, it wouldn’t make sense to stay bearish until October, said Cowen. Without that kind of reset, history suggests a low later in the year, he said, similar to the S&P 500’s 1962 selloff that bottomed in the summer before a higher low that October.

The Yen Carry Trade

The near-term catalyst, however, may come from Tokyo rather than the charts. The Bank of Japan is expected to raise its standard interest rate to 1% from 0.75% on Tuesday, the highest since 1995. But while that may sound like a routine decision it could have real implications for risk assets.

Speculative short positions on the yen rose to more than 115,000 contracts in the week to June 9, the highest since November 2017, Commodity Futures Trading Commission data showed. Those will continue to weaken. 

If the BOJ hikes rates as expected and signals further tightening, those shorts could be unwound, pushing the yen higher and pressuring yen-funded carry trades, leading to forced liquidations and deleveraging across all markets.

Such trades have powered bull markets on Wall Street and in global bond markets for years, and some analysts believe they have propped up crypto as well.

A similar scenario took place after the BOJ’s 0.50% hike on Jan. 24, 2025. In the weeks after that, Bitcoin plummeted about 25% to 31%, the biggest drop in the central bank’s recent tightening cycle as yen-funded carry trades unwound and leveraged traders were forced to liquidate positions.

At the time of writing, Bitcoin’s price was trading at $65,638, up nearly 2% in the last 24 hours. On Stocktwits, retail sentiment around the apex cryptocurrency improved to the ‘bullish’ zone from the ‘neutral’ zone over the past day. Chatter around it, however, remained at ‘low’ levels. 

The asset has been down 25% year-to-date. 

Read also: Arthur Hayes Says AI Drained Bitcoin's Liquidity, Is Now Bearish On All Risk Assets But Energy

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