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Fomo

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The crypto market saw a significant downturn in 2022, with most digital assets, including BTC and ETH, losing over 65% in value. The market began the year with BTC trading in the range of $37,000 to $47,000, but this range was broken in Q2 following Terra's collapse, which coincided with a decline in the US stock market. Since then, BTC traded below $35,000 for much of Q2 and Q3 until recently when the FTX saga pushed the range lower to between $16,000 and $17,000. Overall, the crypto market experienced a bearish trend in 2022, with some assets like LUNA, FTT, and SOL recording, particularly steep declines. Even the most promising niches that had performed exceptionally in 2021 were nowhere to be seen this year. As of December 2022, the total value locked (TVL) across DeFi protocols stands at $38 billion, down from $166 billion at the beginning of the year. Meanwhile, Non-fungible tokens (NFTs) trading volume tanked by over 90%, leaving most NFT holders stranded in an illiquid market. DeFi TVL in 2022: DeFiLlama Contagion: The Word of the Year The crypto market's intertwined nature was undoubtedly exposed last year; many big firms were affected by the collapse of Terra and FTX, including industry heavyweights that had billions worth of U.S. dollars in assets under management (AUM). Some of the big players that went bankrupt due to substantial exposure in either Terra or FTX include Three Arrows Capital (3AC), Celsius, Voyager Digital, and more recently BlockFi, which was one of the largest digital asset lending firms. Simply put, the chickens came home to roost in 2022, and to make it worse, we are not sure we're fully out of the woods yet with several implications following the FTX implosion still to settle. Terra’s Collapse First launched in 2018, Terra’s ecosystem was on a roll until May this year when the UST algorithmic stablecoin lost its peg against the U.S. dollar. It all started when over $2 billion was withdrawn from Terra’s lending and borrowing protocol Anchor on May 7, triggering hundreds of millions of U.S. dollars liquidations. Ultimately, the UST stablecoin was affected by the massive capital outflow and lost its peg to trade at 35 cents by May 9. While Terra’s founder Do Kwon tried to restore back the peg by ‘Deploying more capital - steady lads’, the statement only amounted to becoming a meme within the crypto community. However, it was the aftermath that shocked most crypto stakeholders, a cumulative $60 billion worth of investors' money was lost in this unfortunate event. What followed was a streak of bankruptcy filings by several crypto firms that had invested in Terra’s ecosystem, either directly or indirectly. 3AC, Voyager Digital, and Celsius File for Bankruptcy The collapse of Terra’s UST stablecoin caused a serious ripple effect in the industry, with Three Arrows Capital (3AC), Voyager Digital, and Celsius being among the most affected. Just three weeks after UST depegged, 3AC filed for a chapter 15 bankruptcy and defaulted on a $650 million loan owed to Voyager Digital. This forced the investment firm to also halt withdrawals and eventually file for bankruptcy in the Southern District of New York. The script was similar for Celsius, although it took a bit longer before the crypto-lending company declared bankruptcy. At first, Celsius halted BTC withdrawals on June 12 citing  ‘extreme market conditions’, but with its native token $CEL plummeting by over 70%, the firm was ultimately forced to file for bankruptcy on July 13, 2022. Besides these big players, quite a number of potential DeFi projects became insolvent as a result of Terra’s collapse. The FTX Collapse FTX’s collapse is perhaps the most unexpected black swan event that happened this year, not many people would have imagined that Sam Bankman-Fried, a crypto darling and now turned villain was clients’ deposits. mismanaging The news first broke through a Coindesk article which revealed that a large part of Alameda’s holdings was in illiquid FTT tokens and there were also some notable discrepancies in the balance sheet; this raised eyebrows across the industry, with Binance’s CEO Changpeng Zhao making it public that the exchange would start to gradually liquidate its enormous FTT holdings. The ensuing panic caused a mass FTT sell-off, accompanied by a withdrawal run on the FTX exchange. According to Dune Analytics, FTX clients had withdrawn over $1 billion in the space of a week before FTX officially halted withdrawals. With FTX insolvent, hopes were pinned on a strategic acquisition by Binance, but the plan fell through. FTX was forced to file for Bankruptcy, and SBF turned crypto villain overnight. The contagion spread further with BlockFi, one of the leading digital asset lenders, filing for bankruptcy due to their substantial exposure to FTX. Other major firms affected include Genesis Trading, Galaxy Digital, and Voyager Digital. I have written quite extensive pieces on the FTX saga and . Give them a look if you want a deep dive. here here Aftermath Moving into the year 2023, we have already seen the first signs that we are not out of the woods in relation to the contagion that plagued the markets last year. More than a few notable entities have been making headlines at the beginning of the year with similar trouble. Most prominently, the situation revolving around Genesis’ from the Digital Currency Group is currently unresolved but reports mention a hole in their balance sheet of close to $3B. This is why it is likely we can expect this to continue to be a theme well into 2023. Positive Points of 2022 Despite the many hurdles that faced the crypto industry last year, we must not fail to acknowledge the several points of progress made. What stood