Bitcoin Top Buyers Capping Price Gains With $87.7K Now Critical: Glassnode

Research shows that Bitcoin (BTC) traders holding unrealized losses are capping price increases at $87,700, whereas ETF inflows are reinforcing support near the $80,000 mark.

Key points:

Bitcoin investors who acquired BTC during the later period of 2025 maintain a combined cost basis near $87,700, which currently acts as a resistance barrier according to Glassnode research.
The zone directly past $87,000 contains multiple resistance barriers, featuring the 2026 opening price of $87,490 alongside the 20-month moving average of $87,165.
Support for the Bitcoin price at $80,000 grows stronger as purchasing liquidity concentrates around this psychological threshold.

Bitcoin 2025 Buyers Contribute to $87,000 Resistance Area

Fresh studies from the onchain analytics network Glassnode demonstrate that the break-even threshold for a demographic of recent Bitcoin holders is presently functioning as a resistance level.

Ever since the year began, two separate groups of investors have prevented BTC/USD from advancing whenever values test their purchase cost basis.

Back in November 2025, prices dropped below the cost basis of investors who entered positions between six and twelve months prior, which stood at $94,000 at the time. When the price attempted to push past that trendline at $97,100 in January 2026, it transformed into resistance, prompting a rejection and driving valuations downward.

A comparable resistance trendline is established by the cost basis of participants who acquired BTC one to two years earlier. That specific group fell into an overall loss position in February of the current year when prices dropped beneath their $76,900 cost basis. By May, this cost basis halted a price recovery right above $82,000.

Across both scenarios, underwater investors seeking to liquidate holdings at their break-even point generated a barrier of selling pressure that incoming buying interest failed to absorb. In their commentary, Glassnode highlighted the scale of BTC price pullbacks following rejections at either cost basis level.

“Bitcoin rose to the 6-12 month cost basis in January and then fell by more than a third. It met the 1-2 year cost basis in May and fell by about a quarter,” it said. “The 1-2 year holders also stepped up their selling into the rally at the start of October.”

The current cost bases for the six-to-twelve-month demographic and the one-to-two-year demographic rest at $87,700 and $99,500 respectively.

BTC/USD chart with cohort breakeven levels (screenshot). Source: Glassnode

The region above $87,000 likewise features the 2026 opening valuation at $87,490 along with the 20-month simple moving average (SMA) for BTC/USD at $87,165, which is a threshold that historically heralded fresh all-time highs once recovered as support.

ETF Cost Basis Hosts Fresh BTC Price Support

Situated below the current spot pricing, the cost basis associated with United States spot Bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs) represents one of several noteworthy support zones clustered around the $80,000 threshold.

Glassnode places the spot ETF cost basis at $81,500, whereas Bitcoin’s true market mean—representing the acquisition cost basis for all BTC gathered across secondary markets—rests at $77,500. Beneath that point, the break-even valuation for Bitcoin short-term holders, defined as wallet addresses maintaining a specific volume of BTC for up to six months without liquidating, stands at $74,600.

Acting as a vital psychological milestone, the $80,000 mark currently serves as a focal point for bid liquidity throughout exchange order books.

“The block sits just under the US Spot ETF Cost Basis, so the zone between $80K and $81.5K is where order-book and on-chain support overlap. A break below it would bring the liquidation cluster just under $80K, and then the True Market Mean near $78K, into play,” Glassnode commented.