Bitcoin traded close to $85,800 on Monday as the calendar marked Oct. 5, 2026 — the cycle-bottom date implied by the arithmetic of an anonymous 4chan post. According to Cryptopolitan calculations, the asset has climbed roughly 49% since bottoming at about $57,700 on July 1.

The same post, published on 4chan's business board in December 2023, accurately called the exact date of Bitcoin's all-time high of $126,198, which was set on October 6, 2025.

A 2023 post that called the October 2025 top

The post appeared on December 12, 2023, on 4chan's business board and remains accessible through the Warosu archive. It mapped out four legs of Bitcoin's market history: a 1,064-day advance from the 2015 low to the 2017 high, followed by a 364-day decline into the 2018 low, then another 1,064-day climb to the 2021 peak, and a further 364-day fall to the 2022 low.

Extrapolating from that rhythm, the anonymous poster projected that the next all-time high would arrive on October 6, 2025, roughly two years after the post was made. "People want to believe otherwise but the simulation will repeat itself," the unknown author wrote.

Bitcoin did, in fact, go on to print its highest-ever price of $126,198 on October 6, 2025, landing on the date the poster had named. While the post offered no bottom date, adding its 364-day downtrend to that peak lands on Oct. 5, 2026. Day-count models built on fixed intervals like these have long circulated in Bitcoin commentary, with the roughly four-year halving cycle as their most cited anchor — though a single accurate date from an unnamed author is one data point, not a tested track record.

Analysts see a $50,000 to $55,000 floor by December

Cryptopolitan reported that a sell-off in late June pushed Bitcoin below $58,000 and forced the liquidation of a large number of leveraged positions, with the July 1 low settling near $57,700. Asset manager 21Shares observed that, measured against past cycles that produced drawdowns of 80% or more, the current decline has been comparatively shallow. Bitcoin lost more than 14% of its value in the second quarter of 2026, while July brought gains to open the third quarter.

BTC now sits roughly 32% below its October 2025 high. On Monday, the price climbed to an intraday high of about $86,970 before falling back by roughly $1,000. The peak was $430 short of the late-September high near $87,400, and it marked the second advance in a week to stall below that level. With the fourth quarter now underway, that ceiling and the July 1 floor near $57,700 frame the range against which the cycle projections can be checked.

Friday's weaker U.S. labor market data, which showed that the economy added only 29,000 jobs in September, eased the pressure on the Federal Reserve to keep raising interest rates.

Cryptopolitan reported in August that one research desk identified October to December 2026 as the most likely window for the cycle bottom, with a floor of $50,000 to $55,000. The Oct. 5 date implied by the 4chan arithmetic lands at the start of that same window. Another desk singled out the third quarter as a possible low. The same report projected a potential low in the summer of 2026 if demand for ETFs kept the drawdown below 70%, describing such a path as one never seen before.

The April 2024 halving — the pre-programmed event that cuts the reward for mining new blocks in half roughly every four years — underpins the late-2026 window. Past cycles, the report noted, have hit their lowest points 24 to 28 months after a halving, with capitulation arriving in December 2018 at $3,200 and again at the end of 2022 at $15,500. The fourth quarter also falls 12 to 15 months after the October 2025 peak, a typical duration for a bear market. The study cautioned that a deep recession or stricter government regulation could push the low into the first quarter of 2027.

As of this writing, Bitcoin is trading at about $86,190, up 1.1% over the past 24 hours.

Source: Cryptopolitan