The Power Law Floor: How Low Can Bitcoin Go?

How low can bitcoin go? According to the Power Law floor, the lower bound today is about $67’100 (€60’600, CHF 55’900), only 3% below the price on Nov 13, 2026. Since 2011, every major crash has ended at the floor or above it. Bitcoin has rarely fallen below it, and never more than 12%. The floor is not a guarantee.

The question of the bottom

On October 6, 2025, bitcoin closed at $124’673, higher than ever. Nine months later, on June 30, 2026, it was $58’628: a drop of 53%. Anyone who bought near the high has since been asking one thing above all: how much further down can it go?

No one knows the next price. But in 16 years bitcoin has been through five major bear markets, and they followed a recognizable pattern. The Power Law floor sums up this pattern in one line. It doesn't tell you when the bottom will come, but where it has been so far.

What is the Power Law floor?

The bitcoin Power Law describes bitcoin's price as a curve that rises with the time since the genesis block on January 3, 2009. This curve is called the Power Law line because on a chart with two logarithmic axes it is a straight line.

The floor is the same curve, only lower: 42 % of the line, that is 0.42 times it. It is the line at which the major crashes since 2011 ended. If the price is below it, bitcoin is as cheap as it has rarely been, measured against its history. Above the floor is the trend: the price at which bitcoin is "fairly" valued, measured against its whole history. The floor is also the lowest boundary of the five bitcoin valuation zones from floor to euphoria.

Where is the Power Law floor today?

The floor rises every day because the Power Law line rises. The table shows it today and at a few reference dates, if the pattern continues to hold.

Converted at the ECB reference rates of Nov 12, 2026 (€1 = $1.1081 = CHF 0.9232), assuming constant exchange rates. Today's floor is shown live in your currency on the Power Law page.

Two things stand out. First, the floor grows fast: over the coming year it rises by about 36%. Second, it catches up with the price even if the price doesn't fall at all. If bitcoin stays at $69’219, according to the formula the floor will already be above it around December 19, 2026.

Around December 2028, the floor reaches the all-time high of October 2025. That is the real test of the model: if bitcoin is not clearly higher than today by then, the floor no longer describes it.

All bear market lows compared with the floor

This is how far bitcoin fell in each major bear market, measured from the all-time high to the lowest daily close afterwards.

Daily closing prices: Coin Metrics until Jan 10, 2018, OKX after that. Data as of Nov 7, 2026.

The "Decline" column is getting smaller: −93%, −85%, −84%, −77%, −53%. The "Low ÷ Power Law" column, by contrast, stays remarkably stable between 0.41 and 0.56. That is exactly what makes the floor more useful than rules of thumb like "bitcoin always falls 80% in a bear market". How long each bear market lasted and how quickly it recovered is in the comparison of all bitcoin bear markets.

The reason: the cycle highs are closer to the floor each time. Falling from a lower high means losing fewer percent to reach the floor. Had bitcoin lost 80% again in 2026, it would have closed at about $25’000: at 0.18 × Power Law, lower than at any time since 2010.

The chart shows all bear markets at a glance. The dots mark the lows, the dashed line is the floor.

How often did bitcoin fall below the floor?

Rarely, but it happened. Since 2011, bitcoin has closed below the floor on 119 of 5’790 days, just over 2%. If you include the first months from July 2010, when there was barely a market, it is 3.7%.

The outlier is 2015. Bitcoin had already reached its low in January 2015, at 0.53 × Power Law. After that, the price moved sideways for months while the floor kept rising. In August 2015 the floor caught up with the price, and a brief slump pushed it to $212, 12% below the floor.

That is an important lesson: bitcoin doesn't only get below the floor through a crash. It is enough for the price to stand still long enough. Exactly this situation is emerging at the end of 2026.

What happened after days below the floor

One year after each of the 118 days below the floor since 2011 for which a full year of data already exists, bitcoin was higher. In the worst case it was worth 2.3 times as much, on average 2.6 times.

Two examples:

• If you bought at $212 on Aug 24, 2015, a year later you held bitcoin worth $579 (2.7 times).
• If you bought at $15’784 on Nov 21, 2022, a year later you held bitcoin worth $35’739 (2.3 times). But the price was only back on the trend on February 14, 2024, just under 15 months after the low.

This record sounds clearer than it is. The 118 days come from only five episodes, most of them in 2012 and 2015, when bitcoin was a fraction of its current size. Five episodes are experience, not statistics that determine the future.

How low can bitcoin go today? Three scenarios

History suggests three levels. The prices apply to Nov 13, 2026, when bitcoin stood at $69’219 (€62’507, CHF 57’706).

The percentages show the distance from the price on Nov 13, 2026.

A fall to the floor is what has almost always happened so far. "Like 2015" is the lowest level since 2011. A new low at 0.30 × Power Law hasn't happened since 2011, but it can't be ruled out: a model that only knows the past can't draw a line that the future has to respect.

Bitcoin going to zero is not a Power Law scenario, but it is a real risk of any single investment. If you hold bitcoin, hold only so much that even the worst case doesn't ruin your life.

Work out with your own purchase price how much cushion the floor gives you today and in the coming years:

What the floor means for your plan

The floor is not a buy signal for betting everything on one card. It is a yardstick for setting your own rules before the next panic comes.

1. Hold so that you never have to sell. Losses usually arise when someone has to sell at the bottom: for rent, taxes or a loan. An emergency fund outside bitcoin protects you from that.
2. Plan loans against the floor. If you borrow against your bitcoin, your liquidation price must be well below the floor, with a cushion for a case like 2015 and lower. How that works is explained in the article Borrow instead of selling; work out your numbers in the loan calculator.
3. Set buying rules in advance. For example: near the floor, you buy a little more with your savings plan. What goes on in your head in such phases is described in HODL psychology: handling volatility.
4. Expect time, not just depth. After the 2022 low, it took just under 15 months to get back to the trend; after the 2015 low, more than two years. If you buy, you need that patience.
5. Tell a bottom from a panic. The typical mistakes at the bottom, from selling in capitulation to waiting for "even lower", are shown in FOMO, panic and capitulation.

What it brings to sell a portion near the top band and buy back at the floor is worked out by the cycle calculator. It also shows the risk: if the price never falls to your buyback price, you end up with less bitcoin.

Limits of the Power Law floor

The floor is the model's most reliable line, but it has weaknesses.

• It is fitted backwards. 0.42 was chosen to fit the lows from 2011 to 2022. That says nothing about whether a future low will respect it.
• It is tested more steeply over time. Because the floor rises faster than bitcoin gains in weak years, every sideways phase becomes a test. The end of 2026 is such a phase.
• It depends on the Power Law line. If its parameters change, the floor shifts with them. A separate regression with prices up to November 2026 comes out about 9% below the fixed formula, as the study on the Power Law and the methodology show.
• It knows no events. A ban in major markets, a serious flaw in the protocol or a forced mass liquidation are not in any formula.

So use the floor as a guide for your expectations, not as a promise. All data and formulas are in the methodology.