Welcome to the weekly CryptoFolks Newsletter. However, our launch procedures 🛫 require us to inform you not to consider this article as investment advice, as it represents solely our personal opinion. Always remember to manage your portfolios independently.💁‍♂️

Full? Rested? Bored?

Because during this Thanksgiving weekend I was really bored 😅. From Friday to Sunday Bitcoin basically turned into a stablecoin (well, except for that quick pump and even quicker correction on Black Friday). But what happened to Bitcoin a few minutes after midnight truly deserves to be called Cyber Monday ⚡️.

Apparently on this special Monday Americans spent around $14B on discounted shopping, but that’s nothing, because NO ONE was willing to buy even a single dip on BTC, while the chart was smashing through support levels. What’s more, around $140B in long liquidations evaporated from the market — if you contributed to that, sadge for you 🥲. It was a true illiquid Sunday, probably the biggest one in a long time.

Within just two hours Bitcoin dropped from 91k to 86k, losing nearly 5%. Only then did the bargain hunters wake up, hoping to feast on a dip as juicy as a Thanksgiving turkey 🦃 — according to them, another “super opportunity” to load their moon bag… but I’ll come back to that.

As I’m writing this towards the end of this digital Monday, BTC is bouncing around 86k, which isn’t that bad considering today’s low of ~83,700 — over 8% down.

So… do we open a long expecting a rebound, or go all-in on further downside? 🤔

This is what I’ll focus on now, because we’ve got two options: a rebound, or an extended Cyber Monday. Both scenarios are possible and both have similar probability — and to explain why, let’s look at how things looked back in the day (the good old times when alts pumped 30× in a week 😌).

But before we dive into sweet nostalgia, we need to return to reality and answer the question: Where the hell are we?

Well, for some it’s a grey reality, for others not so much — I’m writing this a day later (December 2), as Bitcoin rallies from 83k to 92k… and my short is currently at -48% 🤡 — it is what it is. Hopefully you made money on the long today 😉

Alright, so where are we? We’re exactly 57 days past the end of the calendar bull market and around -26% from the ATH, which was once again hit precisely on its final day. Looking at this, you could say the bear market has already begun — and that’s also my view.

There are two possible exits from the situation we’re in — but both ultimately connect and lead to further downside:

• Exit ALPHA – a rebound toward ~100k followed by a leg down.

• Exit BRAVO – a leg down now, faster and stronger.

I’ll break down both. PS: there’s no back door 😉

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ALPHA

Here’s the short version: after hitting ATH, Bitcoin drops (similar in size to the current move), then forms a dead cat bounce — a solid recovery that gives people hope it’s back in the game… and then it dumps again shortly after.

If you look at my simulated BTC chart, you’ll see the price rebounds to around 100k — not less than 100k, not more, just 100k.
Why exactly 100k? Because it’s a psychological barrier that the chart likely won’t break — the bull market is over. If it weren’t, I’d be calling for a supercycle and another bear market in 10 years 😄.

On top of that, liquidity for further upside simply runs out. Pushing BTC from 80k to 100k in a bear market still requires a lot of capital. Personally, I don’t think ending QT, rate cuts, or even appointing a new Fed chair would change anything — but more on that later. For now: on to BRAVO.

BRAVO

Here the drops are much faster and stronger — in other words, no room for meaningful recovery. That marked rectangle is where we are right now, and if today’s rally turns out to be a fakeout, we’re heading into another liquidation cascade 💀.

You can see I marked a support line at previous resistance from the end of the bull market — not by accident. In both ALPHA and BRAVO we end up there.
However, with BRAVO we get there much faster — that’s around 73k, shown on the next chart.

Statistics

Now a bit of the queen of lies — statistics. Looking into the past and searching for ALFA and BRAVO from previous bull runs, we get that in the last 3 cycles only 1 time the BRAVO scenario (the strong drop without a retrace) played out. That was in the 2014 bull run. Meanwhile, in 2018 and 2021, large retraces and hopes for a comeback — ALFA — ruled.

At this point, one question must be asked: Is ⅔ of cases enough to assume it’ll be the same now and go all-in on longs? In other words: Will ALFA play out again? Nobody knows. But one thing is certain — it’s not worth risking the capital earned over 3 years in hopes of a Bitcoin supercycle and a new ATH by the end of this year — exactly what “experts” (Tom Lee) and a large part of Twitter claim — since all roads currently lead to the same place: inevitable declines 📉.

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Narratives

Look at the screenshot from the end of the bull run and admit that back then many different narratives dominated — some saying the bull run was ending and a downtrend was starting, others about supercycles and a 250k Bitcoin. Opinions were everywhere.

But what happened right after the ATH and the start of the drop?
Did anyone talk about the beginning of a bear market?
Did anyone say that maybe it’s time to sell?

Of course not! From that moment people began marking lower and lower local bottoms and treating them as dips before the next pump.

There were tons of these “last” bottoms — first at 115k, then 110k, then 100k, 90k, and finally 80k. Nobody cared that cyclicality might have worked since the ATH broke on October 6th and we’ve had only declines since then. Everyone thought there was still time and the price would bounce soon — “Trust me bro” 😅

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This is the classic start of every bear market — a period when everyone is mentally in the Lambo showroom choosing colors for profits they will never realize. Almost every bear market begins in silence, when there are no narratives, and instead suckers keep naively buying each lower dip… until they wake up with their hand in the cookie jar.

It wasn’t different this time — only now people finally noticed their floor is burning and realized it might genuinely be a bear market 🔥.

But no, impossible, because “Bitcoin is getting up from its knees, coming back, new highs ahead, etc…” 🙄

The truth is that many people still fool themselves and hope everything will be fine, supported by the fact that the FED is ending QT — which in short means a massive amount of capital (from printers, of course 💸) will hit the market to “save” the U.S. from recession (which is inevitable — it’s only a matter of time; printing can only delay it and make the crash even bigger). This would pump overheated indices like SPX, NDX, RTY, and that would spill into BTC (because correlation + higher willingness to risk), with a new pro-crypto face replacing Jerome Powell (someone who will print dollars day and night), and Trump’s “you’ll be tired of winning” narrative.

Forgive me this sentence as long as the U.S. national debt 😅 — but I had to get it out.

What I meant is this: No matter how positive the news for crypto or traditional markets may be, recession is coming. Everything is at its peak — traditional indices, gold, silver, and Bitcoin. Yet many will buy into the narrative that everything will be fine, that the FED will save the economy by cutting rates and launching the second biggest money-printing program after COVID, that Bitcoin will make a new ATH because of it… and of course that “altcoin season is coming and fartcoin will do 1000x” 🚀🤡

In summary

The bear market is here, the bull run is over, and declines will come — sooner or later.

Matthew

Welcome to the weekly CryptoFolks Newsletter. However, our launch procedures 🛫 require us to inform you not to consider this article as investment advice, as it represents solely our personal opinion. Always remember to manage your portfolios independently.💁‍♂️

I’ll start with this picture.

Just as a little keepsake, for the memories 📸. Because today we’re going to go through what the so-called “experts” are talking about right now, and we’ll draw our own conclusions from it.

M2

I don’t know whether this requires more commentary or a psychologist for the people posting it 😅 — and it’s not even an isolated case. Some believers have switched their train to gold.

Alright, now let’s see how it’s going.

Well, shit.

Let’s go back to this M2 — at this point you really need some peripheral vision to believe it 👀. And if that wasn’t enough, it didn’t even work back when the correlation actually existed. Read more about that here:

Maybe one day there will be a full article on this.

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Quantitative Easing (famous QE)

The head of the New York Fed suggested in his speech that the Fed might be moving toward money printing and a loose monetary policy. And do you know why? For example:

You know what I’ll say? I don’t believe it — I don’t believe that AI is the reason for the weak labor market numbers 🤖. Sure, some junior-level work can be replaced by a good AI system, but the entire labor market isn’t built only on tech, and definitely not on software developers who are supposedly being replaced.

The FED really might start printing, but not because the soft landing has been achieved and we’re done — it’s because it’s already too late, and the house of cards is starting to collapse. It always starts with the labor market.

Indicators

This one is even more obvious than the M2 thing. Too bad nobody showed this when Bitcoin was at $124k 🤦‍♂️.

Besides, there are things on that list like ETF outflows > 10 days. Did anyone ever verify that? Back then there were no ETFs. Sorry to say it, but market tops usually happen when everyone says they’re buying — not after 10 days of ETF outflows. Something like that has never happened in history — the longest streak of Bitcoin ETF outflows lasted 9 days!!!

I don’t even want to mention that the list also contains CBBI > 90. Well… in history it has NEVER happened that CBBI hit 90 in real time. I talk more about that here:

I could do this all day — many indicators on that list are completely off, and the levels they claim to “warn” at haven’t worked for like 7 years.

Meanwhile, everyone goes to Coinglass, takes a screenshot, posts it on X and boom — “see, there was no top, no indicator showed it.”

Maybe next time I’d recommend some glasses… or binoculars 🤓.

BlackRock

Now this is the cherry on top 🍒. We’ve got two sides here: one group says BlackRock is selling, the other says “look, smart money (BlackRock) is buying.”
They don’t.

These are not BlackRock’s purchases, this is not their money. They operate those wallets on behalf of ETF clients. How long will it take before everyone understands that?

Stimulus checks

Well… rumors say that Trump will hand out (as a “dividend”) $2000 from what they supposedly earned from tariffs. Whether they earned anything is another question. But those checks would go to the lower-income part of society.

And what do crypto people say? TO THE MOON!!!!! 🚀

“This is it, altcoin season, Bitcoin to $200k!”

You know what I’ll say?

Maybe a lot of low-income people really will buy Bitcoin, and maybe the price even shoots to $150k (which I doubt).

But then what happens?

They get steamrolled by the market — they’ll be the last buyers of this bull run, if it happens.

The retail crowd from the previous cycle moved on to trading futures, adding fuel to the fire — and they’ll get steamrolled too.

And by “steamrolled” I mean something like this:

The market is not a place where every average Joe makes money (even though in 2021 that actually happened).

The market is where the smarter or the more crooked players win (I’m looking at you, Binance 😏).

In 2021, after the announcement and distribution of checks, crypto really did take off — and you could even argue it was the moment that started the parabola.

But that has already happened, and it won’t return.

Usually the second time around, emotions take over. You and I might think “WOW finally everything will rise!”, but in reality, everyone will start selling because they know this is the moment (buy the rumor, sell the news).

