Time for a breakout? Bitcoin price pushes at key resistance near $23K

On Sept. 12, Bitcoin is doing Bitcoin things as usual. Since Sept. 9 the price has broken out nicely, booking a near 16% gain and rallying into the long-term descending trendline which appears to have resistance at $23,000. 

Perhaps BTC and the wider market are turning bullish ahead of the Ethereum Merge which is scheduled for Sept. 14, or maybe the elusive bottom is finally in. Weekly chart data from TradingView shows that on June 27 and Aug. 15, Bitcoin’s relative strength index had dropped to lows not seen since 2019.

Currently, the metric has rebounded from a near oversold 31 to its current 38.5 reading. Some traders might also note a bullish divergence on the metric, where the RSI follows an ascending trendline while Bitcoin’s weekly candlesticks trend downward. Bitcoin’s moving average convergence divergence (MACD) has also crossed over as purchasing volume surged and BTC price attempts to break from its current 90-day range.

As pointed out in previous analysis, since Jan. 21, Bitcoin price has simply been range trading in what have turned out to be successive bear flags that see continuation to new yearly lows. Price has consistently encountered resistance at the overhead descending trendline and the price action witnessed today and in the past 90-days is not a deviation from the trend.

Traders should watch for BTC price to push secure a few daily closes above the trendline resistance and setting a daily higher high above $25,400, or even a breakout to the 200-MA at $30,000 would be an excellent sight of either a trend change or at least a leg up to a new consolidation range. Until that occurs, the standard practice among traders is to not go long at long term resistance and wait to see whether the bullish momentum holds or the prevailing trend remains intact.

Related: The Fed, the Merge and $22K BTC — 5 things to know in Bitcoin this week

Of course, there are a handful of other on-chain and derivatives metrics which could add valuable context to Bitcoin’s current price action, but the purpose of this brief analysis is to simply provide a quick, snapshot interpretation of BTC’s current market action and consider what traders might be thinking in the short-term.

The views and opinions expressed here are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of Cointelegraph.com. Every investment and trading move involves risk, you should conduct your own research when making a decision.

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