SummaryBitcoin has flashed a golden cross, indicating a potential long-term bullish trend ahead.Historically, this widely tracked indicator has a spotty track record for accurately predicting sustained rallies.The wait for bulls is over. Bitcoin’s BTC$78,928.37 golden cross is live, confirming a widely-tracked bullish signal on the price chart. However, its record as a standalone indicator is mixed. A golden cross occurs when an assets average price over 50 days, the so-called 50-day simple moving average, moves above its 200-day average. The crossover shows that short‑term momentum is finally overtaking the long‑term trend, setting the stage for a potential sustained rally.This signal has previously triggered 12 times in bitcoin’s history, yielding a mixed long-term track record, as CoinDesk discussed in detail last week. Only three out of the 12 historical crosses remained valid for a full year, generating a massive average return of 250% over those 12 months. Across the remaining nine measurable instances where three-month data was available, the signal produced a far more modest three-month average gain of 24.9%. The latest golden cross, therefore, is far from a guarantee of long-term bullishness, as historical data shows the signal has triggered premature bull traps three times as often as it has sustained multi-year rallies.As of this writing, bitcoin changed hands at $78,650, down 0.6% since midnight UTC, according to CoinDesk data. Bitcoin's golden cross history. (TradingView, CoinDesk)Related Assets