Bitcoin: Rising Wedge and 2 Bearish Divergence Signal Near-Term Weakness

At a glance, Bitcoin still looks bulletproof as it presses higher within a tidy uptrend and sits close to its highs. Look a little closer, however, and the character of the tape changes. The daily structure has matured into a rising wedge, the 100-day SMA now rides almost directly on the wedge’s lower rail, and momentum on both the daily and weekly MACD is diverging negatively from price.

Put simply, the trend remains up, yet the fuel gauge is edging toward empty. With the September 17 Fed meeting looming as a potential volatility trigger, this is precisely the kind of backdrop where markets can “look fine” just before they cool.

With that context, let’s review the daily and weekly charts and connect the structural and momentum dots to understand why the rising wedge plus dual-timeframe bearish divergences argue for cooling in the days and weeks ahead.

A Rising Wedge That’s Getting Tight

On the daily chart, BTC continues to climb within a rising wedge, which is a pattern defined by higher highs and higher lows, but with the upper resistance line rising more slowly than the lower support line. By itself, the pattern doesn’t guarantee a breakdown. However, it’s statistically a late-trend, exhaustion structure, especially when momentum fails to confirm new highs, which is exactly what we’re seeing.

Two features make this wedge particularly consequential:

1. Firstly, the 100-day simple moving average is hovering almost on the wedge’s lower trendline. That puts a widely watched trend gauge right beneath the first structural failure point. In practice, this confluence becomes a high-signal line in the sand: holds above it keep the wedge alive, while decisive daily closes below often flip psychology from “buy the dip” to “sell the rally.”
2. Secondly, pullbacks have less room to breathe inside a wedge. Each minor shakeout tests a steeper support line, increasing the odds that one of those tests finally snaps. That’s why wedges often resolve with a swift drop: once support gives way, there isn’t much air under price.

Taken together, the message is clear: as long as BTC rides the lower rail and respects the 100-DMA, bulls keep the initiative. Even so, the risk-reward for further upside is deteriorating, because each incremental push is demanding more effort for less distance.

Daily Momentum Confirms Fatigue

Although price continues to register higher highs on the daily chart, the MACD has been carving lower highs. That mismatch is a textbook regular bearish divergence: price keeps stretching, yet momentum refuses to corroborate the move. You tend to see this near the late stages of strong advances, when buyers can still nudge candles higher but with noticeably less thrust.

Divergences don’t time tops on their own; however, they raise the odds that the next breakout attempt stalls or that the next support test matters more. Within a rising wedge, this signal is even more potent. As price inches higher on thinner participation, it takes progressively less selling to knock the market back to support, and this often sets the stage for a clean breakdown if that support finally gives way.

Weekly Bearish Divergence Adds Weight

Zooming out to the weekly timeframe, the story stays consistent. Price continues to register higher highs, yet the weekly MACD has been stair-stepping lower highs, highlighting another regular bearish divergence. Because weekly signals build slowly and resolve slowly, they typically carry more weight when they appear.

The implication of this second, higher-timeframe regular bearish divergence is straightforward: even if the primary uptrend remains intact, the path of least resistance in the near term is sideways-to-down until weekly momentum resets. That reset can happen via time (a cooling consolidation that lets the MACD flatten and turn up) or price (a drawdown that shakes out weak hands and rebuilds energy). With both daily and weekly divergences in place, the market is sending a consistent message: upside progress is losing punch, so a needed exhale shouldn’t come as a surprise.

The 100-Day SMA Is the First Line in the Sand

Because the 100-DMA tracks almost exactly along the wedge’s lower rail, it functions as the first tripwire. Above that confluence, bulls can credibly argue the structure remains intact and we’re simply navigating a high-beta uptrend with routine shakeouts. Below it, the message shifts: momentum loss has started to impair price structure.

Above the confluence, the base case for BTC is choppy rallies into the wedge top, frequent mean reversion, and limited follow-through unless momentum improves. In other words, bulls can keep grinding, but every incremental new high is guilty until proven innocent because momentum isn’t confirming, making pushes into the upper boundary more prone to fizzling.

By contrast, a daily close below the confluence (ideally with above-average volume) would confirm a pattern violation and the loss of trend support. From there, the odds increase for a measured pullback toward the next liquidity shelf around ~$105k.

Finally, watch the retest behavior. If BTC loses the 100-DMA, then bounces and fails at the underside of the broken wedge/moving average, that’s a clean bearish continuation signal. If, instead, price quickly reclaims the level and the MACD recovers, you’ve likely witnessed a bear trap rather than a genuine breakdown.

September 17 FOMC Meeting Might Be the Catalyst

Macro doesn’t create chart patterns, but it often activates them. The September 17 Fed decision is a natural volatility spark, and in the context of a rising wedge plus bearish divergences, several paths flow logically from expectations to price action:

• If the outcome simply meets pricing, there’s limited fresh fuel for risk assets. In this wedge-and-divergence context, that’s ripe for a “buy the rumor, sell the news” response, which will drag price back toward the 100-DMA/wedge support. If the fade sticks, it often becomes the spark that tips the wedge lower.
• If Powell leans data-dependent and downplays a rapid easing cycle, real yields and the dollar can firm at the margin. Risk assets—and crypto, in particular—tend to feel that. In such a case, the odds of a clean breakdown from the wedge increase, with momentum already positioned to confirm.
• No cut or a clearly more hawkish stance is least likely based on consensus. However, if it happened, it would tighten financial conditions abruptly. In that case, the wedge likely doesn’t survive the week.

The takeaway isn’t that BTC must sell off on the Fed; rather, expectations are high, and when expectations are high, even “as expected” can hit like disappointment. With momentum already stretched, a macro nudge is precisely the kind of catalyst that can let the technical setup resolve.

Final Thoughts

Bitcoin’s broader uptrend remains intact; however, the near-term message is clear. The rising wedge signals a narrowing advance, the 100-day SMA sitting along wedge support marks an imminent decision zone, and dual-timeframe bearish MACD divergences show momentum lagging. Layered on top of a heavily anticipated Fed meeting, that mix tilts probabilities toward cooling or a pullback, not an effortless extension.

Could BTC rip higher anyway? Sure. Markets sometimes sprint on fumes. But for that to stick, we’d need to see momentum re-accelerate (i.e., MACD pushing to new highs) and a clean break above the wedge with credible follow-through. Absent that, the base case is simple: respect the uptrend but price in fatigue. That means treating strength with skepticism until momentum confirms and treating any decisive daily close below the wedge/100-DMA confluence as first confirmation of a deeper, but likely healthy, reset.

In short, BTC doesn’t need a bear market to go lower from here; it just needs to exhale. And the rising wedge plus daily and weekly bearish divergences are the market’s way of telling us that exhale may be next.