2026 is off to a mediocre start for the market. But if I had to go into more detail then I would say it is a good start. It could start simply because the price is going up. Over the last week we have seen most tokens performed very well. And I obviously hope that this continues. I think it's time we reflect on last year. The fact that it went wildly different from what waiting really expected is something to keep in mind going forward. And I'm afraid the deviation is way too big.
Let's talk cycles. The crypto cycle is literally considered to have a duration of 4 years after every halving which also happens every 4 years, the market goes on a very healthy uptrend and usually posts all-time highs on most tokens. This is the bull market of the 4-year cycle which is simply followed by each halving. Then it steadily goes down, often crashes hard and then we have the beer market until the next halving happens. As a result, after the halving of 2024, people expected a lot of things going into 2025. And it's sufficient to say that things didn't go as planned. Yes, Bitcoin went on and did put an all-time high of $126,000 which peaked towards the end of 2025 but if we calculate proportionally and look at the percentages of the increase in each cycle then it is falling short. That has led money to believe that this cycle is dead early. Here is the most important part. The fact that cycles have changed probably forever because now the investor pool has changed. Previously crypto was mostly retail investors, regular people with their own pocket change. But now a whole lot of institutional investors have got in. And these people don't buy and sell on every dumping pump. So obviously since they are holding on to different tokens for a longer time, volatility will decrease. And decreased volatility will mean unless our chances of Bitcoin or any other token simply mooning. Yes, it is also true that these same actions help against the catastrophic crashes as it simply acts as a dampener on both sides, most people only want to talk about the profits.
But the reality is crypto markets are getting more and more aligned to the traditional financial markets as we speak. Previously, we didn't have to care much about the Fed chair talking about interest rates. But now it is quite important. And the increasing correlation between stock markets and crypto will keep increasing at this rate.