out is that long-term stakeholders shifted focus to more fundamental areas as opposed FOMOing in on speculative narratives. The interest in valuable Web3 innovations increased while we also witnessed celebrities and big brands joining crypto, thanks to NFTs and the metaverse. So, what were the positive trends and developments this year? DApp Usage Was on the Rise The number of daily unique active wallets interacting with Decentralized applications (DApps) by 50% to hit 2.37 million from 1.58 million in 2021. increased Most notably, blockchain-oriented games accounted for close to 50% of the on-chain activity, with Splinterlands ranking as the most popular game in this category. Gambling DApps also recorded a 106% spike in new users, the number of dUAW jumped from 53,364 to hitting 110,140 this year. Ethereum’s Merge Was Successful The much-awaited Ethereum finally happened on September 15th, marking the transition from Proof-of-Work (PoW) to Proof-of-Stake. merge This transition has made the Ethereum blockchain more eco-friendly as it will no longer depend on mining power to secure the network; instead, stakers are now the ones tasked with this function. Looking ahead, Ethereum’s developers are working on the next phase, the surge, which is expected to make the network more scalable. Also delivered a quite lengthy commentary on this subject in . Hedge Nordic VCs Showed a Growing Interest While the overall funding across crypto innovations took a hit this year, VCs appeared to be particularly interested in potential Web3 innovations. Some of the notable players that allocated a significant amount of funding towards this niche include Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) and Sequoia capital. The former announced two billion dollar Web3 focused funds totaling over $7.7 billion while the latter committed close to $3.3 billion towards Web3 innovations as well. Big Brands Joined the Metaverse The metaverse continued to gain traction this year with big brands such as Gucci, Adidas, and Prada launching their own NFT collections. Atari, one of the most iconic game publishers, also recently a massive social and gaming experience in The Sandbox metaverse; Atari Sunnyvale. launched This virtual world allows users to explore and interact with each other, alongside an opportunity to participate in featured games and quests for in-game rewards. Nations Are Adopting Bitcoin For a long time, most governments have been against the use of crypto assets within their jurisdictions. But this stance seems to be gradually changing with the Central African Republic joining El Salvador to recognize Bitcoin as a legal tender. Meanwhile, Russia and Nigeria are making a u-turn on previous legislation that limited crypto transactions. Russian officials recently the use of cryptocurrencies for cross-border payments while Nigeria is set to pass a bill that will recognize the use of Bitcoin and other crypto assets. approved Behavioral Themes: What We Expect For 2023 With 2022 behind us, there is a lot to be optimistic about in 2023, prices seem to have bottomed out, although the uncertainty in macro factors and possible continuation of the FTX contagion could spell more doom for the market. That said, there are some major themes that are already emerging as the top narratives for 2023. Below is a glimpse into the horizon: Self-Custody One of the biggest lessons crypto natives ought to have learned this year is ‘not your keys, not your coins’. A good number of centralized crypto service providers have gone under with clients' funds, including FTX, which was among the most trusted exchanges. Already the shift is happening, the number of BTC held in centralized exchanges witnessed a sharp decline in the aftermath of FTX’s demise as investors sought alternative non-custodial storage solutions. This trend will likely continue in 2023, ushering in a new paradigm where crypto natives reduce their reliance on third-party service providers. Fundamentals Over Speculation Gone are the days when the crypto market was mainly driven by speculative narratives, most of the capital in 2023 will be chasing valuable projects that are based on the principles of decentralization and transparency. Crypto VCs and individual investors who have been in the game for some time are now scouting for Web3 projects that have a solid value proposition as opposed to speculative-driven narratives that promise riches overnight. In my opinion, this will be a game-changer in the adoption of real blockchain-based solutions as well as integrations with existing industries. Regulation Is Around the Corner Regulators from across the globe have signaled an intention to pursue regulatory frameworks that will govern the digital asset industry in the future. One of the key bills expected to come into action is Europe’s MiCA bill which is aimed at preventing insider trading, market manipulation of crypto assets, and unlawful disclosure of inside information. In the U.S., the senate banking committee has held several hearings this year and is also keen on pursuing crypto governance frameworks, especially after the FTX saga which has left a majority of investors in limbo. 2023: A Year of Digestion and Hope Transitioning into the new year, 2023, feels like a much-needed fresh start on many accords. 2022 delivered some of the toughest macroeconomic conditions many of us can remember in our lifetime, and crypto likewise suffered idiosyncratic disappointments. Moving into the new year, the theme of high inflation rates will continue to be central for market behavior. The good news is that there is a fair chance that inflation has already topped out for now. Both equities markets and crypto are seeing a fairly positive beginning which spins hope for a much more positive outlook for 2023 than 2022 proved to be.

