On January 5, 2026, the Hash Ribbon fired a buy signal. The 30-day moving average of Bitcoin’s hashrate had crossed back above the 60-day — confirmation that the worst of miner capitulation was over and conditions were stabilizing. Charles Edwards, the indicator’s creator, flagged it publicly. Bitcoin was trading near $93,000 at the time.
Three weeks later, on January 27, a severe winter storm disrupted power across major US mining regions. Bitcoin’s hashrate dropped approximately 20% — from roughly 1.2 zettahashes per second to around 950 exahashes per second — pushing the Hash Ribbon back into capitulation territory. That reading coincided with the broader February crash that brought Bitcoin from $90,000 down toward $60,000.
Two signals. Three weeks apart. Completely opposite readings. This is a good illustration of both the power and the nuance of the Hash Ribbon — and why understanding how it works is more valuable than just watching for the crossover.
What Is Bitcoin’s Hashrate?
Before understanding the Hash Ribbon, you need to understand what hashrate is and why it matters.
Bitcoin’s hashrate is the total computational power being dedicated to mining Bitcoin at any given moment — measured in hashes per second, now in the range of exahashes (EH/s) or zettahashes (ZH/s). Every miner in the world running machines to solve Bitcoin’s proof-of-work puzzle contributes to this number. When miners add machines, hashrate rises. When miners switch off machines, hashrate falls.
Why would miners switch off machines? Almost always for one reason: profitability. Mining Bitcoin requires significant ongoing costs — hardware, electricity, and facility overhead. When Bitcoin’s price falls far enough, or when difficulty rises fast enough, some miners — typically the least efficient ones with the highest operating costs — can no longer cover their expenses. When running the machines costs more than the Bitcoin they earn, those machines get turned off. This is miner capitulation.
Miner capitulation matters for Bitcoin’s price for a specific reason: miners are forced sellers. When miners are under financial stress, they sell the Bitcoin they mine (and sometimes their reserves) to cover operating costs. That consistent sell pressure from a large, ongoing source contributes to downward price pressure during bear markets. When capitulation ends — when the weakest miners have exited and the remaining miners are profitable again — that forced selling pressure evaporates, removing a structural headwind from the market.
How the Hash Ribbon Works
The Hash Ribbon, created by Charles Edwards of Capriole Investments in 2019, uses two simple moving averages of Bitcoin’s daily hashrate to identify when miner capitulation is occurring and — more importantly — when it ends.
The two lines are the 30-day moving average (30DMA) of hashrate and the 60-day moving average (60DMA) of hashrate. Their relationship is the entire signal.
When the 30DMA drops below the 60DMA, it means recent hashrate is declining relative to the longer-term trend — miners are switching off machines. This is the capitulation phase. On the Bitcoin Magazine Pro Hash Ribbons chart, this period is marked in pink/red. It’s not a buy signal — it’s a warning that miner stress is elevated and forced selling may be ongoing.
When the 30DMA crosses back above the 60DMA, it means hashrate is recovering — the weakest miners have exited, survivors are profitable again, and new machines may be coming online. This is the end of capitulation. On the chart, this crossover is marked in lighter pink transitioning back to white. When this crossover coincides with upward price momentum — Bitcoin’s price starting to move positively — that combination is the full Hash Ribbon buy signal.
As Edwards himself has written: when miners give up, it is possibly the most powerful Bitcoin buy signal ever. Not because the crossover predicts an immediate price jump, but because it marks the resolution of one of the most persistent structural headwinds a bear market can produce.
Historical Buy Signals: The Track Record
The Hash Ribbon’s historical performance is what makes it worth understanding. Every major Bitcoin bottom since the indicator was backtested has been accompanied or closely preceded by a Hash Ribbon buy signal.
The FTX collapse in November 2022 triggered historic miner capitulation — multiple large miners reported bankruptcy and dumped Bitcoin reserves onto the market simultaneously. The Hash Ribbon entered deep capitulation as hashrate fell sharply. When the crossover finally came in early 2023, Bitcoin was trading near $16,000–$21,000. Edwards confirmed the buy signal and noted the signal date was the second lowest price in the prior 48 days. What followed was the 2023 recovery from $16,000 to $31,000.
