Bitcoin Gained 12.7% in April, but Weak Spot Demand Signals Rally May Be Fragile

Bitcoin posted its strongest monthly performance in a year during April, climbing 12.7% for back-to-back monthly gains — but a growing divergence between derivatives activity and spot purchasing is raising questions about how durable that run can be.

The coin had eked out a nearly 2% gain in March, ending five consecutive months of declines. Ether also rose 8% in April, marking its second consecutive up month and its best performance since August.

Despite the headline numbers, crypto data provider CryptoQuant said perpetual futures — the dominant mechanism for leveraged crypto trading — were the "sole driver" of the April rally.

The firm's apparent demand metric, which tracks the 30-day change in outright bitcoin purchases, stayed negative throughout the month even as futures demand climbed. That combination is widely regarded as a warning signal.

"This divergence — rising futures demand alongside contracting spot demand — suggests price appreciation is driven by leverage rather than fresh coin accumulation," Julio Moreno, head of research at CryptoQuant, said in a report Thursday. "Historically, such configurations lack the structural foundation required to sustain price gains and typically resolve via correction once futures positioning unwinds."

Moreno noted that a comparable pattern appeared at the start of the 2022 bear market, where increased futures demand paired with contracting spot demand preceded a prolonged price decline. He cautioned, however, that conditions now differ in important ways — institutional adoption has since deepened, spot bitcoin ETFs have been introduced, and corporate bitcoin accumulation has expanded well beyond Strategy, formerly known as MicroStrategy.

Net inflows into bitcoin ETFs totaled $1.9 billion in April, bringing total net assets to $100.53 billion. Bitcoin treasury companies increased their collective holdings by roughly 58,000 coins, valued at approximately $4.4 billion at month-end prices.

Bitcoin reached an April high of about $79,500 before logging mostly lower levels through the remainder of the month. On Friday it was trading up more than 2% for the first session of May, sitting just over 1% below that April peak.

"This is not a case of lagging spot demand catching up to futures," Moreno said. "Rallies built on this structure tend to be self-limiting. Without spot demand growth to sustain elevated prices, the unwind of futures positioning typically becomes the driver of the subsequent correction."

The data also reflects a structural shift underway at crypto exchanges. Early platforms were built around spot trading, which generates steady revenue during sustained accumulation cycles. Those cycles have become less reliable as demand in 2026 has been uneven and largely reactive — driven by shifting U.S. interest-rate expectations and periodic geopolitical shocks rather than organic buyer activity.

Perpetual futures, meanwhile, have become the dominant venue for liquidity and price discovery, with prediction markets also gaining ground as a derivatives-adjacent product category.

The industry is also navigating a regulatory vacuum. Progress on the market structure legislation known as the CLARITY Act remains stalled, leaving exchanges without a clearer framework for product expansion or compliance planning.

With futures positioning still elevated and spot demand yet to show a meaningful recovery, the April rally's durability will likely hinge on whether broader market sentiment — and institutional buying — can bridge that gap before leveraged positions begin to unwind.

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