The Crypto Market Digestion of 2022 and Prospects of the New Year  

Play-to-earn (P2E) may not necessarily be a new concept but it’s still relatively young. Although the bear market slowed things down considerably, I’m sure that there will be a lot of exciting developments in this space in the next few years. While the current market may be a bit slow and rather boring, it creates perfect conditions for familiarising yourself with various P2E platforms. There’s a well-known investing motto – bull markets can make you money but bear markets can make you rich. Most people just simply translate it to ‘buy low, sell high’ but there’s much more to it. In my opinion, the true value of bear markets is the time they give you. You can research projects. You can learn and try out various platforms. Gas fees are low. There is far less FOMO. In short – you have the time and conditions to prepare yourself for the next bull run. And with a bit of luck, you can also make some money in the process. This article will be a beginner’s guide to P2E and I will use platform as an example but of course, there are many other P2E options. If you are looking for various games, you can check out what was launched on launchpads like , , or . Or you can look up a platform, which has multiple games, such as or KomNPlay. As I mentioned above, I will be using the latter as an example here, but as always – you should do your own research and check out various platforms. KomNPlay Seedify Fund Kommunitas EnjinStarter Vulcan Forged First of all, you will need to set up an account and a wallet. You only need an email address to do it, but bear in mind that KYC (Know Your Customer) may be required under certain circumstances – for example, KomNPlay requires you to KYC for withdrawals above 100,000 KOM tokens. You will also need to fund this wallet with some . This is required, for example, if you want to participate in the Duels (you can read more about it later in this article). KOM tokens Once you’ve earned some tokens, you can either hold on to them to cash out later, or you can move them to an exchange and sell. Bear in mind that withdrawals aren’t always immediate – they can sometimes take up to 24 hours. Once you have an account and a wallet, you just need to pick a game (or games) you're interested in. On a platform like KomNPlay you will find many different titles. In fact, well over 100 different games at the point of writing, so there is a good chance that everyone will find something interesting. Many of those games are simple and easy to play, which makes them perfect for your daily commute or other idle time. So how can you earn crypto while playing? This will vary between platforms and games -  sometimes you just earn tokens and in other cases you may be also able to trade game-related NFTs such as land, weapons, or heroes. There may be also different ways of earning crypto within a particular game or platform. For example, KomNPlay gives you an opportunity to earn tokens through Duels and Wars. In Duel Mode, as you expect, you can challenge other players to a duel. Players who send duel requests can set bets in the form of KOM as much as 1,000 KOM/5,000 KOM/10,000 KOM/25,000 KOM (subject to both players having sufficient funds in their KomNPay wallets), and players can choose the duration of time to play. The player who achieves the highest score within the duration of the game will be the winner and gets the prize pot. In Wars Mode, players will compete against each other. You need at least 1,000 KOM tokens to participate, which will give you 10 Ammo or 10 chances to play. You can also increase your chances by paying an additional 1,000 KOM for 10 more chances, and each time you submit a score to the Warboard, it will be registered. At the end of the War, Captain KOM will decide who has the highest average of their top 5 scores submitted. 80% of the total War Chest will go to the winner, 7% to the runner-up, and 3% to the person in the 3rd place. Captain KOM takes the remaining 10%. Every P2E platform will also have documents with more info about the platform, the registration process, and the opportunities to earn tokens. In the case of KomNPlay, you can find this information . here To sum it up, I think that the whole crypto space has some really rough months ahead of it. Sure, there will be always opportunities to make money on some short-term pumps or by shorting the market but I think that the true value of bear markets is the time they give us. The time you can use to learn and try things out, without FOMOing into the last 'shiny thing'. I believe that the next crypto bull run will be largely driven by crypto gaming and I think that checking out platforms like KomNPlay can be really beneficial in the future. --- Disclaimer The content covered in this article is NOT to be considered investment advice. I’m NOT a financial adviser. These are only my own speculative opinions, ideas, and theories. Do NOT trade or invest based purely upon the information presented in this article.

How to Beat the Bear Market With P2E – a Beginner’s Guide

I wrote three books about bitcoin and publish a newsletter about cryptocurrency. I'd love for bitcoin's price to reach the lofty expectations everybody else seems to have. When you look at the data, trends, and patterns of behavior we saw as bitcoin’s price approached its four previous market cycle peaks, you will see the same things today as you did for each of those other times. Sure, it's cooled off for the past two weeks, but the trajectory hasn't changed. Still parabolic and coming out of a bull flag. The last time bitcoin did this (February), its price doubled. The time before that (December), its price tripled. If bitcoin comes even close to those targets in April, its bull run will end. I realize that seems crazy. On March 11, 2021, I published going deep into the data and correlations. I summarize them below and recommend you read that other post for a more nuanced and informative explanation. This article hits only the high notes. a detailed post for subscribers of my Crypto is Easy newsletter Also, make sure you caught my post from last month, . Bitcoin’s Market Cycle Peak is a Lot Closer Than You Think Mark, don’t even bother. Institutions will never let that happen! Yes, some say institutions will never let the price crash. No more bear markets. Only up forever. They’re all FOMOing in, buying up even the slightest dip. “Wall of institutional