In the context of an 11 month bear market we have rising btc adoption, rising transaction volumes, rising merchant integration and astonishing VC funding into bitcoin companies this year. Fundamentals seem pretty bullish to me.
There is no real data on BTC adoption. Anyway it is obvious that the BTC price is due to speculation, not adoption. Without speculation, the demand for payment use may not be enough to support 100 $/BTC.
The NUMBER of transactions is rising, but the daily
transaction VOLUME IN USD is basically flat, somewhat down from January. However, we do not know how much of that is actual payments (BTC changing hands).
Merchant integration means more merchants are accepting dollars or euros that come from the sale of bitcoins. It gives more excuses for early adopters to sell their old coins. I have yet to see evidence that it is attracting new users.
VC funding seems to be going mostly into service companies, like exchanges, fund management, and payment processors; not into bitcoin itself. Most of those investors do hope that the price will recover, or at least stop falling, so that they get more customers; but they will make money even if the BTC price gradually goes to zero. And some service companies (such as slightly dishonest investment funds) will make MORE money in this case.
The big fundamental fact in the last 11 months is strongly negative: the Chinese government has made bitcoin nearly useless in Mainland China. Apparently, the Chinese speculators who drove the price from ~140$ to ~1200$ have been leaving the market, with some ups and downs, since last December.
A new bubble will require opening some new market, bigger than Mainland China was before de December decrees. Will the COIN ETF do that?