There is what I would like to believe and then there is what is really happening. I would like to think that people are starting to realize that Bitcoin is unsustainable, expensive, and centralized offering little utility. That this realization combined with the emergence of dozens of competitors that are better than bitcoin in many ways with their only weakness being the lack of network effect has caused people to realize that Bitcoin is not the long-term rocket to the moon they were looking for.



The competitors lack the network effect Bitcoin has today and thus they are not ready to take over Bitcoins market cap. Bitcoin will continue to fall and alternatives will rise slowly until major players start adopting support for the next big solution.



Bitcoin miners are among the largest holders of bitcoin, the rise in difficulty is squeezing margins forcing them to sell a larger percentage of the mined coins. These large mining operations are also owned by some of the largest BTC holders and they are on the front lines of the realization that mining is a dead operation walking. I suspect that this is causing them to divest of BTC.



But then again it is probably animal spirits driving the market.