money.” Sounds great. To sustain this bull market, we need institutions to HODL, not just buy. After all, they can’t push prices higher when they’re selling their bitcoin right after they get it. Look at the realized cap HODL waves, which show the movements of bitcoin among older and newer wallets based on the value of the bitcoins that move. Unlike the HODL waves you’re probably used to, this metric quantifies the influence those HODLers have on the market. Rather than calculate a percentage of people or wallets, it calculates the percentage of bitcoin’s market value. We know institutions accumulated a lot of bitcoin from September to December. If they’re still HODLing that bitcoin, we should see it reflected in some growth in the band that represents people who acquired bitcoin in the past 3–6 months. As of mid-March 2021, we didn’t see that at all. In fact, we saw a steep dating back months. drop This chart lumps all the short-term HODLers, people who’ve had bitcoin for three months or less. Blue circles are market cycle peaks. Those shorter-term bands keep widening, resulting in spikes on this chart. You can see the spikes lead to market cycle peaks. As you can tell from the arrow, this most recent spike is approaching (but not quite at) levels we only see at market cycle peaks. As I explained in previous updates, it’s unlikely institutions or their custodians are moving money from old wallets to new ones within their own portfolios, at least not in any significant amount. In other words, those short-term bands are not rising from big HODLers moving to newer wallets that they control. Rather, they’re shipping off their bitcoin to somebody else. Certainly, institutions are HODLing. It’s just not enough to change the trend. some Yea, but money’s pouring into Grayscale and the ETFs! It was until February. Since then, have fallen off a cliff and even went negative in March. flows into Grayscale bitcoin trust Flows into the Purpose bitcoin ETF have dried up, too — from to an average of 200 or less since then. On top of that, 3iQ sold some bitcoin from its fund. 2,200 bitcoins on the first day That signals fatigue or disinterest among institutional investors and traditional retail speculators, at least in the very short-term. (Yes, NYDIG says it has a few billion dollars of institutional money lined up. For a $1 trillion asset like bitcoin, a billion dollars doesn’t seem like enough to move the market.) Ok, that doesn’t matter, that data models predict higher prices for longer Sure, depending on which model you pick. S2F, expanding cycles, hash cycles, four-year cycles, halving cycles, the list goes on. There’s a model for every outcome you want to see, and they all disagree with each other. While I don’t make decisions based on data models, I found a few that fit my bias. They all tell us the market’s approaching its peak. , a mathematical formula that maps the intersection of two specific moving averages. When those averages converge, the market is near its peak. Today, those averages are 5% apart and getting closer with each passing day. All four previous times we saw that pattern, the market peaked within weeks. Pi cycle , a line bitcoin breaches only when it reaches market cycle peaks. We’re very close to breaching that line. Two-year moving average multiplier , an algorithm that marks the big peaks. When bitcoin’s price hits the top of the curve, it signals the absolute peak and triggers deep, long bear markets. If bitcoin’s price remains on this trajectory, we will hit the top of that curve in a month. Logarithmic growth curve . Whenever bitcoin’s price goes above that line, it hits a market cycle peak. That line projects to hit the top of the logarithmic growth curve at the same time as you would expect the lines of the Pi cycle to converge. Golden ratio multiplier All of these signals meet next month at a price of roughly $90,000. For this summary, I’ll overlap all of them on one chart so you can see the trajectory: In my longer update, I delve into this data more deeply. Really interesting stuff. Bottom line? Every time we see those signals converge, we get a crash of +77% and a bear market. Coincidences! Anybody can pick whatever data they want Yes. Anything you can do, I can do better 😉 I don’t offer predictions or statistical proof, just food for thought. The more coincidences you see, the more likely it is that they mean something. We’re long overdue for a severe crash (not a dip) or at least a long consolidation, and maybe we will get that before the market cycle peak. If so, you can throw out all this data. Bitcoin will crash, the market will reset and lay a strong foundation for that big, long bull market that everybody expects. Without that crash or multi-month consolidation, we will head to the market cycle peak a lot sooner at a much lower price than you expect. But the bull market just started Are you sure? Bitcoin’s price has gone up for more than two years. In January 2019, it was $3,200. In January 2020, it was $7,000. In January 2021, it was $25,000. On those dates, the total altcoin market was $37 billion, $53 billion, and $215 billion. Higher each year. We’ve been in this bull market for a while, even if it hasn’t felt like one or it hasn’t met the dictionary definition of “bull market.” Now, the momentum has shifted. This plane’s running out of fuel. It’s ok to refuel Do you want to hop on a plane when it’s already running out of fuel? Or do you want to wait until it lands so you can fill up the tank and then start zooming again? Bitcoin’s price can go a lot higher, but it needs to land and refuel. Otherwise, it will crash. Not a 30% crash like we’ve seen so many times. Not even a 50% crash like we got in 2020 and 2019. A far bigger crash. We still have room to run. You can realistically double your portfolio in a month or two, and if you have a lot of altcoins, you could do even better. That’s an opportunity you can’t get in any other market. At great risk, though. HODLers don’t care Long-term, none of this matters. Bitcoin’s price will almost certainly go way higher in the future than it is today. If you’re willing to HODL the peak and wait six months to three years for your investment to get back to even, then you don’t have to worry about a thing. No matter what happens in the coming months, you’ll be fine in the long run. For me, that’s a big risk to take and a long time to wait. I don’t want to be underwater for that long. You probably don’t, either. It’s different this time No. If we keep this pace, we will soon reach the same place we’ve been four times before, with each market cycle. Four times. Same patterns, Same relationships. Same things we see at the end of each market cycle. It’s not different. It’s not different at all. It’s exactly the same. Why should we expect a different outcome? Mark Helfman publishes the newsletter. He is also the author of three books and a top bitcoin writer on and . Learn more about him in his . Crypto is Easy Medium Hacker Noon bio Originally published at . Voice.com

