There was a message waiting from a friend when I awoke this morning:
"Quite a lot of dippening happening"
Interestingly, I have more relative Bitcoin today than yesterday, which is strange as normally in the dips, alts get hammered even more than BTC does. The total value is of course down though.
My friend also said that he has started to shy away from crypto Reddits, because it is either hype or panic and that most of the people that are active there, likely have very little idea about what they are talking about. Personally, I never got into Reddit forums, but I find that discords are often the same, where there is polarization in the general rooms and a lot of people have no middle ground, it is either on or off.
As they say, the internet knows no chill, but I think that it has got worse over the years as people have not only become more polarized, but they attach themselves emotionally to the positions, even though the positions are changing on a dime, or a dollar as the case may be. At one moment people are in heaven, the next in hell, swinging wildly with no tether to in the darkness bind them.
This makes for a hard life I think, but perhaps it is attractive for many in the sense that they can feel they are part of it, similar to a news story that happens locally that has no affect on a person at all, but due to proximity it feels like "it could have been me". A winning lottery ticket was sold at the local store, or a person was shot and killed at the local store.
Participation is a key part of crypto as unlike many other investments, it isn't passive, it is an active and very personal scene, as we each make our own decisions in what we are going to buy, sell, hold and fold.
Over the last couple weeks, I have had a few comments here and IRL that have asked whether the bull market is over and if the bear is back. Possibly - but if that is the case, this has been the lamest bullrun in the history of crypto. Again personally, I suspect that the real bull is yet to start and we are just gearing up for a spring to the top.
What will be interesting to see is what people consider that top to be however, as I think that as the consolidation happens, people's expectations of the what is a "good price" lowers and they set their sells further down than they would have a few days or weeks earlier. I have done this many times in the past myself, only to have my new sell points cleared and it reaches to where my old were. I think a lot of this has to do with working on percentages, not values and it works in reverse too, where my "new low buy" tends to be higher after a spike, even though I "know" (assume) there is going to be a dip.
Impatience and greed factor in too - I don't want to miss the next run!! I also tend to buyback too soon because increasing a stack 10% and missing 20% is better than just missing the low and he next move up. I have missed quite a few buybacks by a couple sats over the years and the subsequent runs would have been very valuable. I have also caught a few runs by a couple sats too - so it evens out.
Finding investment middle ground helps keep sanity in check as while things will be volatile and go up and down, having some diversity, suitable hedges as well as some utility (Hive for me) in the range of holdings means that one doesn't have to be pulled from one extreme to the other. I think a lot of the hype or panic people are the "all-in" crowd who are so looking for the big score, that they ape into anything that they think will offer it, leaving themselves heavily exposed.
Those who have been patiently building and stacking are losing ground in the dips, but they are well up from where they were not too long ago, so they don't have to worry too much yet and can ride the waves, selling some into the hype, buying back from the panickers who bought on the hype.
Since we in crypto have a lot more control over our investments and transactions than in most traditional mechanisms, it is therefore up to us to take care of ourselves, including our own emotional states. For those who are so affected by the dips that they lose control of their emotions, building diversification into the portfolio can help find a bit of balance.
But, I think the biggest factor for finding balance is creating an environment that facilitates it, which is generally not the polarized and hyper emotional forums and chatrooms filled with people who are winding each other up. At least, limiting time in these groups can help or, balancing it in places where people are more middle ground tethered and less driven by market or social swings.
Building environments that help us be our best is valuable and I would suspect that most people aren't at their best when in a state of hype or panic, as they are driven by more primal urges, with both the ups and downs driven by fear, FOMO on gains, or FOMO on limiting losses.
"How's your crypto doing? Is it up, or down?"
It is static - I have just as much now as I had yesterday.
Well, actually, I have a little bit more....
It is not on and off, there is a top and a bottom - but everything else is the ground between.
There is an okay.
Taraz
[ Gen1: Hive ]
