As the year is coming to a close, Bitcoin’s yearly candle will as well. Candlestick charts summarize how price moved during set increments of time and are used by traders to gauge sentiment, support, resistance and trends. This year, Bitcoin saw its largest rejection ever since 2011, according to BNC Bitcoin Liquid Index.

We can tell that there is a rejection because of the “wick” or thin line on top of this year’s candle. It means that price reached the top of the thin line and then fell back to the top of the thicker line within the span of a year. Typically, traders use this as a sign that price was rejected and when a candle closes with a long wick, it can indicate the reversal of a trend.

Technical analysis isn’t always certain though. In 2011, there was a huge wick towards the upside that could have indicated a reversal, but price never fell below the 2011 closing price during the following year, meaning that it was extremely bullish.

Still, if we’re strictly referring to textbook technical analysis, this year’s rejection is a bearish sign. Another sign that we might see decrease in price next year is the fact that we’ve repeatedly broken trend lines on the BNC logarithmic chart. You can look at this one of two ways: BTC is creating a new area of support and resistance between $8k and $34k that it will stay between, or it has broken trends so many times that it needs to correct to $1k support from prior yearly candles.

Technical analysis helps outline the blueprint of price movement, but fundamental use of the coin and global sentiment can determine the trajectory. In 2019, Bitcoin pulled off another bull run to silence the talk of 2017 being the “crypto bubble” year. It very well may have been an ICO bubble, but Bitcoin almost made it back to that all-time high of $20k.

One of the biggest accreditations of the 2018 crash was China banning Bitcoin and now they want to make their own blockchain-based digital currency, praising the technology. There has been global progress made when it comes to Bitcoin ETFs, institutional custody, high frequency crypto exchanges and payment solutions. Even during the 2019 bear market, major Bitcoin and blockchain news came out on a monthly basis.

So to me, fundamentals seem to be in the right place, sentiment feels more optimistic, but the technical indications don’t look super amazing. That’s the beauty of investments – you can never predict the outcome and there is always risk. At minimum, we can hope that 2020 won’t be a boring year.