The End of The Bitcoin Bull Market As We Know It

The are a series of interviews featuring various important voices and perspectives in the Bitcoin ecosystem. Each interviewee was carefully selected and asked the same group of questions. The main goal was to provide the world with a collection of commentary and opinions on the state of the current Bitcoin and crypto market. Some of the names you will recognize while others don’t wish for the limelight but have great insight and experience we all can learn from. Bitcoin Bear Market Diaries These interviews are raw and unfiltered with no agenda other than giving each individual their opportunity to speak their mind. If you like what you see, please share with your friends. If something offends you, you should probably X out and find another crypto fluff piece that gives you warm fuzzies. Stephan Livera is an Australian Bitcoiner who hosts the Stephan Livera Podcast that features many influential voices in the Bitcoin world. Professionally, he is an Australian Chartered Accountant and works as a technology auditor in financial services. Name Stephan Livera Country Australia How do people know you? Mostly from my twitter and my podcast (Stephan Livera Podcast) focused on Bitcoin and Austrian Economics. I’ve interviewed many Bitcoin leaders ranging from Bitcoin business leaders, economists, to computer scientists and software developers. @stephanlivera How long have you been into Bitcoin? Since Dec 2012. Best Bitcoin experience? The friends I’ve made along the way! Worst Bitcoin experience? Seeing people e.g. shitcoiners and blockchainers, associate themselves with Bitcoin for the cred/publicity, then turning shitcoiner. When they do this, it means the legit Bitcoiners have to do a lot more work to undo their narrative. What do you think is Bitcoin’s biggest threat? Governments actually reducing their monetary intervention. Examples of these interventions include: central banks existing as lender of last resort, legal tender laws, capital gains tax laws, implicit and explicit bailout guarantees for banks, bail-ins, financial crimes / surveillance laws, capital controls. In this scenario, the demand for Bitcoin may drop as we’d already have a sound money as chosen by the market, or at least something closer to it. I believe this threat to be unlikely though, as for political economy reasons it’s common for politicians to promise the world while not bearing the political cost of raising taxes in the here and now. Consequently, they opt for debt and govt bond funding of their operations to push the cost onto future generations, or in some sense, raiding the accumulated wealth of society for their political projects and wars. This whole environment only ‘works’ so long as they are able to force a reduction in the quality of our money (achieved through the above listed monetary interventions). What are your thoughts on the various Bitcoin forks? They’re all shitcoins. None of them have anywhere near the saleableness (think liquidity) of Bitcoin. They mostly exist to enrich the shitcoin founders, whether they understand this or not. What are you optimistic about in this space? Bitcoin and the honest bitcoiners who are busy building, educating, and HODLing. These are the people who know how to play the long game. Biggest regret during the last bull market? Not doing more to combat the shitcoiner/blockchainer narratives. What have you learned during the current bear market? I’ve improved my knowledge of Bitcoin and the Lightning Network greatly, and I’ve also developed my thoughts around the economics of Bitcoin also. What is the biggest fail you have seen during the bear market? Rage quitters and CSW are good examples. What do you think helped trigger the current bear market? Ultimately we “reached everyone we could reach” in that wave. The in between periods are where the gamblers and crazier speculators of the last wave get wiped out. Some newcomers actually take the time to learn the economics and technology of Bitcoin, and they become the new hardcore bitcoiner / HODLer types. Once we’ve had a sufficient period of bear/sideways market, the new wave starts with a new set of people rushing in to speculate on Bitcoin. What kind of damage do you think latest price drop has done to buyer sentiment? In some ways, it’s a good thing as it allows people to more properly learn about Bitcoin before they make their decision to allocate some small % of their portfolio and/or regularly stacking sats to speculate on Bitcoin. This is better than people simply FOMOing in during a bull run as these FOMOers are setting themselves up to get rekt. How do you feel about the current state and future of lightning network? I’m very bullish on lightning network, but being truthful it is a year or two away from it being easy for noobs to use in a ‘sovereign’, fully-validating way where they hold the keys and run the underlying full node (rather than using a custodial wallet etc). But that said, I’m very excited to see a lot of the development work being done. For example, the coming version of the Lightning Network spec which will include things like dual-funded channels, AMP, and more. Further out into the future, if/when we get Schnorr signatures, eltoo, and multi party channels (e.g. Channel Factories and other similar ideas), that’s when we can really see the Lightning Network go to the next level! What are your thoughts on HODLing Bitcoin? HODLers are a big part of supporting this vision. Those who learn the economics and technology of Bitcoin will be very well placed in a coming Bitcoin world. Sometimes it’s not easy to do it, but the reward potential is very high. As my friend Vijay Boyapati puts it, Bitcoin is an asymmetric bet. What are your thoughts on alt-coins? The vast majority are shitcoin scams. Being very charitable to the shitcoins, some of them could be technologically