Remember when everyone was convinced Bitcoin only needed a couple more green candles to blast straight past $120,000? Yeah, me too. Then November 2025 showed up and reminded us, in the most painful way possible, that markets don’t care about our feelings.
Over the past four weeks, U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs have hemorrhaged more than $3.5 billion. That’s not a dip. That’s an exodus. And honestly, watching the daily flow numbers roll in has felt a bit like watching a slow-motion car crash you can’t look away from.
The Bleeding Won’t Stop – And It’s Getting Worse
Let’s be brutally clear about what we’re seeing. For the fourth straight week, every single trading day has ended in net red for the dozen spot Bitcoin ETFs. The latest numbers show another $22 million gone just this week – small compared to the billion-dollar-plus weekly bleed we saw earlier in the month, but still another cut in an already open wound.
In total, November has now sucked out roughly $3.57 billion from these funds. To put that in perspective, that basically wipes out everything they absorbed in September and October combined. The reversal has been savage.
I’ve been around crypto long enough to know that inflows and outflows aren’t the only thing that moves price, but when institutions are consistently hitting the sell button at this scale, it’s impossible to ignore the message they’re sending.
Why Are Institutions Running for the Exits?
Several things collided at once – and none of them are particularly bullish.
- Aggressive new tariff talk coming out of Washington that could spark another global trade war
- The Fed suddenly sounding a lot less dovish about December rate cuts
- A U.S. dollar that just keeps ripping higher, crushing risk assets in the process
- End-of-year portfolio rebalancing and tax-loss harvesting kicking into high gear
Put all that together and you get the perfect cocktail for institutions to lighten up on the “risk-on” trade of the year. Bitcoin, for all its narrative strength, is still treated as a macro-sensitive asset by most traditional players. When the macro environment turns hostile, BTC gets punished first and hardest.
“When the dollar strengthens and rate-cut odds collapse, high-beta assets like Bitcoin tend to suffer the most severe drawdowns. We’ve seen this movie before.”
– Senior macro strategist at a major U.S. hedge fund
The Fear & Greed Index Is Screaming “Extreme Fear”
Right now the CNN-style Fear & Greed Index for crypto sits at 15. That’s not just fear – that’s extreme fear territory we usually only see at major cycle bottoms.
I’ve watched this index for years, and I can tell you from experience that when it lingers down here for weeks (instead of bouncing quickly), it often means there’s still more pain to come before real capitulation arrives. Contrarian signal? Absolutely. Timing tool? Terrible.
Retail investors are getting wrecked. Leverage is getting flushed. And the comment sections on every crypto Twitter thread are filled with the usual “this time is different” despair we always hear near lows.
Technical Damage: The Death Cross No One Wanted to See
If the fundamentals weren’t ugly enough, the chart just rolled over and confirmed a textbook death cross on the daily timeframe – the 50-day moving average crossing below the 200-day.
Before you dismiss technical analysis as voodoo, understand this: death crosses don’t cause bear markets, but they often act as gravity during them. Once price is below both major moving averages and those averages are sloping down, rallies tend to be short-lived and viciously sold.
We’re seeing exactly that pattern play out right now. Every attempt to push back above $90,000 has been met with aggressive selling. The path of least resistance, at least in the short term, looks lower.
Key Levels to Watch – Where Could This End?
At the time of writing, Bitcoin is flirting with the $86,800 zone – a level that matches the 23.6% Fibonacci retracement of the entire move up from the 2024 lows. It’s also where we saw major resistance turn into support earlier this year.
- Hold $86,800 → possible retest of $94K–$95K (38.2% Fib)
- Lose $86,000 → fast move toward $74,500 (April swing low and 38.2% Fib)
- Lose $74,500 → real panic sets in, $64K–$60K becomes very possible
I’m not saying we’re definitely going to $60K tomorrow, but the structure is bearish until proven otherwise. The weekly chart is printing lower highs and lower lows. That’s the definition of a downtrend.
Is There Any Light at the End of This Tunnel?
Of course there is – there always is eventually. But timing matters.
History shows that November and December can be brutal months for Bitcoin when sentiment flips. Remember 2018? 2021? Both saw massive drawdowns late in the year before explosive moves higher the following January–March.
We also have to consider that ETF outflows, while painful, are actually healthy in the long run. They flush out weak hands and hot money. The investors who are selling now are the same ones who piled in at $90K+ expecting $200K by Christmas. Letting them exit at a loss sets the stage for stronger hands to accumulate.
Long-term on-chain metrics still look remarkably healthy. Exchange balances continue to drop. HODLers aren’t spending. The 2024-2025 halving supply shock is still very much in play.
What I’m Doing Personally
Full disclosure – I’ve been adding small amounts on the way down, but nothing heroic. My largest buys are still reserved for below $80K, ideally closer to $70K if we get there.
Why? Because I’ve learned the hard way that trying to catch exact bottoms is a fool’s game. But when ETF outflows are this extreme, when fear is this high, and when the macro backdrop finally starts to stabilize (which it always does), the snap-back rallies can be breathtaking.
December might still be ugly. January might start slow. But sometime in Q1 2026, a lot of people who sold in panic this month are going to be staring at much higher prices wishing they had just held on – or better yet, bought the fear.
The $3.5 billion ETF bleed in November 2025 isn’t the end of Bitcoin. It’s probably just the end of the 2025 euphoria phase. And if history is any guide, that’s exactly when the next real leg up begins to load.
Stay patient. Stay solvent. And maybe keep a little dry powder ready. The crypto market has a nasty habit of making the maximum number of people wrong at the exact moment it hurts the most.
See you on the other side.