Time

Say whatever you want, but definitely not what the entire Twitter keeps repeating like a mantra — that there’s still time for growth, because supposedly M2 exploded so Bitcoin will shoot to $200k tomorrow. You’ve gotta face the truth and admit that the bull market is over, and there was no altseason, and even if by some miracle it were to happen, it definitely wouldn’t be the 2021 version, when even a monkey… or Jim Cramer ;) could make money on crypto. Take a look at the screenshot:

It’s a clear example for all the doubters who stopped believing in cycles. Once again, they proved to be accurate. One full Bitcoin cycle — roughly 3 years of growth and, without rounding, 365 days of decline — lasts around 1430 days, as you can see in the screenshot. Let’s go back to it.

From the end of the 2017 bull market to the end of the next one in 2021, 1431 days passed — almost 100% accuracy. What happened next? The start of the current cycle — a year of decline and another 3 years of growth. Alright, time for some quick math 🧮.

1430 cycle days – 1095 growth days (3×365) = 335 days reserved for the decline (the difference comes from rounding during the bull phase).
This means the official start of the bear market falls 1095 days after the bottom. Now let’s take a look at the chart and see where we stand.

The two orange dashed lines represent exactly 1095 days from the BTC bottom on November 10th, 2022 — the time window for the bull run, the period during which Bitcoin had the chance to hit $200k according to the M2 believers, the time that has now officially ended. Going further — and wanting to be perfectly precise — we could even add the missing 11 days taken from the bear phase. In that case, the bull run ends in two days, this Friday (21.11). See the chart below:

Well… here’s the conclusion: if Bitcoin is supposed to follow M2 and reach $200k, it only has this tiny two-day window left on the chart — just a bit over 48 hours from the moment I’m writing this. Will that happen? Of course it will, there’s no other option… but only if:

— Trump comes out tomorrow and says: “You know what? I’m buying 1 million Bitcoins for the U.S. reserves LOL, let’s see what happens”,
or
— every single person on Earth suddenly wakes up (the blind too 😅) and understands what BTC really is, creating unprecedented demand and a “supercycle”.

Otherwise, we’d need the fattest black swan in history for Bitcoin to keep rising. Time is up — welcome to the bear market. 🐻

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Emotions

Recently, I was explaining to a friend how Bitcoin’s cyclicality works. When I finished talking about the halving, 3 years of growth, and 1 year of decline, I showed her a similar screenshot (the one with Bitcoin cycles). She replied: “It can’t be that simple — if it were, everyone who knows even a bit about this would’ve taken profits already.”

Exactly — it can’t be that simple. Why? Because emotions kick in 😅 — the greatest enemy of all investors. Even if you know Bitcoin perfectly, know how it behaves, know how much it typically drops during a bear market… you can still fall for FOMO and hold your position waiting for “just the last 10%” of gains. Then it becomes another 10%, and another… and so on forever.

The key is sticking to your strategy and avoiding the unnecessary noise from clowns who will desperately try to convince others not to take profits and to wait “just a little longer”, only because after 1095 days of growth their own portfolio is still red 🤡.

You can read more about emotions in investing in this case-study-based article:

The Big Short is a new series titled this way for a reason. In it, I’ll be sharing my journey from idea to execution in maximizing gains on the cryptocurrency market. But remember – everything you read here is just my thoughts and my positions. This is not financial advice, and I’m not an advisor, just a regular market participant like you. What I’ll describe here involves excessive risk, which I do not recommend copying ⚠️.

I’ve decided this one to be out for free to read, enjoy!

Let’s start with a quick recap of where we are.

What does the timing look like?

Pretty bad, not gonna lie. It’s exactly the middle of October—the date everybody was waiting for—yet now everyone wants to believe in the continuation of the bull market into 2026. Yeah, right…

So the simulation, fairy dust, flying UFOs, and unicorns are real?

Well, I guess so.

Being real for a second, it’s the truth—we did wait for October 2025, and here we are. Anyone now saying, “Oh yeah, the bull market will continue 100%,” is betting on something that has never happened before.

Speaking of UFOs, on Polymarket there’s now a higher chance that UFOs are confirmed by the end of this year than Bitcoin reaching $200k.

Let that sink in.

Anyway, the conclusion from the timing is that we’re cooked—unless you’re playing on the right side of the market, like I think I am.

Let’s get a little bit technical here.

You know how in 2021 the MACD showed a bearish divergence on the second top?

Well, here it is.

Guess what—the same thing is happening right here, right now.

I’ve always written about the big, giant trade and the flow of capital. The consequences of that thesis were simple: RTY growth was crucial for crypto. Anything beyond that for RTY is unknown territory—we can’t measure it. That doesn’t mean it can’t go further; there’s just no method of knowing. Why? Because right here, right now, it’s literally at the 4.236 Fibonacci extension—the LAST one there is.

Anything more for Bitcoin would be an anomaly. But there’s a catch: dominance has started falling.

There has never been a point in history where this MACD cross was fake.

A fun scenario to think about now is Bitcoin doing a 0.702 retrace, altcoins making one last rally (most won’t set new ATHs, just like before and like now), while RTY does a fakeout on the 4.236—and boom, the bear is at your front door.

Of course, it could be different. But at the end of the day, it’s kind of like a betting or probability game. When money is involved, I want to be on the most probable side possible—and that’s not a continuation into 2026, especially not Q4, as some say.

Gold is at its peaks, and that doesn’t help either.

The liquidation

You’ve heard about this—the biggest flash crash, flush, dump, whatever you want to call it, in history. $19 billion wiped out of the market. The takeaway? Some traders lost so much that Binance will supposedly pay some of them back somehow (if that’s not rewarding mistakes, I don’t know what is). Spot buyers are “buying the dip”—they’ll be buying dips for the next year or so. Nobody’s got money left, especially retail, since they all gambled it on leverage.

A new wave of capital is needed to move the price up.

Final Thoughts

Anyway, I like to risk on the probable scenario, so I’m still adding to my Bitcoin short—currently 40% in. However, if I see expansion happening in RTY and Bitcoin at a new ATH, I’ll reduce the position—not fully, but some of it for sure. At some point, the bear market will come, no matter what your favorite altcoin shiller says.

I won’t show you more charts—you all know them. It’s a tricky place we’re in; there’s no clear evidence that one way to act is better than the other. You can find arguments for both sides all day long. The key here is not to fall into a narrative. When emotions and green portfolios weren’t clouding our judgment, we determined that Q4 of 2025 would be the time to get out.

That time is today. And today, everyone wants more—they’re greedy, partially because there was no real altcoin season. Sure, XRP did a 5x, but Bitcoin did more. Most altcoins haven’t even passed their previous ATHs (including Ethereum). Nobody got the 100x Lambo money they hoped for—and the reality is, there is no space in crypto for that anymore.

Crypto isn’t a small niche with unheard-of gains. Let me remind you: we have Bitcoin ETFs (multiple!!!!), Ethereum ETFs (also multiple), and altcoin ETFs supposedly coming this fall. Institutions are already here, making the market. They buy and sell, reducing volatility. The days of 2013 or 2017 won’t come back.

Enjoy the money you’ve already made.
In case you’re wondering, I’m 20% in profit.

The Big Short is a new series titled this way for a reason. In it, I’ll be sharing my journey from idea to execution in maximizing gains on the cryptocurrency market. But remember – everything you read here is just my thoughts and my positions. This is not financial advice, and I’m not an advisor, just a regular market participant like you. What I’…

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Welcome to the weekly CryptoFolks Newsletter. However, our launch procedures 🛫 require us to inform you not to consider this article as investment advice, as it represents solely our personal opinion. Always remember to manage your portfolios independently.💁‍♂️

This is the moment you’ve been waiting for. The last 3 years of a bear market and early stages all lead to today, this exact moment. Why? You may ask. Let me show you something.

Introduction

On Thursday, Russell 2000 index closed at the highest level in its entire history 📈.
You might say: “Bro, why are you showing me some random stocks?”

Here’s why:

The correlation between the Russell 2000 small-cap index and TOTAL2 is undeniable—see for yourself.

Impressive, right? 😏

In history, there was never a moment when TOTAL2 moved independently without RTY. Every breakout, every bottom… and guess what? TOTAL2 always sets its tops on the exact same days as RTY. Just take a look.

Well, guess what…

We’re now in exactly the same moment – RTY and TOTAL2 are entering price discovery territory, reaching levels never seen before 🚀.

This is the point where altcoins take the lead in the crypto world, the moment all the influencers have been waiting for to start posting moons 🌙, Mars 🪐, and rocket emojis 🚀. This is the environment where altcoins enter the banana zone and literally everything that moves goes up.

But here’s the catch: a moment like this doesn’t last long. Usually less than two months, often just a single month ⏳.

Reflection on past predictions

If I told you this was the end of the bull market, you might ask: “But what bull market? There hasn’t been one.”

Most people don’t realize how expensive Bitcoin is right now – over $100k.

Reminder: based on cycle math, the ATH this cycle should’ve been around $76k if it mirrored the past. Now you see the point. ETFs have entered the game, massively increasing volatility and inflating the speculative bubble.

Even adjusting for inflation, that $76k translates to about $97k. ❗

Maybe you don’t feel euphoria yet, but at these price levels we are truly in a bull market, just in its final stage. And you’re not the only one not feeling it.

Out of curiosity, I asked Grok, here’s what it said:

“I rate it 6/10. There’s a growing wave of optimism and FOMO (e.g., after ATH and Fed news), but without mania – users are in a ‘waiting room before FOMO,’ with warnings of overheating. Scale 10 is peak mania; we’re in the build-up with potential for higher scores in Q4.”

Now, if the TOTAL2 correlation with RTY continues, we will see the same gains we saw with Bitcoin, but this time in altcoins, which are still lagging behind.

So here we are: an environment where altcoins can rise, while Bitcoin still hasn’t decided if this is the end. This is about the famous 0.702 level from the previous bull run, where it all ended.

It’s not by accident we published this note:

And it’s not by accident that this article is being written. The entire game is played on one chessboard, capital is interconnected. The time you’ve been waiting for is now. Euphoria can appear overnight, and when it does, the most important thing is to keep a cool head and understand what’s happening inside your mind 🧠. That’s why we’ve already published a second article on emotions:

Altcoin season may pass almost unnoticed.

Final thoughts

If I were to pull out my crystal ball 🔮, it says that the crowd will buy the top and get wrecked, and by then it will be too late. Personally, I follow the theory that it’s better to make less than risk losing everything.