interesting, but from a monetary economics POV, they’re still shitcoins. Do you hold any? If not, why? Bitcoin-only! What kind of impact do you think the radical drop in alt-coins will have on their future? Sadly, there’s a sucker born every minute and a shitcoin scammer to take advantage of them. So we will see many more shitcoin pumps to come, and there’s not much that can be done about it. Thoughts on the notion of bitcoinization? I think it will occur over the next few decades. People will slowly upgrade to Bitcoin as their new money, but we will see waves up/down along the way. What Bitcoin startups are you excited about? ZkSnacks (Wasabi Wallet), Samourai Wallet, Casa, Nodl, Lolli, OpenNode, BTCPayServer (not technically a start up, but still) are a few off the top of my head. What “crypto influencers” do you think get it wrong and why? All shitcoiners and blockchainers. Any who drive a multicoiner view of the world also. They fundamentally drive this view that it’s a “Crypto” industry when really it is a Bitcoin industry. Bitcoin, not Crypto. What “crypto influencers” do you think get it right and why? Those who come from a fundamentally “Bitcoin Austrian” perspective. This includes people like Pierre Rochard, Michael Goldstein, Saifedean Ammous, Vijay Boyapati, Jimmy Song, Giacomo Zucco, Francis Pouliot to name a few. What’s it going to take for this bear market to turn around? I view it more as a function of time, rather than a specific action or event. How bullish are you on Bitcoin despite this recent pullback? Extremely bullish. Bitcoin remains the king of the pack and Bitcoin extends its lead over all the shitcoins every day. Any tips you want to give to people new to Bitcoin? One challenge we face in this space is providing up to date and comprehensive information. People try to write new starter guides, but then the guide is out of date within a few months. So it’s often better to follow people on Twitter who have a good reputation. I recommend listening to my podcast series to get yourself up to speed quickly, and also for suggestions on who to follow. Best tips for storing Bitcoin? The security and considerations you take with your bitcoin should be commensurate with your level of investment. Once you move up in your level of investment, you should consider the following: Backups Hardware wallets Validating your incoming payments through a full node Using software such as Electrum Personal Server to help reduce privacy leakage CoinJoining and other mixing techniques through Wasabi Wallet, Join Market, Samourai Wallet etc Multisignature, multi-device, multi-location (the approach used by Casa) Name some of your favorite information sources and/or podcasts in the space. Podcasts: Noded Podcast, Tales from the Crypt (& Rabbit Hole Recap), Vortex’s news show at the Cryptocast Network, Bitcoin Knowledge by Trace Mayer, Block Digest, Max Hillebrand’s work at the World Crypto Net, Bottomshelf Bitcoin, Reckless Review, Citizen Bitcoin. Newsletters: Marty’s Bent, Bitcoinoptech News/Articles: Be wary, many of the news sites in this space will send you down the wrong path of shitcoining or blockchaining. I’d recommend following specific reputable individuals, such as Aaron van Wirdum and Kyle Torpey for good bitcoin journalism. For other writing, I’d suggest following reputable people on twitter (again, see my podcast guest list) and seeing what articles they share. Any last words of wisdom? Find ways to contribute. Look for where there’s a gap, such as something that’s not already being done well, and then look for ways where your skills can be used to help contribute. Some examples: Writing how-to guides or create step-by-step YouTube videos Software development, review, or documentation contributions on Bitcoin/Lightning projects Testing out bitcoin/lightning software and giving feedback to the developers Setting up bitcoin meetups in your local area Setting up a bitcoin business Every little bit helps, and as you help, your skills, knowledge, and reputation improve. Play the long game. Stay tuned for the next Bear Market Bitcoin Diaries. You can find more volumes and articles here!

Bitcoin Bear Market Diaries Volume 21 Stephan Livera

It is the most debated topic among crypto enthusiasts:Will bitcoin go up again or will it stick to its path towards the downside? The answer is far more simple than most people believe:No one can tell you what exactly bitcoin is going to do. But the good news is, we can estimate the chances of both options, bitcoin going up or down. So let’s take a look both from a technical analysis but also a fundamental point of view. The history of bitcoin: Bitcoin had exactly four big rallies: 1. The first one was back in 2011. Bitcoin rose from 0.50$ to 32$. After that, it fell almost 94% back to roughly 2$. 2. The second rally was in 2013. The price went from slightly below 10$ to almost 266$! After that, it fell almost 82% back to 50$. 3. The third rally was in 2014 when BTC’s price soared from 110$ to 1254$ and fell to 135$ afterward and incurred a heavy loss of almost 93%. Many believed that price drop was due to the MtGox exchange hack back then. 4. The fourth rally was the most recent one, which went from 3000$ September 11th to 20.000$ December the 16th. But this one was different. It basically started on first August 2016, when BTC had it’s last bigger correction (>40%) where it fell from 777$ to 466$. Since then, BTC was in a permanent bull run and declined only 70.71% to date. A sign there is still room towards the downside? What about now? We saw a rise from 5800$ to 6600$ since the most recent rally in July which peaked to 8500$. Are we bullish again? Will we form new highs?I don’t want to disappoint fellow crypto bulls but I think the answer is:Not yet… The descending triangle pattern is the most reliable bearish pattern of technical analysis. The more times the bottom line of the triangle gets touched, the more reliable it gets. The weekly candle from 13th-19th August is a bullish reversal candle. However, the recent uptrend from 5800$ to 6600$ had really small volume — a bearish sign that bitcoin will not manage to break the resistance at 6600$. Let’s assume we break it (1H chart): Let’s take a look at the daily chart: “Okay okay, we get it! No moon for in August.” Have you ever heard of the stock market adage “Sell-in-May”? As the more a market matures, the more it assimilates to the big market cycles. It’s quite normal that a market