Hash Ribbons Indicator

Hash Ribbons was introduced by Charles Edwards, founder of Capriole Investments, in his August 2019 article "Hash Ribbons & Bitcoin Bottoms" (originally on Medium, now hosted at capriole.com). The insight: miners are the network's most transparently cost-pressured participants. When hashrate growth turns negative — miners capitulating, forced to switch off — price has historically been near a bottom; the moment hashrate resumes growing has been one of the best risk-reward entries.

This chart plots the original construction: the 30-day (green) and 60-day (red) simple moving averages of hashrate. The 30DMA crossing below the 60DMA marks the start of miner capitulation (hashrate contracting); the 30DMA recrossing above marks capitulation's end and recovery. Edwards' full buy signal additionally waits for price momentum to turn positive (10DMA of price above 20DMA) as confirmation. By his count, miner capitulation occurs roughly once a year on average, with halvings a common trigger.

Edwards' backtests in the original article and later updates cover the major bottoms since 2011 (2015, 2016, 2019, March 2020), with strong returns after confirmed signals. But he documents the failures himself: a 2015 signal was followed by a ~42% drawdown, with similar early signals in 2019, 2021 and 2022. His own remedy is layering a price-trend filter (e.g. 50/200-day MAs) — it is not a standalone bottom-buying button.

Hashrate is an estimate inferred from block times, and even smoothed by 30/60-day averages, extreme events — China's 2021 mining ban, large grid outages — can produce crosses unrelated to economic capitulation. Generational jumps in ASIC efficiency also decouple hashrate swings from miner financial stress. Hash Ribbons reads the supply-side stress cycle only; it is blind to demand. Pair it with on-chain demand metrics.

Beyond network data, see the broader market via total crypto market cap and BTC liquidations.