I’ll leave you with this information. Feel free to send us a message or leave a comment – I’d love to start a discussion about this. 💬

Welcome to the weekly CryptoFolks Newsletter. However, our launch procedures 🛫 require us to inform you not to consider this article as investment advice, as it represents solely our personal opinion. Always remember to manage your portfolios independently.💁‍♂️

You might think it all comes down to a lack of knowledge about investing — jumping into projects after just a few minutes of research and relying on intuition. Of course, like anyone who’s been interested in crypto or investing for more than a day, you probably believe this doesn’t apply to you… but are you 100% sure about that? 🤔

Every one of us who has ever invested any amount of money into an asset that was supposed to bring profits, only to see it turn into a loss, knows the feeling. While those “quick” or “for fun” investments are almost identical to roulette in a casino 🎰, there is one key difference that allows you to recover your invested funds (and no, I don’t mean throwing even more capital into a losing position). I’m talking about a sell order — because as you know: “If you haven’t sold, you haven’t lost.” Lol

At this moment, you may still insist that you don’t invest that way, that only inexperienced retail does this — the ones buying into a dog token just because their neighbor made 100x on it. And I don’t doubt that. But let the first person cast a stone who has never held onto a losing position, waiting for it to return to breakeven… or, during a bull market peak, at least thought about moving secured capital into a riskier asset chasing bigger profits, since “everything is going up.” I’ll start.

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Like any other investor, I’m only human, and I know very little about the immediate future — and even less about potential events that could shape markets and listed companies. So sometimes, I rely on intuition. While in everyday life that might make sense, in the world of financial markets ruled by mathematics, probability, and cold statistics 📉 — it doesn’t.

There’s also another crucial aspect of investing: emotions. Emotions, combined with the belief that “I’m not like the others, I know what I’m doing,” naturally lead to negative results. By focusing on total nonsense — our ego, our infallibility, our desire for quick profits — we forget the fundamentals that are key before buying any asset: fundamental analysis, sentiment, and all that stuff. Here’s how it played out for me.

Since not much is happening in the crypto market right now, and just like you, I’m waiting for altseason, with my Bitcoin profits already secured, I decided to “make some extra” on the traditional stock market.

Feeling overly confident, thinking losses were impossible (after all, I had already made 400% on BTC), I pulled up a list of stocks looking for that one “gem.” As the “experienced investor” I was, I skipped fundamental analysis, skipped going through the company’s structure or leadership, skipped the whole due diligence process.

The only thing I looked at was the stock price and how deep it was from its ATH — pure genius. After a few minutes of hunting, I found what I was looking for — let’s call it Company X. All I knew was: its stock price was down -90% from ATH, in a 4-year downtrend, and its market cap was similar to the average coin on pump.fun 💀.

So I thought: YOLO. The price will go slightly up, I’ll make a few dozen percent, and then I’ll move on to find the next “gem.” Great mindset. What could possibly go wrong? 🙃

At first, nothing dramatic happened. The price dropped slightly by 10%, which of course I ignored — being in crypto for a few years, such things don’t impress anyone. A few days later, I became even more convinced I was the God of investing, as Company X went up and I was 20% in profit. Instead of taking gains and running while I could, what did I do? Of course! I waited for another 20%. And that’s when it started.

Over the next week, the price went back to -10%, and I grew impatient about my “quick” profit. Another 7 days passed, the stock dropped another 30%, and then hovered at that level for a long time. That’s when I thought maybe it wasn’t the best idea to blindly invest in this company. Sitting at -40%, I finally decided to do proper analysis… and realized how massive of a mistake this was.

Imagine a company with a profit margin of -168%, a return on invested capital of -155%, almost zero liquidity, no cash on hand, $14 million in debt, and a dividend yield of -18.5%. That’s what a “quick” profit looks like. 😬

After seeing that, I reached the classic conclusion you see in memes: “I don’t want profits anymore, I just want to get back to my average entry price.” So I started hoping Company X would somehow recover, but I knew it was basically impossible. Meanwhile, the stock dropped further, hitting a local bottom, leaving me at -75%. Things looked hopeless… until I read that management had filed for bankruptcy. Normally, that would be the nail in the coffin ⚰️, but in the back of my head, I thought maybe a bigger player in the industry might acquire the company.

That didn’t happen. But luckily for me, X managed a few attempts at signing partnership deals with other companies, which revived some sentiment — and the stock price suddenly jumped 160% off the bottom. Still, I was at -33%. And instead of celebrating that someone was buying, I was frustrated that I hadn’t bought the bottom myself to make those 160% — ah, emotions.

A few days later, nothing much was happening on the chart… until another news release hit: the company withdrew its bankruptcy filing. Sentiment flipped 180°, the price jumped another 48%, and I literally had just a few hours to exit with a small profit from this “quick” investment.

In the end, I realized 2.8% profit after being down -75%. But it didn’t really matter — the capital I had put into Company X was only $100, a tiny fraction of my portfolio. I wasn’t that crazy (or corrupted by crypto markets) to go all-in and risk everything for small gains. Although honestly, if I had invested more and seen a -75% loss, I probably would have cut my position early to save what was left, just like the majority of investors do.

What a ride, wasn’t it?

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Even though this whole anecdote revolved around a small amount of money, it remains a valuable lesson for me: always — and I mean always — only enter projects you know and only after thorough analysis, so you don’t end up dragging skeletons out of the closet ☠️. More importantly, like I wrote at the beginning: in investing, you can’t rely on intuition or gut feeling — especially after a streak of successful trades made that way. Sure, those do happen, but it’s basically the same as betting on a roulette number and hoping to win.

The approach should always be calm, with cold calculations of all possible scenarios, especially the worst ones — because history shows that the “worst case” can always turn out even worse.

Keeping the core emotion at bay during the end of a bull market — greed 🤑 — is absolutely key to executing your plan and making money, so you don’t end up like the others stuck with altcoins down -70%, -80%, even -90% in a bear market, hoping they’ll “bounce back.” We all know most alts never return to ATH in the next cycle.

To wrap up my story, I wish you to make as much profit as possible in this bull market’s final phase — but without falling into FOMO and greed, chasing “just a little more.” Be careful when everyone is already in profit — there’s a reason they say the top is the most dangerous time in the market! ⚠️

Let’s talk about this!

Lower interest rates mean cheaper credit for businesses.

The better a company prospers, the higher its profits and the higher its stock price (in theory — in reality, the market is not 100% efficient). You must understand that the game here is really about business and entrepreneurs; at the end of the day, their financial condition decides whether the price goes up or down.

Imagine you’re the CEO of a manufacturing company 🏭. Your firm already has a loan for a factory and equipment, and you additionally want to expand into another sector, say producing teddy bears. It’s 2021, interest rates are basically near zero, so you’re paying tiny interest on the factory loan, and seeing how cheap money is, you take another loan for Winnie the Pooh machines. 🧸

Then inflation hits, Jerome Powell comes out and raises rates — suddenly your cheap credit gets expensive. Instead of 0.5% per year (like in 2021), you’re now paying 6–8% — that’s an extra $50k–100k annually on a $1M loan. Winnie the Pooh costs you 8% per year for nothing, and you haven’t even started selling them. Worse — you can’t find buyers because your marketing team is too busy watching cartoons. The teddy bear venture is a total disaster 🧸💸, and all you’re left with is equipment and rising loan costs.

What now? Now both your factory and teddy bear loans are eating you alive, the high rates drag on for 2 years, and you’ve burned through your savings paying interest. Your business model was built in a cheap-credit environment, but suddenly operating costs multiply. For example, in U.S. manufacturing, debt costs rose 200–300% in 2022–2023 (Bureau of Economic Analysis). Enter Jerome Powell again, lowering rates, and you’re back in business.

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Here’s the first red flag 🚨

What if rates don’t get cut in time? You may ask.

Your money runs out, the knight in shining armor never arrives, and you? You go bankrupt. You can’t pay your interest, you’re forced to sell everything, and that’s it — you’re out of business. Larger corporations manage better: they can cut staff, sell parts of assets, or pause new investments. But all of that still reduces company value → stock prices fall 📉.

Now let’s look more from the financial markets perspective. Lower rates decrease the discount rate used to value future earnings — meaning stocks, real estate, and crypto look more valuable. People flee low-yield savings or bonds into higher-return assets, fueling bull runs. If bonds pay zero, why buy them? Even worse, Swiss National Bank introduced negative rates — you had to pay them to hold their debt 🤯. Not attractive, so many prefer assets like Bitcoin, which returned 600% in 5 years at one point.

Rate cuts are also interpreted as the Fed being “proactive,” saving the economy from slowdown. This builds investor confidence, reduces panic risk, and encourages buying — especially at the start of a cutting cycle. But here’s the catch: how many times did the Fed cut too late (and a recession followed right after)?

Since 1954, the Fed cut rates 11 times, and 9 times a recession followed. Only twice in 80 years did cuts not precede a recession — one being the famous 1966 “soft landing.” Today looks similar to 1966… but also very similar to the classic crisis setup.

More problems

The Fed is a huge machine, and much of its data is lagging. Cuts come only after signs of slowdown show up — but those data are already 3 months behind reality. That’s often too late.

• 2000–2001 (Dot-Com Bubble): Fed cut rates from 6.5% → 1.75%. NASDAQ crashed 50%, recession hit.

• 2007–2008 (Financial Crisis): Fed cut from 5.25% → 0.25%. S&P 500 fell 57%, recession hit.

• 2019–2020 (Pre-COVID): Fed cut from 2.5% → 1.75%. Then COVID hit → markets crashed 34%.
  

Research shows cuts take 6–18 months to impact the economy. By the time they do, recession often has already begun — and markets priced it in already.

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Another key: debt.

Low rates encourage more borrowing — exactly like in my teddy bear story. That leads to bubbles, e.g., the housing bubble in 2008, fueled by cuts in 2001 and mortgage debt rising 150%.

Fact

Where are we now?

We’re actually already after the first cuts.

Markets expect more in September’s FOMC meeting.

At first glance, this looks like a tsunami of liquidity 🌊 for risky assets, including crypto. Cheaper loans could funnel trillions into Bitcoin, Ethereum, and alts. But here lies the paradox: cuts don’t happen in a vacuum — history warns they often signal deeper economic problems, not a lasting bull market.

Liquidity-driven optimism.

We’ve already seen glimpses of the “bullish” side since the cuts began. After the September 2024 rate cut, Bitcoin briefly rose to around $65,000, driven by expectations of easier money and increased leverage in DeFi and margin trading. By Q1 2025, BTC reached historic highs near $109,000, fueled by massive ETF inflows (e.g., Bitcoin ETFs accumulated 51,500 BTC in December 2024 alone, outpacing mining supply by 272%) and broader risk-on sentiment.

