Bitcoin's on a streak it hasn't hit since 2012

Bitcoin

has posted gains in July and August and looks set to end September higher, marking a three-month winning streak that has occurred only once before in the cryptocurrency’s history.

Bitcoin’s price rose by 4.8% in July and 25.2% in August, according data source CoinDesk. September is also in positive territory, with prices trading 10.9% higher at $86,140 as of this writing.

The only prior such instance dates back to 2012 when prices rose 41.0%, 6.4% and 24.4% in those respective months.

October then broke that streak, with bitcoin falling 9.7% for the month. But the decline bottomed out at $10.17 on Oct. 26, and it was from that low that bitcoin launched into one of the largest rallies in its history, a 165-day run that carried price to $230 by April 2013, a gain of more than 2,000%, according to CoinDesk’s analysis of daily price data.

Whether this year follows a similar path – a red October followed by a big bull run – or takes a different route entirely, isn’t something the 2012 precedent can settle on its own. The sample size is too small. Bitcoin has been trading from at least late 2010 and since then, this pattern has shown up only once. So, there isn’t enough repetition to draw a meaningful conclusion about what happens next.

Still, the setup is noteworthy because of its rarity, the outsized rally that followed the 2012 example and bitcoin’s broader four-year market cycle. Some cycle models point to a potentially bullish phase beginning around October or November, although historical cycle patterns are approximate rather than fixed calendar rules

The magnitude of any rally may also be smaller than in bitcoin’s early years. In 2012, bitcoin was a thinly traded asset worth barely $10, and its market could be moved by a relatively small number of buyers.

Today, bitcoin is part of a multi trillion dollar market with substantial institutional participation, deep spot and derivatives liquidity across dozens of venues, and a broad range of directional and relative-value strategies, including options, futures and basis trades. Those markets did not exist at comparable scale in 2012, making a rally of similar percentage magnitude much harder to achieve today.