Crypto Gloss

Willy Woo

Willy Woo (pseudonym: Woonomic) is a New Zealand-born Bitcoin analyst who pioneered the field of on-chain analytics for Bitcoin market cycle analysis, developing the NVT Ratio in 2017 (often described as “Bitcoin’s P/E Ratio”), NUPL (Net Unrealized Profit/Loss), the Difficulty Ribbon, and other indicators subsequently adopted across the analytics industry; he co-founded Woobull Charts, one of the first public-access repositories of Bitcoin on-chain metrics, and has been a subscriber-based analyst and educator on Bitcoin fundamentals and market structure since 2017.

Background

Willy Woo is New Zealand-based and prefers to operate pseudonymously under “Woonomic” on social media. He has a background in software engineering and financial technology. He became interested in Bitcoin in the early-to-mid 2010s as a monetary technology experiment and shift his career toward full-time Bitcoin analysis approximately around 2017.

Woobull Charts

Woobull.com (Woobull Charts) is the public-access website Woo built and curates, hosting a collection of Bitcoin on-chain and market structure charts. It was one of the first free resources providing:

  • NVT Ratio charts
  • NVT Signal (a refined version)
  • NUPL (Net Unrealized Profit/Loss)
  • Difficulty Ribbon
  • Mayer Multiple
  • Stock-to-Flow comparisons
  • Various UTXO-age and HODL wave derived charts

The site became a standard reference for Bitcoin analysts, journalists, and investors during the 2020–2021 bull cycle and remains widely used.

Key Analytical Concepts

NVT Ratio (Network Value to Transactions)

Woo developed and published the NVT Ratio in 2017, based on collaboration with Dmitry Kalichkin who later refined it into NVT Signal. The concept:

  • Formula: Market cap ÷ daily on-chain transaction volume (USD)
  • Interpretation: Analogous to a traditional P/E ratio. A high NVT suggests the network’s valuation is high relative to actual usage (potentially overvalued). A low NVT suggests valuation is low relative to on-chain economic throughput.
  • Limitation: Does not account for off-chain transactions (Lightning Network, exchanges processing in-house transfers), introducing a denominator undercount as Lightning adoption grows.

NUPL (Net Unrealized Profit/Loss)

NUPL measures the aggregate unrealized profit or loss of all Bitcoin holders as a percentage of market cap:

  • Derived from UTXO age analysis — each unspent output’s cost basis is estimated from the price at the time the coin was last moved.
  • Ranges from -1 (maximum loss) to 1 (maximum profit).
  • Historical peaks above 0.7 have corresponded with market cycle tops; values below 0 have corresponded with capitulation bottoms.

Difficulty Ribbon

The Difficulty Ribbon visualizes mining profitability stress through a series of moving averages of Bitcoin’s mining difficulty. When shorter-term moving averages cross below longer-term ones (ribbon compression), it historically signals miner capitulation — forced selling of mined BTC to cover operating costs — which has coincided with market lows.

The Woonomic Newsletter

Woo has run a paid subscriber newsletter/research service where he publishes deeper market cycle analysis, on-chain indicator readings, and macro commentary. His paid content typically includes:

  • Cycle phase assessments.
  • Capital flow analysis.
  • Institutional demand tracking.
  • Model-based scenario price analysis.

Key Dates

  • 2017 — Publishes NVT Ratio concept; launches Woobull.com.
  • 2018 — Further develops NUPL and Difficulty Ribbon analytics.
  • 2020–2021 — Bull cycle brings widespread adoption of Woo’s metrics across the analytics industry (Glassnode, CryptoQuant, Checkmate, and others build on the methodology).
  • 2021 — Among the more cited public Bitcoin analysts during the cycle’s peak discussions.

Common Misconceptions

  • “Willy Woo predicted the Bitcoin top in 2021 accurately.” — Woo’s models indicated elevated overvaluation signals at various points in late 2021, but no on-chain analyst, including Woo, called the November 2021 top precisely. The tools provide probabilistic cycle context, not precise price timing.
  • “NVT Ratio is a reliable real-time trading signal.” — NVT’s denominator (on-chain transaction volume) has been increasingly affected by Lightning Network off-chain activity and exchange internal netting, reducing its signal reliability compared to earlier Bitcoin cycles when most transfers settled on-chain.

Last updated: 2026-04

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