Bitcoin News Today: Standard Chartered Declares Bitcoin's $59,000 Bottom Is In — "Winter Is Over, Welcome Back to Crypto Spring"

Standard Chartered analyst Geoffrey Kendrick has declared that Bitcoin reached its definitive cycle bottom this week, with the low locked in at $59,000 — a 53% drop from the October 6 all-time high of $126,000. "Winter is over. Welcome back to crypto Spring," Kendrick wrote in a Friday note. CoinDesk data shows Bitcoin touched as low as $59,375 on June 5 at approximately 18:00 UTC. At the time of writing, Bitcoin hovered just shy of $64,000 — a recovery of nearly $4,500 from the low in just over a week. The case for the bottom: two catalysts converging Kendrick, who maintains a $4,000 Ethereum price target and a $100,000 Bitcoin target by year-end, identified two specific drivers behind his call. The first is the SpaceX IPO's role in clearing forced ETF selling. Recent weeks saw some of the sharpest spot Bitcoin ETF outflows since inception, with total redemptions exceeding $5.72 billion since the second week of May — a figure that updates and extends the $5.4 billion estimate 10x Research had calculated earlier in the week. Kendrick noted that ETF holders have anecdotally been liquidating positions specifically to free up cash for SpaceX IPO participation — directly supporting the capital rotation theory that CoinDesk's "Day Ahead" column raised before the IPO. With SpaceX now trading — opening around $150 on Friday and running approximately 26% above its $135 IPO price — Kendrick argues that the specific selling pressure tied to IPO participation may now be exhausted. The intense demand for SpaceX exposure is also visible on crypto exchanges like Hyperliquid, where SpaceX's crypto-traded contracts have implied valuations as high as $2.4 trillion — 35% above the official IPO valuation, reflecting the same retail and speculative enthusiasm that drove VELVET's 1,400% weekly surge on pre-IPO exposure plays. The second catalyst is the potential US-Iran peace deal. If a genuine G7-related agreement materializes, it could halt oil's escalation, which would in turn cool rising US Treasury yields and ease the macro pressure that has weighed on crypto throughout the correction. Brent crude fell to approximately $87 per barrel and WTI to around $85 as Trump spoke of a likely peace deal — continuing the de-escalation that helped drive Bitcoin's recovery to $63,500 by Saturday. The complication: Trump's U-turn Kendrick's thesis received an immediate complication. After initially speaking of a likely peace deal — the comments that helped push oil toward $85-$87 and supported Friday's crypto rally — Trump later reversed course in a Truth Social post, stating that the deal made public was not what had actually been agreed and warning Iranian officials to "get their act together." This U-turn fits the now-familiar pattern of premature peace optimism followed by reversal that has whipsawed markets repeatedly since February — including Iran's own denial just one day earlier of a Sunday Geneva signing date. The pattern raises the question of how durable Friday's oil price decline and the associated crypto rally will prove if the underlying peace process remains as unresolved as it has been throughout the conflict. Three metrics Kendrick is watching to confirm the floor Kendrick laid out a specific, falsifiable framework for confirming his bottom call over the coming days — a notably concrete approach compared to the more qualitative bottom-calling that has characterized much of this cycle's commentary. First, a Monday announcement showing that Strategy purchased more Bitcoin this week. Given that Strategy already disclosed a 1,550 BTC purchase for $101 million earlier this week alongside raising its dollar reserve to $1 billion, a continuation of that buying pattern into the following week would reinforce the signal that Strategy's capital structure concerns have eased following the panic triggered by its 32 BTC sale. Second, a return to net-positive daily inflows for US spot Bitcoin ETFs on Friday. This is the most direct test of whether the $5.72 billion outflow streak has genuinely ended rather than merely paused — and it directly addresses the demand-side concern that CryptoQuant raised regarding the 652,000 BTC weekly demand contraction and the fastest-shrinking ETF demand since January 2024. Third, continued declines in international oil prices, which would validate that the Iran de-escalation — however uncertain given Trump's U-turn — is translating into genuine commodity market relief rather than a headline-driven false signal. What it means Kendrick's framework essentially operationalizes the "close to value, not confirmed recovery" assessment that dominated this week's on-chain analysis. Bitcoin's valuation relative to its realized price ($53,600) already suggested the asset was cheap by historical standards. What was missing was confirmation that demand-side metrics were turning alongside the price action. If all three of Kendrick's signals confirm next week — continued Strategy buying, positive ETF flows, and falling oil — the case for $59,000 as the genuine cycle low strengthens considerably, and Kendrick's broader targets of $100,000 for Bitcoin and $4,000 for Ethereum by year-end become a more credible base case. If any of the three fail to materialize — particularly the ETF inflow signal, given the unresolved Iran situation and the upcoming June 17 FOMC meeting — the bottom call would remain unconfirmed, and the "close to value, not confirmed recovery" framing from earlier in the week would continue to apply.