This fits the positives we’ve already discussed: lower rates encourage speculation. For example, if the Fed delivers the anticipated 50 bps cut in September 2025 (as Treasury Secretary Bessent suggested), it could further weaken the USD, attract foreign capital into crypto, and spark a short-term pump — potentially pushing BTC above $140,000, according to some trader models.

On X, crypto enthusiasts are buzzing 🎉 — posts like “TRILLIONS WILL FLOW INTO CRYPTO” are gaining traction, highlighting how historically, rate cuts ignited rallies (e.g., Bitcoin’s 1,600% surge after the 2020 cuts). Even macro factors, like earlier rate reductions in Europe and China, are being cited as precursors to a global liquidity wave benefiting high-risk assets like altcoins.

Zoom out, and the paradox becomes clear

These cuts are reactions to mounting economic problems, not proactive growth boosters. The Fed’s easing comes amid warnings of a potential U.S. recession in 2025, with economists like Mark Zandi pointing to a deteriorating labor market — over half of industries are shedding jobs, unemployment fears are reaching Great Recession levels, and planned trade tariffs under President Trump are further damaging sentiment. We’ve all seen the headlines about major companies across industries preparing for layoffs.

J.P. Morgan Research puts the probability of recession at 40% (down from 60%, but still high), while Goldman Sachs estimates 30%, forecasting only 1.25% GDP growth in 2025 — half the 2024 pace and below pre-pandemic averages. And let’s be honest — what these institutions present to the public is worth about as much as a bus driver’s advice on investing in DeFi 🚌💸.

Recent data shows GDP growth returned in Q2 2025, but at a sluggish pace, while consumer confidence keeps eroding despite strong retail sales — a classic paradox signaling underlying fragility.

This mirrors historical patterns:

• 2001 (dot-com bust) — cuts preceded a recession and market crash,
  

• 2007 (financial crisis) — same story,
  

• 2019 (pre-COVID) — cuts, then another crash.

In 2025, we’ve already seen volatility

Bitcoin fell from Q1 highs amid macro uncertainty, with billions of dollars in long positions liquidated in July after a hotter-than-expected inflation print temporarily crushed hopes for cuts. Stock markets also fell after the December 2024 cut (S&P 500 down 3%) and, while partially recovering, high-yield spreads have tightened without removing recession fears.

If Powell keeps playing tough, thinking cuts aren’t needed yet, two things happen:

• it deepens the later crisis,
  

• it scares investors (since cuts are already priced in, a delay would break the narrative and trigger sell-offs).

What I’m trying to say is

After rate cuts, a recession almost always follows → markets drop → crypto gets hit even harder ⚡. Timing now becomes the key. Everyone already “knows” that the bull cycle should end in fall 2025 because of cyclicality, but markets always surprise the majority. I doubt it will neatly end in October/November, but we are still talking about late 2025 or early 2026.

Welcome to the weekly CryptoFolks Newsletter. However, our launch procedures 🛫 require us to inform you not to consider this article as investment advice, as it represents solely our personal opinion. Always remember to manage your portfolios independently.💁‍♂️

Bitcoin set a new ATH just 10 days ago, and you might have already forgotten about it because of how much has happened since — you’re not alone in this. Today, I’ll reflect with you on whether that was the top and the end of Bitcoin’s bull market. We’ll consider all the signals coming from the market to answer this crucial question. The answer most likely won’t be black-and-white (as it usually isn’t), but at least we’ll get closer to the truth.

We’ll take into account four segments — all equally important. Without one, the picture isn’t complete. That’s why it’s crucial to look at the market from every possible angle — so we don’t fall for just a single narrative.

Let me share my perspective in TLDR style:

I don’t think this was Bitcoin’s final peak — it’s still relatively early (timing), there’s no frenzy on the streets yet (lack of retail mania), and so far this has been a Bitcoin-driven bull market (leaving time for capital to flow deeper into altcoins). There are also many other reasons, such as the rate cuts recently almost confirmed by Jerome Powell, which the retail crowd sees as a bullish environment.

In one of the future newsletters, I’ll show you what really happens after rate cuts — you don’t wanna miss that 😉 like the market missed your take profit.

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Timing ⏳

Everyone has probably heard of cyclicality (I hope so) — and despite that, it continues to work. This bull run is practically no different in timing from the previous ones.

Assuming it stays this way (and we don’t fight the tide like rookie traders selling the top only to buy back higher), the peak according to the 4-year cycles should land on October 21st, exactly 4 years from Bitcoin’s bottom. Of course, the chart you see today may not look like a perfect 1:1 replication because the moves are smaller — but that’s how financial markets and liquidity work: the bigger the market, the lower the volatility, especially with such a high number of long-term hodlers.

We’re also in the post-halving cycle window (April 2024), where historically BTC peaks 12–18 months later. That means a potential top between September 2025 and April 2026. In the last cycle, it happened just 11 months later (assuming you count the first top as the real peak — that’s also when many altcoins reached their ATH). Today, we’re in month 16.

So, what do we know about timing? We’re right in the sweet spot — a 2–3 month window for Bitcoin to set that top. My bias is that it hasn’t happened yet, but nothing can be excluded.

Price Action 📈

So far, we haven’t seen the famous parabola at any stage of this bull run — a key difference from previous ones.

See the difference?

What is Bitcoin telling us? Honestly, not much. The channel between $80k and the current ATH looks more like a huge Wyckoff distribution — and we’ll probably stay in that range a while longer to fill it. I like to view the chart from an inverse perspective to cut away the narrative and focus only on facts.

From that angle, if you ask me whether this was already the top (or bottom), I’d say yes. But if you ask whether the trend can still continue — I’d also say yes. Elliott Waves suggest we’re now waiting for the fifth and final wave upward — and that’s where the true top may be set.

That said, this is nonsense in practical terms. An investor profits when they buy lower and sell higher — not by aiming for the perfect top or perfect bottom. Chasing perfection only reduces profits by a few percent but drastically increases the chance of failure. Keeping that in mind — we’ve sold our Bitcoin.

I hope you agree that at the end of the bull run, it’s usually smaller projects that outperform Bitcoin. Since April 9th, Bitcoin has risen 54%, while ETH is up 245% and Solana 119%. This is capital rotation happening right in front of our eyes.

Soon, we’ll start hearing about the flippening — the moment when Ethereum’s market cap surpasses Bitcoin’s.

I’ll just leave it here. 🔥

Emotions 😮‍💨

I asked Grok to outline the current sentiment toward crypto on platform X, here’s what it said:

Powell’s speech significantly improved sentiment, and the narrative around rate cuts is picking up steam 🚀, but still, it’s not that moment. We don’t see random celebrities tweeting about Bitcoin, or everyday people on X asking how to get started. Google searches for terms like crypto or Bitcoin are also still fairly although not fully empty.

Market Participants 🏦

Some of the retail crowd loaded up when Bitcoin first broke $100k — that event had real hype. Since then, emotions have cooled, even though the price continues to climb, and small wallets are sleeping…

The demand side of the market is filled with institutions.

👉 59% of institutional investors plan to allocate >5% to crypto in 2025,
👉 $3T of pension fund capital could flow into the market.

These are insane numbers 🤯, and I think we can already call this an institutional bull run. That’s where the FOMO and euphoria are happening: buying without much thought, adding Bitcoin to their portfolios just to announce it on X — and then their stock price jumps.

The Surprise Element 🎭

Maybe that’s exactly where the surprise factor lies: this time, we might not get the retail frenzy of your average John Smith. The bull run could end once institutional FOMO fades.

The surprise won’t come from interest rates — Powell already came out and said cuts are coming, and the market priced that in accordingly (BTC +5%, ETH +16%). Unless further cuts don’t happen (which I doubt), that card is already played.

Why do I bring this up? Because markets always carry an element of surprise. The market is a zero-sum game — for someone to win, someone else must lose. Until now, the majority usually lost. This time, the majority seems to be winning — unless the real majority hasn’t yet entered crypto. If the crowd hasn’t flooded the market yet, we don’t know.

So, if the majority is to lose, something must shock them — and we’re still waiting for that. The key is not to get caught off guard ⚡.

If you want to talk about this, feel free to join the subscribers chat! We will discuss all of this there (really).

Timing again ⏳

Timing itself might be the big surprise. At the start of this year, many thought the bull run could end before April — shocking everyone. That didn’t happen, but that doesn’t mean it still can’t.

Somehow, cyclicality has been working for years — and when it stops, it will shock many. The bull run could end next week, or it could stretch into 2026. It goes both ways.

Final Thought 🧘

At the end of the day, we know that we know nothing. Be sure to not feel like you’re wasted your time reading this, a lot of people take decades to get the randomness of what happens in the future. This is the time to watch the market closely and remain cautious — just like 4 years ago at the bottom.

The Big Short is a new series titled this way for a reason. In it, I’ll be sharing my journey from idea to execution in maximizing gains on the cryptocurrency market. But remember – everything you read here is just my thoughts and my positions. This is not financial advice, and I’m not an advisor, just a regular market participant like you. What I’…

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Welcome to the weekly CryptoFolks Newsletter. However, our launch procedures 🛫 require us to inform you not to consider this article as investment advice, as it represents solely our personal opinion. Always remember to manage your portfolios independently.💁‍♂️

During a bear market, in the media and beyond, we often hear that cryptocurrencies are a scam and that most people lose money on them. The latter is actually true — most people do lose money in crypto. What’s more, not long ago, a creator on X ran a poll among their community, and it turned out that even though 100% of them were in profit on BTC (because of the price hitting new ATH), more than half still had an overall loss on their portfolio.

You might think: What a bunch of fools — BTC is up 6x from the bottom and they’re losing money? How is that possible?

The answer: greed and pressure.

There is hope

For some reason, so far the retail crowd (small wallets in on-chain data terms) is playing this bull run almost perfectly — buying the dips and selling into strength.

Retail is represented by so-called plankton 🐟 — wallets holding between 1 satoshi and 0.01 BTC (or up to 1 BTC, though 1 BTC is now serious money). Considering growing adoption and new people entering the market, we can clearly see an accelerated rise in the number of these wallets, and a slowdown when Bitcoin’s price was outside its previous ATH.

Such small wallets are often used for utility purposes in various blockchain applications — and of course, some of us here hold more than 0.01 BTC. Let’s now look at wallets holding up to 1 BTC — here, my point becomes even clearer.

In the previous bull market, these people were left holding the bag 🛍️, buying as prices climbed.

Even being stuck with Bitcoin bought at $69k didn’t turn out to be the worst investment — but the real bloodbath happened in altcoins. In 2018, holding Ethereum meant facing a -94% drop. Even in 2021, the drop was still “only” -81%.

Massive numbers.

