Bitcoin and Ethereum Death Crosses: A Tale of Two Gaps

Bitcoin and Ethereum are both in death crosses, but their gaps are closing at very different speeds. The size of a cross shows where the market has been, while the rate of change indicates what's happening to each average right now.

When calculating both assets' simple moving averages (SMA) from CoinGecko's 365-day daily series on August 18, 2026, at 05:02 UTC, Bitcoin's 50-day SMA read $63,673.69 against a 200-day of $69,119.97, and Ethereum's read $1,843.25 against $2,012.90.

Both assets have active death crosses, with the 50-day average below the 200-day, but their gaps are shrinking at different rates. When measured against each asset's own price, the two crosses are almost the same size, but Ethereum is closing its cross at about 3.9% of price per week against Bitcoin's 1.9%.

A death cross can end without a rally or buyers showing up; it simply requires the calendar. The 200-day SMA is a queue where each day's close joins and the close from 200 days earlier leaves, moving the average by the difference between those two numbers divided by 200.