Market update - March 6th, 2026

Bitcoin holds firm as geopolitics escalate

Geopolitics returned to centre stage over the weekend following a significant escalation involving Iran. The earlier departure of UK embassy staff had already signalled rising tensions, so markets were not entirely blindsided, but the speed of developments has forced a broader reassessment of where digital assets sit within the modern safe haven landscape. The assets most directly exposed to the conflict, crude oil and volatility, repriced sharply higher, while equities weakened across the board.

Against that backdrop, Bitcoin's behaviour was notable, having risen by 7% since the conflict began. Rather than acting as a vehicle for sustained liquidation, as has been its historical pattern during weekend geopolitical shocks, Bitcoin rallied into the instability and has since stabilised above $70,000. That divergence from prior behaviour warrants explanation.

The answer lies largely in the market structure leading into the event. Over the preceding five months, we estimate roughly $30 billion in net whale outflows, pushing prices through important technical and valuation thresholds. By the time geopolitical risk resurfaced, much of the selling had already run its course. MVRV¹ had compressed to roughly one standard deviation below realised value, leverage ratios had declined from approximately 33% in October 2025 to around 25%, back in line with long-term averages, and Bitcoin's RSI² had touched 16 at its recent trough. Speculative excess had been largely flushed from the system before the shock arrived, leaving a cleaner setup than in prior episodes.

A complicated macro backdrop

The flow data since the escalation has provided the clearest confirmation of this dynamic. After five consecutive weeks of ETF outflows totalling approximately $4 billion, digital asset investment products recorded over $1 billion of net inflows in the first five days of March alone. Investors are not retreating from this market, they are adding exposure into the uncertainty, a pattern more consistent with safe haven allocation than speculative risk-taking.

The macro backdrop complicates the picture, though perhaps not in the way one might expect. Payrolls declined by 92,000 against expectations for a rise of 55,000, unemployment rose to 4.4%, and wage growth surprised to the upside, a combination that limits the Fed's room to ease for now given their focus on inflation rather than employment. With energy prices now surging on Iran fears, goods-side inflation is likely to follow. Futures markets are pricing a June rate cut at below 28% probability, although this has shifted to some extent since the payrolls data, it isn’t enough to materially move the needle. For traditional risk assets, slowing growth alongside sticky inflation is an uncomfortable environment.

For Bitcoin, the same conditions that constrain central bank flexibility, sovereign debt burdens, energy-driven inflation, and the demonstrated willingness to weaponise financial infrastructure as a geopolitical tool, are precisely those that make its structural properties most relevant. Bitcoin's self-custody model eliminates that risk category entirely, a property that is increasingly understood and, and is perhaps why we are seeing evidence of a significant rise of bitcoin’s use inside Iran.

Our base case remains near-term consolidation with a modest downside bias, a decisive close above $72,000 would be required to confirm a more constructive technical picture. But with leverage reset, valuations normalised, and $1 billion of institutional inflows arriving precisely as geopolitical stress intensified, the asset is beginning to behave less like a fragile risk trade and more like a maturing macro hedge. That distinction, if sustained, matters considerably for how institutional portfolios approach allocation.

¹Market Valued to Realised Valued: a measure to value a digital asset based on its historical transaction activity
² Relative Strength Index: a technical indicator signalling when an asset is overbought or oversold.