For a traditional stock market investor — let alone bonds — that’s insanity. And Ethereum is still the #2 project; a big one like Solana dropped -96%.

We can now agree that being left holding the bag isn’t something we want. The problem is, retail has always ended up with the bag — and this time will be no different. The current cycle must have some element of surprise for that to happen.

Someone will have to buy your Bitcoin at $150k or your XRP at $9 — maybe it will be John Smith from Wall Street via an ETF — but that’s another discussion.

Someone must end up buying the top — that’s how the market works.

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Where are we now? 📍

Let’s start with prices:

• Bitcoin — $117k

  • +71% from its previous ATH

• Ethereum — $4,220

  • -14% from the ATH.

Let’s zoom in 🔍:

Since the local bottom on April 9, Bitcoin’s price is up 58%, and Ethereum’s is up 205%.

Retail is driven by greed and pressure — the urge to make as much as possible in the shortest time. But that’s not what the market is about — it’s a game of patience.

Anyway — greed and pressure leads us to think:

“Only an idiot buys Bitcoin now at 6x from the bottom — I’ll buy Ethereum because it’s cheaper”

(yes, some really think $117k vs $4,200 is a huge difference - “it is clearly cheaper”, yea right) and because it’s still below its ATH. And that’s exactly what’s happening right now — capital is losing interest in Bitcoin and flowing into ETH. We’re even seeing MicroStrategy-wannabe plays like $SBET, and ETFs are recording net inflows on most days.

Next?

Greed and pressure will decide ETH is “too expensive” and will move to coins worth just a few cents — because you can get more of them than ETH at $5k. That’s when attention will shift to small caps.

On this chart, we’re now at the Big Caps (Ethereum) stage — from here, the street is only one way. This isn’t my original concept — it’s a fairly well-known model of how a bull market unfolds.

Greed and pressure take control not when prices go up, but when they start to fall

“Don’t worry you guys, it’s only a healthy correction, it will be back soon.” - John Smith, 2021

That’s what happens with Bitcoin, Ethereum, and everything else. Think of a bank like J.P. Morgan or Citibank — imagine you run one. They know all about greed and pressure, which is why they don’t wait for the perfect top. I do the same — I’ve sold my BTC and will soon sell my ETH. I’ve still made 5x on BTC and 2x+ on ETH. Some traditional investors wait a lifetime for 5x.

What to do?

• Definitely not what this guy says 👇

  

  

  That’s pure emotional triggering on guys like me and you. Emotions stay at the door when logging into an exchange.

• If you’re just starting — not financial advice — but I’ll be waiting for Autumn ‘26. You’ll see…

• The altcoin season everyone is waiting for will pass right before our eyes and we won’t even realize it. There will be no time to take profits.

• In the meantime — education is the answer.

Books, valuable videos (not those with 🚀 and “million X” thumbnails), not just about crypto, but also about investing in general.

Greed and pressure want to control you in every market. I know this isn’t what you want to hear — you’d rather get a guarantee that altcoin season is coming and your tokens will do 10x. But even if that happens, what good is it if you’re waiting for 11x, 12x, 14x, 20x — and you never harvest the fruits of your capital? 🍏

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The Big Short is a new series titled this way for a reason. In it, I’ll be sharing my journey from idea to execution in maximizing gains on the cryptocurrency market. But remember – everything you read here is just my thoughts and my positions. This is not financial advice, and I’m not an advisor, just a regular market participant like you. What I’…

Read more

Welcome to the weekly CryptoFolks Newsletter. However, our launch procedures 🛫 require us to inform you not to consider this article as investment advice, as it represents solely our personal opinion. Always remember to manage your portfolios independently.💁‍♂️

Let’s kick off with a meme

After Bitcoin’s recent rally to $123k, it might seem like what everyone’s been waiting for is finally happening — and it partly is. But only partly, because we’re still missing the final piece of the puzzle. That piece is, of course, the retail crowd, which hasn’t fully joined us yet — otherwise, we’d already be on Mars 🚀. So how long until we hit that phase of euphoria, hype, and YOLO that will lift Bitcoin one final time in this bull run? Where’s this correction coming from, and why is it turning into another sideways trend? What about the scenario that’s been playing out for the past two months and continues to do so? Hey, this is Matthew, and welcome to the latest crypto market update, where I’ll clear up all your doubts!

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Should we be popping champagne already? 🍾

That’s the question many investors are asking themselves. How long can we keep waiting? Half the summer’s almost over, vacation bills are due — but Bitcoin, after a new ATH, has just stopped moving?

It’s true that appetite grows with eating, and after seeing $123k on the charts, it’s easier to imagine further growth than temporary stagnation. But stagnation is normal after a move up of over $11k in a few days. In fact, it serves as a kind of pit stop — like in F1 racing 🏎️ when drivers pause to refuel and change tires. Bitcoin is stopping to gather liquidity and retail interest before the final leg of the rally. And unlike F1 with multiple pit stops, Bitcoin only needs this one pause to begin the last leg of this bull market. To back this up, let’s revisit that earlier scenario I mentioned.

Take a look at 2017 — the situation was nearly identical. After a long ABC correction, Bitcoin made a strong move upward, then paused (see the white oval on the chart — looks like an egg, but you get it 😉). We’re now exactly in the same spot.

Looks familiar, right? So what’s next? Since we haven’t yet seen the true euphoria phase — with wild volumes, crazy liquidity, and tourists flooding the market like never before — and given the increasing interest from retail and institutional buyers (discussed in my last article)

as well as current technicals, it’s not hard to guess that after this correction, we’re entering the real HYPE, YOLO, and full FOMO mode.

One surefire sign? When everyone starts talking about crypto again and your cab driver asks, “What do you think about Bitcoin?” That’s when you’ll know. All that’s left is to wait patiently. It might be a day, or maybe even a week. I don’t know exactly — I don’t have a crystal ball 😅.

So what will it look like?

Pretty obvious: since this is the final phase of the bull run, it will likely follow Elliott Waves, just like in 2017.

Same thing now:

Just know — these 5 waves don’t form a separate structure, but are actually the final leg of a larger wave formation that started at the local $75k bottom. It’s the missing puzzle piece.

Here’s how it looked in 2017:

Enough technicals — what else supports Bitcoin’s growth?

Definitely its declining dominance, now around 60% and still dropping.

Add to that a new ATH for total crypto market cap, breaking $4 trillion, showing that new capital keeps flowing into the market 💸. This supports current prices of Bitcoin and other top projects.

And don’t forget traditional markets in the U.S. — indexes are pumping like crazy. Just look at the S&P500:

Same goes for tech stocks:

Think it can’t get better? Take a look at the U.S. Dollar Index — crashing hard:

And we know that a weaker dollar means stronger risk-on assets like Bitcoin. You don’t need a PhD to figure that out.

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In summary

The current Bitcoin correction is just a pit stop before the next leg up, when retail finally joins in — kicking off the long-awaited peak of the bull run. It’ll be a time of extreme positivity, HYPE, and YOLO, with prices skyrocketing and everyone talking about crypto again. That’s when you should start thinking about getting off the train, even if it means missing the last 10% of gains. As Buffett said:

“Be fearful when others are greedy.”

Even though the upside might still be tempting, don’t forget why you’re here — to realize profits. And when no one’s talking about corrections, that’s when they’re most likely to happen.

So for this final parabolic move, I wish you calm, rational thinking, and the biggest profits possible.

Welcome to the weekly CryptoFolks Newsletter. However, our launch procedures 🛫 require us to inform you not to consider this article as investment advice, as it represents solely our personal opinion. Always remember to manage your portfolios independently.💁‍♂️

Let’s kick off with a meme

During a bull market, when euphoria hits, things usually start moving quickly.
We see positive news, and readers start believing everything is still going in the right direction — and there’s just no way prices could drop... right?

So why does Elon Musk suddenly remember Bitcoin uses too much electricity right at the top?

Why do negative headlines suddenly flood the space, triggering a bear market that lasts an entire year until the bottom?

This time is no different.

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Right now, we’re still at the beginning of the end — Bitcoin is rising, and we’re surrounded by positive news, like this one: TRON has become a company listed on NASDAQ 📈.

Justin Sun, the same person who was accused by the SEC of issuing unregistered securities and market manipulation, rang the bell on Thursday, marking TRON Inc’s official public debut.

There’s more — not long ago we saw Circle make its debut, and that was a massive success.

But this isn't about which project will perform better.

It’s about the market sentiment and investor emotions — because emotions drive this market more than anything else.

Reason and cool calculation are traits of those who have already made their profits and are preparing to exit — not those who are buying.

And when emotions take over the wheel, it’s usually time to act in the opposite direction.

We saw this all over social media as Bitcoin hit a new ATH above $120k 🚀.
Even though we were away, this news still reached us, and we could feel the emotional wave flowing with it.

Yet, this isn't reflected in Google search volume for "Bitcoin."

Same with views on my favorite crypto YouTube channels — still flat.

Because the retail crowd is becoming institutional — thanks to ETFs, Bitcoin has done a 7x from the bottom, but on-chain data doesn’t show strong retail participation, which is quite puzzling.

Let’s be honest — we’re still retail due to the capital we’re playing with, and there’s a lot of us here.

Because of ETFs and large players buying Bitcoin in stealth, we don’t show up in on-chain metrics, and the buses full of new retail investors haven’t even arrived yet. 🚌

On Twitter, we constantly see reports of old whales realizing profits worth hundreds of millions of dollars — it’s really happening, and ancient Bitcoins are moving on the blockchain again.

The truth is, John Smiths are buying Bitcoin through ETFs every day — it couldn’t get more bullish than this.

That’s why retail data looks like it does.

Normally, Johnny Smith would have to buy Bitcoin directly and maybe transfer it to his wallet — then he'd count as retail in on-chain analysis.

Now, he just buys an ETF on an exchange, and we’re all excited because iNsTiTuTiOnS aRe HeRe 🙃, not realizing that the bull market is playing out just like it did 4 years ago, 8 years ago, and 12 years ago.

Ethereum has also entered the game — a coin that was recently a bit of a joke has now made incredible returns.

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Since April 7th, Ethereum has seen a 180% increase, while Bitcoin only 65% — and no one seems to notice 😅.

But they should — because that’s real capital rotation deeper into the market.
Bitcoin might rise to $150k, but to me, that won’t matter for two reasons:

• I already sold my Bitcoin and now only hold Ethereum

• Ethereum will grow even more.

And Ethereum will pull all projects built on its tech along with it — dragging the rest of the market onto the same train 🚂.

Altcoin season will pass us by before we even notice.

Right now, Ethereum and altcoins make up 83% of volume on futures markets — the highest in 2.5 years.

