Bitcoin’s social mood swung from one extreme to the other in roughly 72 hours this week, with on-chain analytics firm Santiment tracking a shift from deep fear to what it’s calling “ultra FOMO mode” between Monday and Thursday.
The firm is now reading that crowd enthusiasm as a warning, not a green light.
From Rejection to Recovery: What Actually Happened
Monday looked rough. Bitcoin had just stalled near $76,000, negative commentary piled up on social platforms, and Santiment’s positive-negative sentiment ratio dropped sharply into FUD territory. The firm flagged that as a buy signal.
By Thursday, April 23, Bitcoin had recovered above $78,000 and was knocking on $80,000 again. As of writing, BTC is trading around $77,500, up about 4% on the week and almost 10% over the past month, per CoinGecko, though it’s still about 38% off the all-time high of over $126,000 set in October 2025.
Santiment posted earlier today that the ratio had flipped hard into “ultra FOMO mode” and called it a “clear caution signal,” adding that a sustained break above $80,000 would be more convincing if optimism pulled back slightly first.
“Prices can continue to rally, and a breach above this resistance level would be massive in bringing in new and returning traders,” the firm wrote. “However, it will ideally happen when optimism calms down just slightly.”
ETF flows were more straightforward, with Farside Investors logging $223 million in net inflows across US spot Bitcoin ETFs on April 23, where BlackRock’s IBIT accounted for $167.5 million of that. Wise Crypto noted IBIT has pulled in roughly $3 billion year-to-date, landing in the top 1% of all ETFs by inflows.
Derivatives-Driven Rally Raises Questions About Durability
Not all analysts agree that BTC’s recent move was fully supported by strong demand. According to one of them, Carmelo Alemán, the rally from about $76,000 to $79,400 was largely driven by futures activity rather than spot buying.
During that move, open interest rose from about $24.9 billion to $28 billion, while short liquidations across Bitcoin and Ethereum totaled over $1.1 billion. This, per the market watcher, meant that many leveraged bearish positions had to be closed, which drove prices up.
While such rallies can be sharp, they can also be unstable if they’re not backed by sustained spot demand, and Alemán noted that this structure often leaves the market vulnerable to reversals if buying pressure fades.
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