CryptoQuant founder and CEO Ki Young Ju: capital is flowing into BTC again, which is characteristic only of bull cycles.

He posted a chart of #BTC realized capitalization (Realized Cap), accompanied by this brief but optimistic statement.

Realized Cap, as a reminder, is a metric that values each BTC coin at the price when it was last moved on the blockchain, then adds up those values. Unlike regular market capitalization, which is calculated using the current market price of all coins, it takes their movement history into account.

That’s why growth in Realized Cap is often seen as a sign that BTC’s acquisition cost basis is being reset and that new capital may be coming in. The chart shown clearly illustrates the cyclical nature of this process:

- In 2016–2017, Realized Cap grew rapidly alongside the bull market.

- In 2018–2020, that growth gave way to a prolonged period of stagnation.

- In 2021, the metric surged again, but in 2022–2023 it began declining and moved into a range.

- A new, prolonged growth phase began in 2024 and continued through the end of 2025.

At the beginning of 2026, Realized Cap began to decline, accompanying BTC’s bearish phase. BUT in recent weeks, the metric has started rising again. That’s why Ki Young Ju views this reversal as further confirmation that the bull market is returning.

The only caveat is that an increase in Realized Cap doesn’t equal an actual inflow of the exact same amount of new money. It’s worth keeping that in mind. This metric also changes when coins acquired earlier are moved at a higher price, including between wallets.

Overall, though, historically this metric has been a good signal for a “bull run,” as we’ve said. So our announcement on September 14 that #BTC had entered a bull market (when the price moved into a sustained uptrend on the weekly timeframe) is now getting strong support from actual capital flows. We’d still like to see a correction after the initial pump, so we don’t buy at the highs. We’ve already shared the condition under which we’ll start buying all assets in all copy portfolios without waiting for a correction: the price moving into a sustained uptrend on the 2-week timeframe. We’ll buy in stages, not all at once.