Meanwhile, the amount of Ethereum held on exchanges, like Bitcoin, is at record lows.

Queues are forming on the Ethereum network — for staking entries and exits.

John Smiths on Wall Street want Ethereum too — they keep buying more, just like corporations with negative earnings, like $SBET, trying to be the MicroStrategy of Ethereum 🤖

And we could go on like this till the end of next week... but you get the point.

This has all already happened — don’t treat it as a buy signal.

Everyone knows about it by now — including you. It’s priced in.

I’m showing you this data because it’s a great indicator of what’s happening outside the Bitcoin narrative.

And that’s where our attention should go — bull markets end with capital rotating into small projects, right before a massive sell-off begins.

Macro is still giving us time — tariffs are being delayed, fake progress in negotiations is being announced, and of course, we’re approaching interest rate cuts...

Let’s just hope it’s not too late, when everything’s already falling apart.

This isn’t the end — but we’re close. On Monday, we’ll take a look from a technical analysis perspective.

Cheers, Jacob

Welcome to the weekly CryptoFolks Newsletter. However, our launch procedures 🛫 require us to inform you not to consider this article as investment advice, as it represents solely our personal opinion. Always remember to manage your portfolios independently.💁‍♂️

Let’s kick off with a meme

Alright, where are the gains that were supposed to be here but aren't? Do you feel cheated by the simulation, which once again laughs in your face and rolls back Bitcoin’s gains? 😤 Me too.

However, despite that, I’m not discouraged from continuing to analyze charts! If you’re also not giving up and playing until the final whistle, then join me for an update on the previous end-of-bull-market scenario for Bitcoin.

Yes, every day brings us closer to the top, and when we reach that top, it’s downhill from there—ushering in the bear market, which is worth preparing for and profiting from while others lose money. Want to know how to do that? Welcome to The Big Short series, where you’ll see how to play a safe short from start to finish of the bear market!
(Pssst. If James Wynn had read this, his trades would’ve had a 100% win rate 😉)

🔑 Key to your success while others fail →

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Alright, now that the future is secured, let’s go back to the present, to squeeze as much capital as we can for that epic short.

Hi, it’s Matthew here - welcome to the Bitcoin scenario update!

Like on rails!

It was supposed to be so beautiful and amazing, a flag was forming, and toward the end, we even saw the beginning of a pump, represented by a large blue candle (see screenshot). But as quickly as it started—it ended even faster 😅.

Instead of a breakout, we got another sideways trend, and our flag, at best, is now forming a smaller secondary flag—which is actually a positive.

If you’re having trouble spotting it—here it is:

Does this mean we should expect stagnation over the next few days followed by a breakout from the trend? Most likely yes. But will it definitely happen?

Well, looking at how the simulation keeps mocking us—it’s anyone’s guess. We might see another massive green candle tomorrow, sparking investor hope... only for it to be quickly extinguished 🔥.

Regardless of what happens in the short term, it doesn’t really affect what’s coming next: the parabola we’ve been waiting for. Why? Because we still need to grind through the range and wait patiently for some macro or geopolitical catalyst to really kick off the bull run 🚀.

Yes, I know I keep repeating this “range,” but looking at the charts, it’s hard to ignore. Almost every time before the price shoots to the moon, we go through these boring periods, like the ones shown below 👇

Take the 2017 case, when after the ABC correction, the price had its first breakout, then two days of pause, and another pump. It seemed like the bull run had officially started... until another correction crushed those hopes.

Then the pattern repeated. The price returned to previous levels, pushed higher again, then entered another sideways trend. Only after the third breakout did it go parabolic and reach a new ATH.

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Now look at last year’s case, when Bitcoin jumped from 66k to 86k USD.

Same pattern. After the ABC correction that ended at 58k, we soared to 69k within days. An 11k increase made everyone think this was the real bull run. But what happened?

A “harmless” correction, totally understandable after such growth. Then, two days later, Bitcoin hit 73k—its previous ATH—only to drop to 66k within a week, spooking investors 😨 who were sure we were headed to the moon.

And then came a major global event—Donald Trump won the presidential election. That triggered chaos in the crypto world, and Bitcoin surged to 93k, nearly touching 100k.

As you know, the Trump victory was the catalyst I mentioned earlier. It ignited the entire crypto market, resulting in those violent gains 🔥.

So as you can see, from the end of ABC to the start of the real parabola, we need time and space—the “range”—to develop.

And while it’s not a perfect pattern every time, there is one thing all these charts share: Elliott Waves 🌊

🔍 Let’s look at the first example:

From the moment the ABC correction ended until the final parabolic move, it was all made up of 5 Elliott Waves, with the first four building up the range, and the fifth delivering that sweet moonshot 🚀

Now the second example:

Same thing—four waves prepare the ground, and the fifth explodes upward. Quite impressive, wouldn’t you say?

So, what about right now?

As I write this, Bitcoin is breaking 111k, and it looks like it’s finishing up wave 3 (upward). See for yourself:

So, what’s next? According to the pattern:
→ Pullback (wave 4)
→ Then the rocket to Mars (wave 5) that we’ve been waiting months for! 🪐

The million-dollar question is:

• How long will wave 4 take and how deep will the drop be?

Personally, I don’t think it’ll be dramatic. Sure, we don’t know what lies beyond the right side of the chart—but we can speculate, based on this white-marked range:

But what is that compared to the bigger picture? Zoom out, and you’ll see that wave 4 is just a formality:

Of course, I’m not saying we’ll reach 150k in one massive parabolic push—though it’s not impossible, just unlikely. According to Elliott Wave theory, as I wrote before in the gold bull market case (check the newsletter from 3 months ago here).

Almost every 5th wave contains its own 5 internal waves. I highly recommend learning this pattern—it’ll come in handy 📚.

What should keep your spirits high about Crypto’s bright future?

• Traditional markets are still at ATH and preparing for a breakout 📈

• ETFs and retail investors are buying like crazy

• Market sentiment is shifting positive, as seen in ETH

• ETH price jumped today (Wednesday) to $2700, which is very promising ✨

In summary:

We’re entering a boring phase, likely the final correction (wave 4) before the insane surge well beyond current Bitcoin ATHs.

These gains should also carry the top altcoins like Ethereum, XRP, Solana, and with it... the memecoins 🐸.

Short-term = might be dull.
Long-term = everything is lining up.
Sooner or later, headlines will scream:
“Bitcoin reaches new all-time highs!”

Why will Bitcoin grow?

• Macro factors

• Geopolitical shifts

• Traditional markets influence

• Proven bull-market patterns from the past

Important note: Everything you've read here is just my personal opinion, not investment advice 😏.

I wish you patience and calm like oldest hodler, Bitcoin at $1M, and most importantly - achieving your investment goals 💪

The Big Short is a new series titled this way for a reason. In it, I’ll be sharing my journey from idea to execution in maximizing gains on the cryptocurrency market. But remember – everything you read here is just my thoughts and my positions. This is not financial advice, and I’m not an advisor, just a regular market participant like you. What I’…

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It's Jacob and Matthew here! Usually, we write newsletters for you, but this time we have a story to share. 😄

We had the amazing pleasure of giving a talk at our university — and of course, the topic was cryptocurrencies.

But let's start from the beginning. In November, we received the offer and thought — alright, what's next? What should we talk about to other students to present a realistic picture of crypto, one that differs from what we see in the media? Usually, it's a simple narrative — either crypto is used for crime, or it is a crime. So, how do we present it properly?

Together with Matthew, co-author of this Substack, we came up with a plan. What kind? Smart and simple: talk about why crypto is the future of the financial system 💸. After all, we were speaking to students — this topic will concern them one day.

We had the plan. Now came the content and how to present it. We had zero experience speaking in front of 200 people. That’s when MIT’s lecture “How to Speak” by Patrick Winston came to the rescue.

A massive dose of knowledge on public speaking and real tricks that work — and, of course, a list of golden rules for giving a great presentation. So, we had the formula and knew how to speak and prepare slides. Now came the content.

We started with an outline — a list of points we wanted to cover. First things that came to mind were easy: what are cryptocurrencies, blockchain, and naturally the issue of transparency — a topic that always stirs emotions among beginners. Then came the idea of showing real-world use. Why talk about something no one uses? That’s when we brought up Bakong (Cambodia’s blockchain-based transaction system), strategic reserves in Bitcoin, and XRP with RippleNet.

At this point, we did a trial run — and what happened? We ran out of time 😅 We wanted the lecture to last one hour, including a Q&A session at the end. But what we prepared already filled 40 minutes. Originally, we planned to discuss who Satoshi is, what he meant, and how Bitcoin compares to other technologies in finance — but there was no time.

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Our final must-have? CBDCs. That was our priority, especially since the digital euro is coming to Europe this year. People must know what that means ⚠️

How did it go? We'll tell you separately 👇

Jacob

Before we started, there was some stress — honestly, next time we’ll choose a different format. This time, we switched slides: Matthew spoke, then I did, back and forth. Just when I was getting into it, the slide was over. One thing to improve is definitely body language — with little experience, it was a weak spot. But that didn’t stop the talk from being interesting! Despite the late hour, most people stayed focused.

Oh right — we started at 5:30 PM, finished around 6:40 PM. Not the ideal time, neither for us nor for the audience. That played a big role in the Q&A, where fewer questions were asked than we expected — hence the early ending.

We finished with a nod to the audience, acknowledging their desire to grow and interest. In return, we got applause from the entire room 👏 It was an incredible feeling, a moment we’ll never forget.

It was a huge challenge — preparing, knowing what and how to say it, and finally performing. The challenge was accepted — and successfully completed. Not everyone gets the chance to do something like this during their studies — and we made it happen 💪

Honestly, organizing something like this was a nice break from student routine. Usually, you take notes and do homework, and that’s it. Here, we got to create something truly ours and present it — all in our first year of studies!

When I talk to others about their first year, they say they barely made it through. Their faces are priceless when I say I gave a lecture on crypto at a public university in year one 😄

Why crypto? Because in our view, it's the future of finance. And if we can contribute to that future, the decision was easy — of course we’re doing it. The university environment wasn’t as excited, but hey — it’s crypto after all.

The challenge? Deciding what to say. You know how it is here on Substack — it’s not financial advice, but the belief that Bitcoin could reach $150k is our opinion. And no one can take away our right to express it.

Now imagine standing in front of 200 people, including PhDs, saying this is their chance for financial freedom. That gave us a chance to return to the roots of crypto — it wasn't created for price speculation, but to transform finance, to introduce real digital cash (not the CBDC imitation).

For me, this was an unforgettable experience, especially because the first time is always special.

