Uncle V (YouTuber) asked me to unpack my opinions about how and why the crypto market trend has changed. My response is below:
Happy to Uncle V. A few things to unpack:
1 So-called 4 year Cycle
I walked into one of the first bitcoin supply shocks in 2013 when bitcoin notoriously peaked to about the price of an ounce of gold. That setup the so called 4 year trend analysis so popular leading into the 2021 run-up after seeming to have been a validated thing in 2017. But the 2021 bull run didn't do what so many conservatively expected. BTC has sustained a relatively higher price for a longer period of time, 18+ months, than it ever had in the past following an ATH. In the same way that many people miscalculated the bull run, many are now wrongly calling crypto winter. Or, crypto winter is just taking longer to arrive.
But the longer it takes to arrive, the closer we get to when the next run up would have been expected. The trend has shifted significantly.
2 Supply Shock
As the supply halvenings recur it is less about the amount of coin diminishing and more about adoption, people holding and using the coin. A halving from 50 to 25 BTC is immense! even 25 to 12.5. But 6 to 3? Now it's more about getting people to use the currency and there is more competition from newer coins with better technology (ehem, EPIC!). In fact, this is a good time to consider the economics of EPIC correspondent to the timing of EPIC. It's no accident! EPIC is calculated and built to communicate a solid value proposal. Superior money for the people, by the people.
So, bitcoin's supply shock is now more dispersed as an effect and reliant upon tangible catalysts like spot ETFs, more nation states making it legal tender, and just getting more people into crypto in general.
3 Crypto in General
NFTs (still think this is 'mostly' a huge trap), so-called "meme" coins (their not, really... all of them have utility in one way or another), new tech like Mimblewimble, graph-based crypto, DeFi, stables, and the growing number of 20K or so crypto projects, institutional investors... It all just adds up to a significantly changed market.
I think BTC is more likely to continue trading range-bound and sort of sail through at a higher wave than previous cycles while we continue to grow the broader crypto community. The contrary point of view is that BTC does a little dead cat bounce to the 40's 50's and then crashes hard to $15K for a true crypto winter. I just don't know who they think these people are who would sell their crypto so cheap. The past 18+ months price/volume data doesn't support a $15K proposal in my opinion. But let's see.
And regarding all of these 20K+ coins out there all competing for adoption and integration:
I don't know any other crypto more innovative in the approach to being superior money for the people by the people than EPIC.