declines in the summer, but the adage also says: “Remember to come back in September!” bitcoin So let’s summarize the technical analysis: There is no reason that bitcoin will gain significantly in price neither August nor in the near . We will most likely head below 6000$ and break the support line, forming new lows up to 3000$. future What about the fundamentals? There are many both highly intelligent and/or incredibly high net-worth individuals who are really bullish on BTC in the long run. The bottom line is this: “If you aren’t bullish on the blockchain, you don’t understand it.”And since cryptocurrencies are the tools to entrench the blockchain into society and bitcoin is the mother of all cryptocurrencies, the bears will end up FOMOing(Fear of missing out) into BTC when it reaches a new ATH (All Time High). “Hey wait! You are missing the most important part about cryptocurrencies! What’s about decentralization, privacy and withdrawing the power of the banks to the ordinary people?” Yes, that’s very important reasons why you should be bullish on bitcoin & cryptocurrencies from an ethical point of view. But these characteristics don’t lead to a surge in prices. In fact, it’s important to empower the truly decentralized projects and stop the support of centralized projects. You don’t want to get rich by investing in cryptocurrencies if this leads to a sad future of the humankind. So please study the idea of the original Bitcoin whitepaper and stop promote scaling solutions which tremendously decrease the decentralization and privacy. Furthermore be extremely skeptic towards institutional solutions regarding the scaling difficulties within the blockchain. The Blockchain Trilemma is yet to be solved -bringing decentralization, security, and scalability into conformity. As long as this can’t be solved, the cryptocurrency space can’t go in the original direction of blockchain’s idea from Satoshi Nakamoto, the inventor of bitcoin and is open to being abused by authorities. So let’s gets back to the Wall-Street wisdom -Why you should re-enter the market in September: As you might have heard of the CBOE VanEck / SolidX ETF, these guys managed to design an ETF which matches all of the SEC’s previously mentioned criteria: -The minimum investment is 200.000$ which exclude non accredited investors (protection of retail investor).-Insurance for theft/loss of the private key.-Price does not depend on a single exchange.-Backed by CBOE-the ETF buys actual BITCOINS, unlike other ETFs. This is the only serious ETF because it eradicates the arguments which gave the foundation of previous rejections of the ETF attempts by the Winklevoss Twins. Furthermore, it opens the door for institutional money, since the minimum investment is pretty high, the risk of loss of the private key has vanished and there is no need to open an account on a cryptocurrencies exchange. The decision whether the CBOE/SolidX ETF gets approved or rejected will be held at the 30th of September OR postponed to February (240 days from the date published in the Federal Register). Although it may be not approved in September, it might be pretty safe to say, that speculation of such approval will lead to at least a small rally in September. By the time it gets approved, there is no doubt in my mind that this will lead to a tremendous surge in price. Unlike many other events in the crypto verse, it’s not “buy the rumors sell the news” because it actually brings new money into Bitcoin since many accredited investors have shown interest in such a product and the ETF requires an actual buy of Bitcoins which automatically leads to higher demand versus limited supply. “But wait…. You’re always talking about the ETF. Didn’t the NASDAQ plan to launch a crypto-exchange? Furthermore, didn’t the ICE, the owner of the New York Stock Exchange, say in early August that it planned to launch a company called Bakkt to enable “consumers and institutions to buy, sell, store and spend digital assets on a seamless global network”? Is it correct, that Bakkt is backed by M12, the venture capital firm of Microsoft, Boston Consulting Group, quant trading company Susquehanna International, Starbucks, Fortress Investment Group and the founder of Brevan Howard Asset Management?” Yes, absolutely. All of this is correct and super bullish for Bitcoin & other cryptocurrencies. However, it is unclear when Bakkt will launch its exchange.The only thing which was given a date is ICE will initially launch a one-day bitcoin futures contract in November. As far as you might remember, the introduction of futures didn’t lead to an uptrend but rather initiated the bear market back in mid-December. In fact, CME, the world's largest futures exchange, launched its own bitcoin futures contract exactly on the same day Bitcoin reached its summit, roughly 20.000 USD. To put it in a nutshell, you have all reasons to be extremely bullish on cryptocurrencies in the long run, but I see no fundamental reasons that the price of Bitcoin found its bottom yet. For that reason, I stick to the conclusion of the technical analysis, that the probability to decline further in price is significantly higher than the chance of entering a new bull market. Apart from this, I experience the overall sentiment too bullish and there haven’t been shaken out all of the wild speculators and so-called “Lambo-Traders” (which refers to people who have nor proper understanding of the technology neither the longterm vision to truly believe in cryptocurrencies and the ideas behind it). People who entered the market because they love the idea to get rich fast needs to resign otherwise I don’t think we are ready for the next bull run! Having said that, I conclude that this article has come to an end but not the bear market. My next article might be about the future of altcoins and their potential replacement by security tokens because I sincerely believe that many of these altcoins are highly overvalued and you should exercise extreme caution with buying any of these. Have you ever seen a time where pure ideas received millions of funds for no other reason than faith? If not, I welcome you to the cryptocurrencies altcoin bubble. If you enjoyed reading this, please like & share and leave a comment, I am open for discussion. Thanks for reading this! Legal Disclaimer* — This is not investment advice and I am not a financial advisor. Please invest on your own risk.

Has BTC’s bear market come to an end?