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Matthew

Hi, Matthew here! I’ll soon share my thoughts on speaking in front of 200 people and talking about crypto while everyone looks at you like you're a bear at a new Bitcoin ATH 🤣 But first, make sure to leave a like on this post — not gonna lie, Jacob and I find it super motivating and honestly just really nice.

Imagine being 21, in your first year of studies, and giving a talk to over 200 people — when you've never done that before 😬 I won’t lie, that fact alone made me nervous, but it wasn’t the biggest challenge.

The hardest part? Fighting myself. Why? Because I’m naturally an introvert and have struggled with stuttering since childhood. That combo really doesn’t help with delivering ambitious talks. But if you say A, you have to say B.

On the day of the talk, I felt strangely calm. But that was the calm before the storm — an hour before, the anxiety kicked in hard. Still, I knew I was well-prepared and had something important to say.

Something that might open eyes and spark financial awareness in our peers — encouraging them to start investing in their future.

When everything was set up, the audience in their seats, and we were in a battle-ready mindset, it was time to begin. Since we were switching speakers with each slide, Jacob started first, and I waited for my turn. When I finally took the microphone and began to speak, I felt a sudden surge of intense emotion 😳 — my body instantly warmed up, tension built up, my breathing quickened, my voice trembled, and it was hard to squeeze out even a single word. And just like that, my worst fear became reality – stage fright.

However, I was prepared for such a situation, as I couldn't let a brief emotional wave destroy all the hard work I had put in. I knew exactly what I needed to do to regain control – I paused, took a deep breath, and calmly continued my slide. I’ll never forget that feeling — even though it was incredibly stressful, it was also thrilling. In moments like that, when you must make the best decision in just seconds, you really feel alive ⚡.

The beginning wasn’t the best, but as time passed and slides changed, I felt increasingly confident, and it became easier to talk about Bitcoin’s advantages as a tool for revolutionizing the monetary system. And that, on a typical university campus, where the number of people into crypto could be counted on one hand — and that hand belongs to Master Yoda 🧙‍♂️.

Two of those people were Jacob and me. That’s why, when we talked about Bitcoin or crypto in general, I felt like an alien walking through Times Square, knowing that most students had no idea what we were talking about – so we tried to avoid crypto slang and convey everything in the simplest possible way.

Since it was pretty late for a lecture on magical digital money, we had to find ways to keep the audience awake and engaged. One of the tricks was a prop – a stack of money (Monopoly money, since I’m not that rich, yet… 😥), used to illustrate how our audience earns their hard-earned money. Since I was already feeling good and enjoyed delivering the talk, I grabbed the "pile" of money and started tossing it toward the audience (like simulating money printing). Their smiles were priceless and gave me even more motivation 💸.

The rest of the lecture went really well — we stuck to our presentation plan, and as it neared the end, the final topic came up: CBDC (Central Bank Digital Currencies). If you're reading this article or are interested in the subject, you likely realize how dangerous CBDCs can be — so this topic could not be ignored.

Honestly, it was my favorite part of the lecture, and I was excited to raise awareness about what really hides behind the acronym CBDC. I took this mission to heart ❤️ — I criticized the abstract concept from top to bottom, in every possible way, even comparing it to a certain political system 😏, and backed it up with real-world evidence from other countries. It was a bold move for a first-year student who’s just starting university life, especially since there were not just students in the room, but also several PhDs. Would’ve been a shame to get kicked out for having "inappropriate opinions" 😬.

Despite the late hour — almost 7 p.m. — the audience remained engaged, clearly interested in what we had to say. That meant a lot.

With the final slide, it was time for the Q&A session. Unfortunately, we didn’t plan it perfectly — instead of displaying a QR code for submitting questions by phone, we handed out paper and pens, which turned out to be a less-than-ideal solution. Something to improve for next time. Still, a few students managed to ask questions, and we happily responded.

In the end, the Q&A was shorter than planned, but I didn’t mind — I was just exhausted. However, all the effort and hundreds of hours of preparation paid off when Jacob honored the audience and the whole room burst into applause 👏. That moment was incredible — seeing all those people smiling and clapping was the best reward I could have imagined before the lecture. I’ll never forget it. It was especially touching because the applause wasn’t short – it lasted for almost a minute!

So, what are my final thoughts? Of course – positive! I’m very proud and satisfied that I pulled off such a huge project, despite my young age and lack of experience. But what’s even more important to me is the fact that I "won" against myself, overcame my biggest fears, and did exactly what was the hardest thing for me to do. That gave me proof that limitations exist only in the mind — and they can be tricked. You can push forward, even through the biggest challenges 💪.

Speaking for the first time in front of such a large crowd and talking about crypto in a place that isn’t exactly welcoming to it confirmed what I’ve long suspected: excuses are just an escape — a way to avoid problems that we all face, which will eventually return twice as strong if left unaddressed.

Jacob, Matthew

Welcome to the weekly CryptoFolks Newsletter. However, our launch procedures 🛫 require us to inform you not to consider this article as investment advice, as it represents solely our personal opinion. Always remember to manage your portfolios independently.💁‍♂️

Let’s kick off with a meme

Do you know that feeling when you’re waiting for something, like a vacation, checking the calendar day by day to see how much longer until that long-awaited trip… but every time it feels like it’s just a dream and those holidays may never actually come? If so, I’ve got something that will definitely lift your mood — and no, I’m not talking about the first days of summer 😉.

ut before I tell you what it is, let me ask you one thing — would you rather like this newsletter now, or after you finish reading it? 🤔

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I’m talking about a major event we’ve both been waiting for — just like those long-anticipated holidays — namely: the big parabola, the rocket, the blast-off, the comeback, the green candle, or simply — Bitcoin price gains! 💥

That’s right — I mean that the waiting period for this “final parabola” is nearing its end, and what lies ahead is the most exciting phase of this market: the biggest profits, the banana zone, the arrival of tourists and retail, joy, and an increased public interest in cryptocurrencies.

How do we know it's right now? You’re about to answer that question yourself. So, if you’re ready, let’s dive in 🚀

Shakeout before the breakout

If you haven’t joined this Substack just yesterday, you probably know the Bitcoin scenario I’ve been focused on for over a month now. Bingo! It’s the ABC correction, which has now officially ended. Just as I wrote earlier — after the correction ends, a breakout to the upside follows — and that’s exactly what happened. Over the past week, Bitcoin rose nearly 10%, decisively ending the ABC and shifting the trend upward.

What you’re seeing here couldn’t have ended any other way — the last price drop to the 0.702 Fibonacci level (white line) and bounce upward is a perfect example of how Fibonacci retracements are a useful tool for predicting asset prices 📈.

Okay, Bitcoin is rebounding — but is that really such a big deal? One could argue we’re just back in sideways trend territory. Looking at the chart in black and white, it’s true — Bitcoin is hovering around 107k and may seem stuck again. But when you look more closely, through the lens of technical analysis, you don’t need to be a psychic to see what’s coming.

The 3-day pause in growth gave us a clear signal about the future of the big parabola — we’re building a bull flag. For those unfamiliar, it’s a classic bull market pattern, almost always followed by a strong upward trend.

What does a bull flag look like? Check the image below.

As you can see, it’s a very simple structure, hard to mess up, with a key feature being a temporary stagnation with a slight downward slope — hence the flag shape. And what comes next… we all know 💚

Let’s apply that to the current situation:

As controversial as it may sound, especially after all this hype about huge gains — what’s next is a brief correction 😉. But don’t worry — it will be shorter than CZ’s hair 😄 and is needed to complete the flag, just as I marked in the screenshot above. So over the next few days, don’t expect fireworks — just patience, like the oldest HODLers, waiting calmly for the inevitable.

Those who think ABCs, flags, etc., are just coincidences, should look at the repeating patterns from previous bull markets — and you’re about to see that too.

Let’s take the first example from the 2017 bull run, specifically late September to early October.

Take a look at this screenshot — nearly everything matches up perfectly with today. The only major difference over these 8 years is the more classic shape of the ABC in 2017 — but everything else is nearly identical. After the correction, we saw a strong rebound (yellow line), followed by a short downtrend to form the flag — then boom, the pump 🚀.

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Another example — same pattern — can be seen in late June to early July, also from early 2017.

Again, the situation is nearly identical to now. The only real difference is again the shape of the ABC, but the sequence remains the same: correction → recovery → flag → pump. This pattern is very common — not just in Bitcoin or crypto, but in many asset classes. Why? Because it builds momentum for price increases — after all, it’s rare for an asset to go from $100 to $200 overnight with just a single green candle. While that can happen, it’s even rarer and less predictable than black swans.

“I still don’t believe in technical analysis” — you might say. Fine — assuming TA is like statistics (you know what), let’s look at how crypto compares to traditional U.S. markets.

It’s no secret — Bitcoin, along with most of crypto, follows the top U.S. indices like the S&P500, Nasdaq, or Russell 2000. Why does this matter? Because when traditional markets are crashing — our beloved digital coins suffer too. And when they rise — crypto usually follows.

Well, lucky for us — when we look at the performance of American indices, we see a whole lot of green 💹. Let’s break it down:

Top 500 U.S. companies: +3.4% and a new ATH above $6100

U.S. tech companies: +4.2% and also a new ATH

U.S. small & mid-sized businesses: +2.7%

The oldest U.S. index gains +3.8%

As you can see — all major U.S. indices are hitting new highs or rising fast, marked by beautiful green candles. And if Wall Street’s on fire… what’s next for crypto? I’d say that’s a very rhetorical question 😉

So you see — it’s hard not to be optimistic right now. The crypto market, led by Bitcoin, feels like a ticking time bomb ready to explode — and once it does, nothing will stop it.

That leaves me with just two questions — one more important than the other:
🚀 Is your rocket ready for launch?
👍 Did you like this post yet?

I am sick of them buying

Another week, same market, same people — they’re here again, buying everything in sight. Yep, it’s them. Wall Street.

They bought Bitcoin ETFs every single day last week — and that’s not even unusual. The buying spree has been ongoing since June 6, with only 5 red-flow days. If we zoom out even further — Bitcoin has been bought non-stop since April 14.

And Ethereum? Same story.

Speaking of Ethereum — check this out! The number of Ethereum transactions just hit a new all-time high — over 24 million!

Still not enough? Look at the capital inflows — the ETH ETF has seen 7 straight weeks of gains!

So yeah — huge buying pressure… yet the price still looks kind of… flat. We’re technically still in a correction phase, albeit the final one, before liftoff. Someone must be selling them all that BTC and ETH, but let’s not worry about that now.