The mid-2024 capitulation followed the yen carry trade unwind in August 2024. Bitcoin bottomed near $49,000 as the Hash Ribbon entered capitulation. When the crossover resolved and the buy signal appeared, Bitcoin went on to hit $100,000 by January 2025. The signal date for the buy was near the August lows.
The pattern is consistent: capitulation creates the bottom, the crossover confirms it’s ending, and the buy signal marks the beginning of the recovery window. It doesn’t time the exact lowest tick — but it has reliably identified the zone of maximum risk/reward for long-term accumulation.
The January 2026 Signal — And What Happened Next
The Hash Ribbon story in early 2026 is particularly instructive because it shows both the signal’s value and its limitations in real time.
Following the November 2025 correction from Bitcoin’s October all-time high of $126,296, miners came under pressure as prices fell from $100,000+ toward the $80,000–$90,000 range. The Hash Ribbon entered capitulation in late 2025 as less efficient miners began shutting down. By early January 2026, the 30DMA crossed back above the 60DMA — the Hash Ribbon fired its first buy signal in over six months on January 5, coinciding with Bitcoin’s hashrate hitting an all-time high above 1.068 billion TH/s and Bitcoin trading near $93,000.
Then came January 27. A major winter storm across US mining regions knocked offline a significant portion of America’s mining capacity. Hashrate dropped approximately 20% — the largest single decline since China’s mining ban in July 2021. The 30DMA rolled back below the 60DMA, pushing the Hash Ribbon back into capitulation. This re-entry coincided with the broader February macro sell-off and the historic $3.2 billion realized loss day on February 5 that we covered in Onchain Pulse #1.
The key question as of early March 2026: has hashrate recovered enough to generate a new crossover? Check the current reading on the Bitcoin Magazine Pro Hash Ribbons chart or Glassnode’s Hash Ribbon chart — that’s where the live signal lives. A new 30DMA crossing above 60DMA, coinciding with price momentum turning positive, would be the buy signal to watch for in March.
Post-Halving Complications: Why 2024–2025 Is Different
One important nuance for interpreting the Hash Ribbon in the current cycle: the April 2024 halving cut miner block rewards from 3.125 BTC per block to 1.5625 BTC overnight. That 50% revenue reduction immediately pushed marginal miners toward capitulation — creating an artificial Hash Ribbon signal that was driven by the halving mechanics rather than genuine market-driven distress.
This matters because it compressed the typical post-halving recovery timeline. In prior cycles, the halving-driven capitulation resolved over 3–6 months as difficulty adjusted downward to compensate for less efficient miners exiting. In 2024, surging Bitcoin prices and massive institutional demand via ETFs resolved the pressure faster — miners who survived the halving saw their dollar revenue recover quickly as BTC prices rose toward and then above $100,000.
The practical implication: in a halving year, Hash Ribbon signals require more context than usual. A capitulation signal driven purely by halving mechanics resolves differently than one driven by a genuine bear market. Pairing the Hash Ribbon with exchange reserve data (covered in our Exchange Reserves Explained article) and Thermocap Multiple gives you better context for which type of signal you’re reading.
How to Use the Hash Ribbon in Practice
The Hash Ribbon is a long-term, macro-level signal. It is not useful for timing short-term trades or week-to-week market moves. It’s most powerful when used as a cycle-positioning tool — a signal that tells you whether the structural headwind of miner forced selling is present or absent.
Three practical rules for using it well:
First, wait for the full signal. The crossover of 30DMA above 60DMA is the first condition. The second condition is positive price momentum — Bitcoin’s price actually moving upward, not just the hashrate recovering while price continues falling. The full buy signal requires both. A crossover into a continued price decline is a caution sign, not a buy signal yet.
Second, treat it as a zone indicator, not a price target. Hash Ribbon buy signals have historically appeared within 10–20% of major cycle lows — but “within 20%” of the low and “at the exact low” are different things. Use it to identify favorable accumulation windows, not to call the precise bottom tick.