Being new in a deregulated market, where everyone is rushing after the next big thing that can make them rich brings along with it a lot of risks. Sadly, the thirst for financial gains heavily outweighs the interest in the underlying technology at the moment. The last crash that happened in the market left many new investors with heavily red portfolio, but more importantly they However unfortunate this is, experiencing such hardships early as an investor can be extremely beneficial. lost confidence in the market. In this article, I will be outlining some of the lessons I have learned, and observations that I have made during the past several months. Hopefully, these tips will be enlightening and lead to better decision making. Is the feeling you get when you see a huge green candle on a chart and you dont own that coin, so you sell your own coins in order to chase the increasing price. can be extremely dangerous, as you are investing in a coin that has gone up considerably and that might even be at . The chances of the coin going down from this point is larger then it going up. This was proven during the last crash for coins, such as FOMO — Fear of missing out: Emotional trading such as FOMOing ATH (all time highs) Tron (TRX), Verge (XVG) and Ripple (XRP). The time for your coin will come. In a bull-market every coin with potential gets its chance to shine. Lesson learned: Leave emotions out of your investing strategy and don´t chase prices. Twitter is a great tool for news and research. However, sometimes Twitter can feel like . Self proclaimed share their ideas and tips for investing. What many new investors and people don´t see is that everyone has a hidden agenda. Not everyone is a saint that wants to share valuable information, unless it benefits themselves in some way or another. Influencers often have personal stakes in certain coins that they are and might even have been sponsored by companies to shill their coins. Many have even been caught spreading Twitter — Influencers: walking through a room filled with bear traps crypto-influencers shilling (promoting) FUD (Fear, uncertainty and doubt). One recent example of this is the debacle. Where McAfee tweeted out that Binance had been hacked, even though there was no evidence to support this at all. This resulted in panic in the market. Fortunately, Binance hit back hard at these accusations and put the issue to rest. McAfee and Binance Incidents like these weaken the credibility of the cryptocurrency market and spread FUD. Stay woke and be critical to what people say and research why they may be saying it before you share it with others. Lessons learned: Transparency is a scarce attribute in the cryptocurrency market. Loudmouths are the ones that get the platform. People that scream and shill coins are usually the ones that get the most up votes on reddit-articles or the most likes on their tweets, For example, when scrolling down there is always going to be at least one post regarding a certain coin that has a huge community following, with bias posts promoting a coin they most likely have huge of. However, as controversial as these posts may be. Go through them and listen to peoples opinions and then form own opinions accordingly. Don´t follow the masses without having research done. Loudmouths: as their words reflect the intentions of the masses. r/cryptocurrency, bags (large amounts of coins) Lessons learned: DYOR — Do your own research while not dismissing others opinions. There are several reasons that may have led to the recent stagnation in the cryptocurrency market. Some of the drivers, according to speculators are — News — Be critical: bitcoin futures, the lunar new year, loss of interest in bitcoin, shorting by whales (people with power to move the market), etc. However, I believe that the main driver for the recent crash was fake news. In January, the South Korean government announced regulatory measures on cryptocurrency exchanges in the country. People thought that this meant an all out ban of cryptocurrencies in South Korea. However, it was later found out that the government only wanted to regulate the exchanges and prevent anonymous trading, which actually is a good thing as it makes it safer to trade. Trading was commenced again on the 31. Jan. Korean Exchange Regulations: This news was blown out of proportion. In addition, it was later found that South Korean government officials were caught doing They sold their cryptocurrency holdings and profited just before the regulators announced crypto regulatory measures. insider trading. Lesson learned: DYOR. Diversification is one of the oldest and most important concepts every investor needs to learn to protect their investments and mitigate risk. This is how i deal with this issue: Diversify — Risk Management: . These are the safest and most resilient investments, mostly found in the top 10 coins. Popular choices are Bitcoin, Ehtereum, Neo, etc. These are the coins that I believe have a strong future ahead and will survive volatility in the market the most. Low risk — High market cap: 40% of your portfolio These are up and coming projects with developments coming in the near future and with potential for further growth. These are found in the top 50 coins. Popular choices are VeChain (VEN), ICON (ICX), Omisego (OMG), etc. Medium risk — Medium market cap: 30% of your portfolio. This part of the my portfolio is dedicated to high risk — high reward investments and active trading. These coins require constant monitoring and maintenance. Recent investments made are Red Pulse (RPX) and Internet Node Token (INT). High risk — Low market cap: 30% of portfolio. PS: Sometimes you may find yourself with too many coins in your portfolio. If this happens, try consolidating your investments. Consolidation makes it easier to manage your investments, reduces fees and frees up your time. Lessons learned: Never put all your eggs in one basket. If you have been around for the last couple of months, or even years, you should know by now that the exchanges in the cryptocurrency market are prone to attacks. Over the last couple of months several cryptocurrency exchanges have been hacked. The most recent ones being the Nano and Bitgrail hack where $170 million was lost and the Japanese exchange Coincheck hack where $500 million in NEM was lost. Protect your investment — don´t leave your coins on exchanges: The technology provided by blockchain gives us the platform to be our own banks. Practicing this is another case. People keep their hard earned money on centralized exchanges. Transferring your coins from an exchange to a hardware wallet or desktop wallet is costly, painful and time consuming, but it is essential to keep your investments safe. Lessons learned: You don´t own your coins as long as they are on an exchange. — Enough said. Ponzi schemes: BITCOOOONNEEEEEEECCCTTTT! Lessons learned: Just don´t. Disclaimer: This is not financial advice. Just my opinion. Follow for more Medium posts

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