What this chart shows
Realized price is realized cap divided by circulating supply. Because every UTXO's last movement is recorded on-chain at a known price, this is a measured average cost basis for the entire market — a statistic that simply cannot be computed for equities or FX. Coin Metrics' free community tier doesn't publish the realized cap dollar figure directly, so this page derives realized price algebraically from two things it does publish — market price and the MVRV ratio (PriceUSD / CapMVRVCur) — which is exactly equal to realized cap divided by supply.
How to read it
The gauge above shows the current premium of market price over realized price (this ratio is MVRV itself). When market price trades below realized price, the average holder is at a loss — a state that existed only briefly in Bitcoin's history: late 2011, 2015, the covid crash of March 2020, and mid-2022 to early 2023. Each episode coincided with a cyclical floor. High multiples, conversely, indicate the average holder sits on large paper gains that can be sold into strength.
Limitations
Coins lost forever (estimated in the millions of BTC) carry ancient cost bases and drag the average down, so “true” realized price of active holders is somewhat higher. Exchange and ETF custody moves ownership without moving coins, freezing cost bases at custody-transfer dates. And as always: four bear markets is anecdote, not sample.