͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏

Forwarded this email? Subscribe here for more

Bitcoin Bear Dies, Somebody Won’t Get Debt Rolled in Q4

Bitcoin rips higher and crushes the $83,000 level. TBL Liquidity Indicator considerations. My eyes are on the bond markets.

Nik Bhatia

Sep 21

∙

Preview

READ IN APP

Article brought to you by:

Secure your bitcoin with Casa’s multivendor multisig setup. Multiple hardware keys, no single point of failure, guided Premium setup and recovery support without Casa ever holding enough keys to move your funds…plus 10% off with code TBL.

Get Premium Today

Dear Readers,

A loyal TBL Pro named Matthew sent us a question, and I know it is exactly what many of you were thinking this morning. I knew it because it was my feeling as well:

When the liquidity environment is not supportive, how are we supposed to think about big bitcoin moves to the upside like we've seen the last few days?

In summary:

The Bitcoin Layer and my books Layered Money and Bitcoin Age are dedicated to education around our credit system, its lack of discipline, and the way bitcoin provides a potential avenue to financially survive our times. We position TBL Liquidity Indicator as a tool for shorter-term allocation and investment decisions, not a suggestion to sell your hard-earned bitcoin because of a Red Dot.
TBL Liquidity Indicator isn’t going to be perfect. It is a global macro indicator that uses US Treasuries and the US dollar to determine Liquidity conditions on bitcoin. Our active strategy has captured alpha this year versus buy-and-hold bitcoin assuming perfect timing and no tax considerations, but even in backtests we miss. The goal is to provide value over a long time horizon, not nail every trade. We need to be reminded that this is an imperfect quantitative indicator that has proven to work very well in 2026. All that could change on a dime if bitcoin rallies another few dozen percent with TBL Liquidity active strategies sitting on the sidelines. Today’s price action is a sign of TBL Liquidity Indicator not working, or at best, not working quickly enough.
Bitcoin has been known to front run Liquidity, so perhaps this is a sign of more money printing or volatility suppression to come.

Overall, I have been trying to communicate underlying bullishness since my Jane Street $64,000 bottom call, including some wonderful bullish divergences, a bottom in the bitcoin/gold ratio, and the washout of the on-chain metric “percent of supply in profit” which I have come to love.

How clear can the end of the bear market be?

I recorded an incredibly important bitcoin price update today and directly answered Matthew’s question at length.

Finally, I am starting to worry about Q4 in the sense that I fear somebody will not receive a favorable debt roll. Today’s letter is primarily a quick hypothesis share on this topic.

Augustine also wrote us a quick “Quant Note” below my letter that explains more in detail how he is thinking about this bitcoin-rally-in-a-Red-Dot. Don’t miss this crucial explanation of how TBL Liquidity Indicator is working.