Ark Invest CEO Cathie Wood says Bitcoin’s well-known four-year cycle may no longer define the asset’s long-term behavior, arguing that institutional adoption is reshaping everything from volatility to how deep future drawdowns might be.
Speaking with Fox Business on Tuesday, Wood said Bitcoin’s sharp crashes, often 75% to 90% in earlier years, are becoming less common as large financial players accumulate the asset.
“The volatility’s going down,” she said, adding that institutions “are going to prevent much more of a decline.” Wood suggested that “we may have seen the low a couple of weeks ago.”
Her view challenges more than a decade of market expectations. Bitcoin’s cycle has traditionally followed its halving events, block reward reductions that occur roughly every four years.
The most recent halving on April 20, 2024, cut the mining reward to 3.125 BTC, historically a trigger for supply squeezes and strong rallies.
However, Wood argues that the market’s behavior has shifted, as Bitcoin trades more like a risk-on asset, moving in line with equities and real estate rather than acting as a hedge.
“Now, gold is more of a risk-off asset,” she said, noting that investors use it to protect against geopolitical shocks.
Ark has continued adding crypto exposure, recently buying more shares of Coinbase, Circle, and its own Ark 21Shares Bitcoin ETF (ARKB).
Wood’s comments land in the middle of a wider industry debate. Analysts across major institutions say Bitcoin no longer responds to halving cycles the way it once did.
Earlier this week, Standard Chartered said ETF buying has reduced the halving’s influence as a price driver.
Analyst Geoffrey Kendrick wrote that the pattern of prices peaking 18 months after each halving is “no longer valid,” lowering the bank’s 2025 price target from $200,000 to $100,000.
On social media, the debate has been intense since late July.
Bitwise CIO Matt Hougan and CryptoQuant founder Ki Young Ju both said institutional inflows have effectively erased the traditional cycle. “The cycle is dead,” Ju wrote.
For years, Bitcoin followed a rhythm: accumulation, a rally tied to halving effects, a peak, then a multi-year downturn.
Source: Bitbo
But this time, after hitting $122,000 in July, analysts say Bitcoin’s behavior looks different, slower, steadier, and less tied to retail speculation.
Sentora executive Patrick Heusser pointed to the Bitcoin Power Law model, which views price growth as part of a long-term curve influenced by time rather than strict four-year windows.
