Over the past seven days, Bitcoin rallied 22% from $64,800 to $79,000. Retail traders are screaming “bull market” on every social feed. Samson Mow, the man who predicted the 2021 top within a few thousand dollars, counters: “The real bull market hasn’t started.” That’s not a warning. It’s an immutable logic play.
Mow is the CEO of JAN3, former CSO of Blockstream, and the architect of the “superbitcoinization” thesis. He has been wrong before—his $100,000 call for 2021 missed by six months and a global macro crash. But his track record on market structure is precise. He called the 2021 peak based on on-chain exhaustion, not TA. Now, he sees a bounce that lacks the fundamental weight of a true bull.
What is a “real bull market”? Most traders define it by price action: a 20%+ move from lows. But my quant model from the 2024 spot ETF arbitrage era taught me to look at liquidity flows. The 22% bounce to $79,000 came on declining volume—the CME futures volume dropped 18% week-over-week. The open interest is flat. The real bull market is not a price spike; it’s a structural shift in capital. Mow understands this. He’s saying the current rally is a liquidity grab, not a regime change.
Let’s dissect the order flow. The bounce was driven by a short squeeze on Binance—funding rates turned negative for two days, then skyrocketed to 0.04% as shorts were liquidated. That’s a textbook gamma squeeze, not organic accumulation. Meanwhile, permanent holders (addresses with zero outgoing transactions for 3+ years) have been adding 4,500 BTC per day for the past week. That’s the signal Mow is watching. The real bull market will be built on that accumulation, not on exchange order books. The 22% move is just the front-run.
Here’s the contrarian angle: Mow is the ultimate permabull. When he says “no bull,” it’s a contrarian indicator that the bull is already here. But I ran the numbers differently. If Mow were right, the price would correct back to $72,000 within two weeks. If he were wrong, the price would break $85,000 and trigger a cascade of stop-losses. The truth is somewhere in between. The market is still in a “stealth accumulation” phase, identical to Q4 2020 before the ETF hype. Mow’s statement is a warning to retail: don’t mistake a dead cat bounce for a new cycle. The smart money is accumulating via OTC and ETFs, not on exchanges. The ETF flows have been positive for 12 consecutive days, but the volumes are still 40% below the March peak. That’s not a bull market—it’s a foundation.
s immutable logic. The real bull market begins when the price decouples from the standard deviation of the 200-day moving average. Currently, BTC is trading at 1.2x the 200-day MA, which is below the 1.5x threshold that historically marks the start of a parabolic run. Mow is not bearish; he’s setting the bar high. He wants people to stop chasing 20% moves and start thinking about the structural shift: nation-state adoption, dollar debasement, and a fixed supply. The current rally is a symptom of that shift, but not the shift itself.
I’ve been through this before. In 2020, I shorted Compound’s governance token at $200 because the APY model was unsustainable. The market laughed until the crash. In 2022, I liquidated my Terra position six months before the collapse because the algorithmic stablecoin was a mathematical error. The same principle applies here: the real bull market is not a price point—it’s the sustainability of the narrative. Mow is testing the narrative. He’s saying: “If you think $79,000 is the top, you’re missing the point.” The point is the $200,000 to $1,000,000 range that requires a global liquidity shift.
s immutable logic. The immediate takeaway is actionable. The $79,000 level is a liquidity magnet. If it holds as support for two more days, the next target is $85,000. That’s where the December 2024 high sits. A break above $85,000 would confirm that Mow’s “no bull” call was a tactical warning, not a bearish prediction. If the price falls back to $72,000, the bounce was a trap. I’m watching the COT report for hedge fund positioning. If commercials increase their short positions, the correction is imminent. If not, the bull is already in motion.
The retail crowd is divided. The FOMO is real but muted. The funding rates are still below 0.01% on major exchanges, indicating that the leverage is not excessive. That’s actually a bullish sign. The real bull market will be a slow grind, not a vertical spike. Mow’s statement is a filter: only those who understand the difference between a liquidity event and a structural shift will profit.
s immutable logic. The final thought: Mow is not a trader. He’s a philosopher of Bitcoin. His “no bull” call is a test of conviction. The market will prove him wrong or right within the next 30 days. I’ve positioned my quant fund to be long above $72,000 and short below $69,000. The real bull market, as Mow defines it, will arrive when the Fed cuts rates and the dollar index breaks 100. That’s the macro trigger. Until then, the 22% bounce is just a rehearsal. The audience is watching. The stage is set. The bull market hasn’t started—but the curtain is about to rise.


