Trader names Bitcoin’s next target after $16,000

The trader Ilya Meshcheryakov explains the current market situation.

The flagship cryptocurrency continues its uptrend and not long ago it breached the $16,000 mark — Bitcoin hadn’t been this high since the start of 2018. Altcoins, however, are not doing as well as in 2018, as any meaningful rise here is more the exception than the rule, and Bitcoin’s dominance stands at 64.6%.

In the previous overview, it was possible to quite accurately gauge the next stop for the flagship — the resistance was the $15,850-$15,950 zone, on the basis of which the “ascending triangle” pattern formed.

This is a very strong pattern for continuing the rise, as from the perspective of the balance of supply and demand there is a “compression” of the selling zone. At the same time, pullbacks from this zone are getting weaker, and breakthroughs beyond the zone are becoming more insistent — bulls increase activity, and bears are no longer able to keep the price below.

Ascending triangle on Bitcoin with the highlighted resistance zone (in red). Hourly chart BTC/USDT from TradingView.

The target for this formation is the $17,500 mark. To reach it, use the height of the figure (about $1,500) and the breakout point — around $16,000. Given how quickly Bitcoin has accelerated recently, this appears a fairly realistic target.

However, in a certain percentage of cases this pattern can transition into a flat with the lower boundary at $14,500, which would be a significantly less bullish phase. The signal for a move into a flat would be a breakout of the $15,400 level.

Meanwhile, the strongest altcoins of the past week have formed a similar pattern — Ethereum (ETH) price has already attempted to break above the resistance, but pulled back quickly, and Chainlink (LINK) quotes are close to a breakout. The target for Ethereum is around $505, and for Chainlink — $15.5.

It is worth noting that for a large number of other coins, the situation is not as bright: they failed to reach even their early November highs and are trading with notably lower resistance.

Comparison of formations for ETH and LINK coins. Hourly charts ETHUSDT and LINKUSDT from TradingView.

There are fewer red flags for bulls than last week — Bitcoin has already dumped ‘passengers’ twice: a move down $1,500 on November 7 and $1,000 on November 9, which reduced overbought conditions and now gives fewer chances for short-term declines to trigger stop-losses on long positions. Therefore, declines of more than $1,000 should be viewed as a possible break in the uptrend.

Thus, mid-term targets based on the current formation sit near $17,500, and negating the scenario would be a drop below $15,400, which could push Bitcoin into a prolonged flat.

Altcoins are painting mixed scenarios, however at the moment there are no grounds for a leadership shift from last week.

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