Third, use it alongside the broader onchain framework. The Hash Ribbon tells you about miner behavior. STH-SOPR tells you about short-term holder behavior. The MVRV Z-Score tells you about overall market valuation. When multiple metrics align — Hash Ribbon recovering, STH-SOPR crossing above 1.0, MVRV Z-Score in the green zone — the confluence is far more meaningful than any single signal alone. All of these metrics are defined in our Bitcoin Onchain Glossary.
Where to Check the Hash Ribbon for Free
Three free tools display the Hash Ribbon clearly. Bitcoin Magazine Pro’s Hash Ribbons chart is the most visually clean — it shows the colored zones (pink for capitulation, white for recovery) alongside Bitcoin’s price, making it easy to correlate the signals with historical price action. Glassnode’s Hash Ribbon chart is available on their free tier with a basic account. Checkonchain includes hashrate and miner metrics as part of its broader analytics suite.
Check it monthly rather than daily. The Hash Ribbon is a slow-moving, structural indicator — daily fluctuations in hashrate create noise. The meaningful signal is the sustained crossover and recovery, which unfolds over weeks, not hours.
The Bottom Line
The Hash Ribbon earns its reputation as one of Bitcoin’s most powerful buy signals because it’s grounded in economic reality rather than speculation. It doesn’t measure sentiment or predict where price will go — it measures whether the people who secure Bitcoin’s network are under financial stress or not. When the stress resolves, a reliable structural headwind lifts. That resolution has coincided with every major Bitcoin bottom since the indicator was created.
The 2026 story is still unfolding. The January buy signal was real — and was then interrupted by an exogenous shock. Whether the subsequent capitulation resolves with a new crossover in March, and whether that coincides with positive price momentum, is one of the most important technical developments to watch in the coming weeks.
We track miner metrics alongside MVRV, SOPR, exchange reserves, and ETF flows every Monday in the Onchain Pulse. Subscribe below to get the weekly read before the trading week begins.
The Hash Ribbon is one signal in a broader onchain framework. For cycle-level valuation context, the MVRV Z-Score measures how far Bitcoin’s market cap is stretched above its aggregate cost basis, while Realized Price gives you the actual dollar-level floor where every major bear market has historically found a bottom. The NVT Ratio adds a usage-based valuation check on whether Bitcoin’s market cap is justified by actual transaction volume. When all of these converge — Hash Ribbon recovering, MVRV in the neutral zone, price above Realized Price — the composite read is much stronger than any single indicator. For a structured view of what multiple signals look like at cycle extremes, the 7 Cycle Top Indicators post covers the full framework. For identifying specific price levels where buyers have historically stepped in, see Bitcoin Accumulation Zones. For a step-by-step weekly routine using all of these tools in under 15 minutes, see the Onchain Analysis Tutorial and the 10 Best Free Bitcoin Onchain Tools.
Sources
- Bitcoin Magazine Pro — Hash Ribbons Live Chart (free)
- Glassnode — Hash Ribbon Chart (free tier)
- Checkonchain — Miner and Hashrate Analytics Suite
- Charles Edwards / Capriole Investments — Hash Ribbons & Bitcoin Bottoms (original article)
- CoinDesk — Bitcoin Miners Cut Production as Hash Ribbon Points to Rebound (Jan 27, 2026)
- TradingView/NewsBTC — Bitcoin Miner Capitulation Ends: Hash Ribbons Flash Buy Signal (Jan 6, 2026)
- Bitcoin Ethereum News — Bitcoin Triggers Rare Hash Ribbon Signal (Jan 5, 2026)
- NewsBTC — Bitcoin Hash Ribbons Trigger Buy Signal (FTX recovery context)
This article is for educational purposes only and does not constitute financial advice. Always do your own research.
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Disclaimer
The information provided in this article is for informational and educational purposes only and should not be construed as financial, investment, or trading advice. Onchain News does not provide recommendations to buy, sell, or hold any asset, and nothing here should be taken as a guarantee of future performance. Always conduct your own research and consult a qualified financial professional before making any investment decisions. Cryptocurrency markets are volatile and you are responsible for your own risk.
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