The down market that took Bitcoin to about US$58 thousand this year was far more mild than previous cycles. The assessment is by David Lawant, head of research at Anchorage Digital, who took part this Wednesday (16) in the Digital Asset Conference 2026 in São Paulo. In his view, the way the sector weathered the decline shows that Bitcoin has matured as an asset class.

“Many people in this room have already seen other Bitcoin and crypto bear markets, and honestly I have to say that this one was relatively easy compared to the others,” he said. Bear market is the name given to the prolonged period of falling prices in a market.

“I think there are specific reasons for that, and those reasons show Bitcoin’s maturation as an asset class in a way that really surprised me,” the executive added.

Why did a drop of more than 50% in Bitcoin not cause panic?

The numbers are frightening for those who entered the market now. After renewing its all-time high at US$126,000, Bitcoin had accumulated a decline of more than 50% at the worst moment of the cycle. The low was around US$58,000 a few months ago.

“That can be scary for many of those who are entering the market now,” Lawant acknowledged.

According to him, the atmosphere within the industry was very different from what was seen in past crises. The executive places the downturn period between October of last year and a few weeks ago.

“When we talk with our peers and we see what the industry is seeing, nobody stopped working—which was very different. And nobody lost enthusiasm for Bitcoin and for the more interesting areas of crypto, like stablecoins and tokenization,” he said.

Stablecoins are cryptocurrencies whose value is linked to a reference asset, generally the U.S. dollar. Tokenization is the process that turns traditional financial assets into digital tokens traded on a blockchain.

What changed in Bitcoin’s bear market since FTX

Lawant compared the current scenario to that of previous crises. The toughest reference was the break of FTX, an exchange that was one of the biggest in the world before it collapsed.

“For those who were here when FTX collapsed, there were moments when people questioned the very existence of the industry,” he said.

Speculative crypto and the fundamental thesis followed different paths

The executive also pointed to a separation between different market segments during the downturn.

“We saw a very clear differentiation between the most speculative areas of crypto and the assets that have a very clear fundamental thesis,” he said.

For Lawant, this split is one of the signs that Bitcoin has started to be treated differently from the rest of the market. He dares to say that the cycle’s bottom was in the range of US$58,000.

The article “Bitcoin bear market” was “relatively easy” compared with the previous ones, said Anchorage Digital, which was seen for the first time in BeInCrypto Brazil.