Michael Saylor's firm Strategy has significantly reduced its Bitcoin accumulation pace, purchasing only 3,273 Bitcoin for $255 million last week, marking a substantial decline from earlier buying rounds. According to Fortune reports, Strategy acquired more than 100,000 Bitcoin during March and April, a position worth over $7.7 billion at current prices. The firm's holdings even overtook BlackRock's popular Bitcoin ETF, highlighting the scale of its buying activity. However, the slowdown has been attributed to weaker sales of its perpetual preferred shares, known as STRC, which the company uses to fund its Bitcoin purchases. As per Glassnode analysis, the STRC funding mechanism, introduced in July 2025, carries an 11.5% dividend and is designed to trade around $100. However, when the shares fall below that level, issuing new stock becomes more expensive, limiting Strategy's ability to raise funds for additional Bitcoin buying.
Bitcoin's mid-sized holders, known as 'sharks' with 100–1,000 BTC, are increasing their exposure with their aggregate holdings climbing toward ~3.5 million BTC, near multi-month highs, according to Glassnode. At the same time, perpetual futures funding rates have hovered around neutral to slightly negative, reflecting cautious sentiment among leveraged traders. The divergence suggests that while spot demand is strengthening, the derivatives market is not positioned for aggressive upside. For May, rising shark accumulation with flat-to-negative funding suggests Bitcoin may see a controlled pullback or sideways grind, not a clean bullish breakout. Larger holders are buying spot, but hedging through futures shows they remain cautious about near-term downside, with dips potentially attracting buyers but rallies staying capped unless funding improves.
Bitcoin's liquidity backdrop has turned decisively bullish as Tether's stablecoin USDT's market cap growth has flipped from contraction to expansion. CryptoQuant data shows Tether's 60-day market cap change staging a sharp V-shaped rebound after falling below zero in early 2026, signaling fresh capital returning to the market. Historically, rising USDT supply has acted as fuel for Bitcoin rallies, as stablecoin liquidity often becomes "dry powder" for spot buying. The latest rebound suggests the late-2025 liquidity drain has ended, giving BTC stronger support near the $77,000–$78,000 range. If this newly minted USDT converts into spot demand, Bitcoin could challenge overhead resistance in May, making the liquidity pivot one of the clearest bullish signals currently supporting BTC.
Bitcoin has consistently posted negative returns in May during recent US midterm election cycles, reinforcing the seasonal "sell in May" narrative. In 2018, Bitcoin fell about 18% in May amid a broader downtrend following a failed Q1 recovery rally. In 2022, the cryptocurrency dropped another 15%–16% during May, pressured by aggressive monetary tightening and the collapse of major crypto entities, which drove prices toward the $26,000 zone. Across these two cycles, Bitcoin has averaged approximately 15% decline in May during midterm years. If the pattern repeats, BTC may drop toward $65,500 in May, with the monthly drop typically marking only the early or middle phase of a larger downturn, with full-cycle drawdowns historically extending beyond 60% from peak levels.
Bitcoin trades within a rising channel after rebounding from February lows, but momentum is fading near resistance. A breakdown below the lower trendline, aligned with 0.618 Fibonacci support, could trigger a decline toward the $69,000 region by early May, extending the corrective structure within a broader post-peak downtrend. A rebound from the $69,000 support raises the odds that the BTC price will eye the channel's upper trendline as the primary upside target. Conversely, a close below the lower trendline may trigger a bear flag setup, with bear flags forming when the price consolidates higher inside a parallel channel after undergoing a downtrend. Applying this technical rule on the BTC/USD daily chart brings the flag target to under $56,000, with the pair potentially reaching this level by the end of May or early June.
