Bitcoin is struggling to gather upside traction despite repeated defense of support at $10,000.

• The top cryptocurrency's sell-off from the August high of $12,476 looks to have come to a halt near $10,000 over the past seven days.
• A bear failure at key levels like $10,000 often entices chart-driven buyers and can lead to notable price bounces.
• So far, however, bitcoin's rebound has been capped at around $10,500.
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• Essentially, bitcoin is trapped in the narrow range of $10,000 to $10,500.
• A range breakdown would imply a continuation of the retreat from highs above $12,400 and yield a deeper sell-off.
• "If $10,000 is breached, the cryptocurrency could drop to $8,100," crypto trader and analyst Josh Olszewicz tweeted earlier this week.
• Alternatively, a move above $10,500 would signal an end of the price pullback and continuation of the broader uptrend.
• Continued improvements in on-chain metrics favor the bullish case.
• "Robust hashrates enhance network's security and would shift bitcoin's price floor upwards," analysts at Stack, provider of cryptocurrency trackers and funds, said in a weekly research note.
• Bitcoin's hashrate rose to record highs above 140 exahashes per second earlier this week, according to data source Glassnode.
• Further, the number of "wholecoiners" or addresses holding at least 1 BTC has hit a record high of 823,000 this week.
• The metric suggests investors aren't spooked by last week's double-digit price drop and expect the cryptocurrency to resume its broader uptrend.