If we do break out — this could be the very capital that kicks off the banana zone 🟢. At the moment, that capital is going only into ETF-accessible assets — i.e., Bitcoin and Ethereum, not altcoins via something like Coinbase, which still isn’t seeing much traction.

The first altcoin ETFs will probably be released later this year, maybe in the fall — which is when we’ll really start hearing alarm bells that the bull run is ending. Until then, if Coinbase isn’t a top 10 app, and Twitter isn’t flooded with crypto, this cycle could turn out to be a “bull run for institutions only”, without retail.

Wait… someone’s whispering something — it’s the market.

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There’s a clear correlation between Coinbase stock ($COIN) and TOTAL3 (altcoins excluding BTC & ETH). No surprise there — Wall Street’s got its own “altcoin” on the exchange. But it looks like they didn’t invite us to altcoin season this time. $COIN stock 🚀, altcoins 🐌

Will altcoins follow Coinbase into orbit? Nobody knows. But if Bitcoin is about to break new ground, and Johnny Smith from Manhattan knows something, then we’re sitting on a ticking time bomb.

Right now, TA, demand, and market narrative are aligning perfectly. Once the public catches on, it’s game over. More companies are adding BTC to their treasuries, and it’s hard to find anything negative — except geopolitics. But does that even affect the U.S.? The stock market doesn’t think so.

Still not convinced?

Institutions are still longing Bitcoin, while retail is shorting — and the divergence is the largest in history.

Who’s wrong? What do you think? 🤨

We may really be not bullish enough.

But remember: the top comes on the most positive news, not the negative ones.

Till next time!
Jacob, Matthew

Welcome to the weekly CryptoFolks Newsletter. However, our launch procedures 🛫 require us to inform you not to consider this article as investment advice, as it represents solely our personal opinion. Always remember to manage your portfolios independently.💁‍♂️

Let’s kick off with a meme

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Bitcoin Is Holding Steady

Bitcoin has stayed above $100k for 45 consecutive days, and while it almost lost that streak recently, it held on. 👍 That's where the good news ends—because there’s a problem: Wall Street is holding the price, not retail investors, not institutions. It’s the Bitcoin ETFs keeping it above $100k. This week? They’ve been buying again.

They’ve also been buying Ethereum.

If they’re buying in that volume, and the price isn’t moving, then someone’s selling to them, matching their demand perfectly. Without ETFs, Bitcoin would’ve already dropped below $100k—there’s no other scenario. But fine, that’s just an alternate simulation where ETFs don’t exist. In this reality, ETFs do exist and are buying. All good—until they stop. 😬

What if these investors go on vacation? What if a media attack is launched or a skeleton falls out of the closet? Then we’ve got a problem—because if they start selling, there’ll be nothing left to catch. Well, I’ll be out there picking up the pieces myself, no worries. It could go the other way too: if everyone starts buying, the price could rocket. 🚀 We're sitting on a bomb.

To sustain this valuation or enter the long-awaited banana zone, we need more people outside Wall Street, the kind who download Coinbase, buy altcoins—because, well, that’s who we want to sell them to.

But that’s not happening yet. Will it? Probably. The question is, how much will it cost us?

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Is Anybody Home?

No one’s home if we’re knocking on retail’s door. It’s just empty. No one’s answering. You bang on the door—nothing happens. Yet Bitcoin’s still at $105k. We need to remember: a large portion enters through ETFs, but not everyone (I think?). Sure, CNBC has a crypto tab, but who’s even checking it?

Summer is usually a period of market calm: lower capital, lower volatility, lower volume. That doesn’t mean it has to be like that this time, but so far, every major crypto bull run has played out in spring or fall—when people are at home, not on holiday. Looks like we’ll have to wait until autumn for this cycle’s final push. And the seasonality nerds will be right again. 🍂

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I’m a Genius

Last week, the U.S. Senate voted on the so-called GENIUS Act, which includes regulations on stablecoins. What’s inside? The rules for issuing stablecoins in the U.S. Who’s allowed to issue a permitted payment stablecoin? An insured depository institution or its subsidiary, a federally-qualified issuer, or a state-qualified issuer. So, there’s opportunity for both public and private sectors.

Naturally, there’s a requirement for 1:1 backing with Federal Reserve assets, cash, or government bonds. Rehypothecation is banned—meaning brokers or financial firms cannot use client assets (already pledged as collateral) to secure their own trades or liabilities.

More highlights? 🔍

• Monthly audits

• Independent yearly audit

• Reserves and private keys stored by a regulated entity

• Issuers must be able to freeze funds under, say, a court order.

It does smell a bit like CBDC, I won’t lie—but it’s not a digital dollar, and existing solutions (USDC, USDT) will likely survive. Oh—and the president wants to sign it ASAP.

Is This Good News?

The eternal debate in crypto: do we want regulation?

Yes—because regulations attract capital. A regulated market is a safe market in the eyes of institutional players.

But… regulation means restrictions, which individuals dislike. Look at the GENIUS Act: sure, 1:1 collateral in U.S. assets sounds good—but the issuer must be able to freeze your funds on command? 🥶 That’s not freedom in the crypto sense.

Crypto was meant to be free, secure, and anonymous. Now it’s just secure. There’s a reason I said it feels like CBDC. Either way, we’ll have to live with it—this isn’t Bitcoin where the network decides what enters. So, we’ll console ourselves with more capital flowing in. 💸

It’s Definitely Good News for AMERICA

The GENIUS Act says stablecoins can be backed by U.S. securities—including Treasuries. Guess what? Tether’s been doing that for ages, and the market is already heavily buying U.S. debt, effectively funding the U.S. government.

It’s the petrodollar, but crypto—call it cryptodollar or stabledollar. We will think about the name for another time. 😅 Anyway, stablecoin issuers are buying U.S. debt, and everyone in Treasury must be thrilled:

1. Someone buys their debt so they don’t have to

2. The U.S. becomes a leader in digital assets

This Time Is Different

Between 2023–24, job growth steadily declined, reaching some of the lowest levels in U.S. economic expansion history, averaging under 1% in 2023.

Eventually, the labor market stabilized at that low level, and in recent months it’s bounced to around 1.9–2%. But the expansion is long in the tooth, and whether this pace continues is unknown—immigration has slowed, and demographics have thinned, meaning fewer jobs are needed to sustain employment.

Many parts of this cycle resembled the “soft landing” of 1966: sudden credit shocks, collapse in cyclical goods, battered real retail sales, the 3m10y yield curve inversion, and job figures just shy of recession. The latest job growth after Fed tightening adds to the parallel.

Other elements looked like the 1973–75 recession, especially early on: part-time job growth, a falling Full-Time/Part-Time ratio, and labor hoarding. But we’ve diverged from that path as the cycle has matured.

We’re now 40 months past the first rate hike in this cycle (see X-axis). Only the 2007–09 recession took longer to show up after such an event.

Credit: @txmctrades on X

Consumers

Let’s stay with the economy. It runs on two things: credit and spending. Here’s a fun fact: the top 10% of Americans account for 50% of all spending, while the bottom 60% account for just 20%.

No matter what the left or socialists believe, it’s the wealthy who keep this system running.

Then there’s public debt—which just passed $37 trillion and is rising exponentially in nominal terms. But I decided to revalue the U.S. public debt in gold—see what came out of that.

Since fiat is always devaluing, it makes sense to price assets in hard money. It’s too early for conclusions, but it’s worth thinking about and I will. 🤔

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We Hoped for Rockets, and We Got Them

The U.S. got involved in the Israel–Iran conflict, and so far, markets remain stable. Knowing how this goes, Monday will probably be greener than grass. 🌱

For crypto, the combo of uncertainty, possible war escalation, and summer seasonality (lower volatility) could mean a period of stagnation—until September/October, just as cyclical patterns suggested all along.

Until next time, folks!

You're reading the weekly CryptoFolks newsletter — a press digest from the world of cryptocurrencies and the current macroeconomic landscape — where together we explore what lurks on the right side of the chart 📈. But before we take off, the launch protocol requires me to inform you: this article is not financial advice, it's merely my personal opinion, and remember to manage your portfolio independently and responsibly.

Meme of the Week

The Past Week

...undoubtedly started with a bang, which sadly can't be said for its second half. A lot happened, and even more price volatility showed up on the charts. One moment you feel like popping champagne, the next you're waking up to the gray reality of needing to work just to afford the next dip 🥲.

The situation is so dynamic, it’s hard to say whether we’re in a bull market or a bear market. But one thing is certain — around here, it's always essa 😎. So if you're feeling overwhelmed by the flood of new information (like dollars flying off U.S. printers daily), then sit back, relax, and check out what happened last week, what it means, and how it shapes the future of the crypto market.

And by the way — if you appreciate my work, and it saves you time and stress, consider leaving a sub and joining the closed community, which always stays one step ahead of the chart, enjoying exclusive benefits like access to a special newsletter series explaining how to play out "The Big Short" — from the top to the bottom of Bitcoin's correction.

Let’s start, as usual, with the total crypto market cap

Currently sitting at $3.23 trillion, after a 6%+ correction from the Monday pump that pushed it up to $3.44 trillion. That’s also over 7% below the last time Bitcoin hit a new ATH. So where did the drop come from?

There are two versions.

• The official one: Israel’s war with Iran triggered a reflexive drop in traditional markets, dragging the crypto market down with it.

• The unofficial one: I play fortune-teller with a crystal ball 🔮 and tell you I saw it coming — because I’ve been repeating like a mantra that we still have one last correction (C) in this ABC cycle to go.

And while some “fortune-tellers” are out there trying to make a quick buck off human naivety, promising magical 100X gains during volatility like this — I’m not one of them. Instead, I’ll show you what it really means when price consolidates during a bull market. You’ll also see an alternative ABC correction scenario and find out whether the Bitcoin plan we’ve been tracking for the last month is still in play.

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But first, let’s see how the altcoins are doing.

Not bad, not great — just average. Or as market sentiment might call it: neutral. Given the recent events, one could’ve expected altcoins to plummet, but both they and Bitcoin have become oddly resilient to outside factors lately. Or maybe… fewer people care about crypto? 😉 Either way, the result is a mere 4% drop in market cap of non-top-10 altcoins, down to $235 billion. The chart (and Ethereum, which we’ll get to) has returned to a sideways trend that’s been dragging on for 5 weeks.

Sorry to disappoint you, but it’s not yet time for altcoin season 🐢.

Now let’s move on to what the bulls love most!

Analysis and pricing of individual projects — starting with the hardest money on Earth:

Bitcoin

Imagine you decide to go on vacation and enjoy life away from the charts. You come back after a week, and without even looking at the chart, you see Bitcoin at the same price as when you left. Sounds familiar? Well, you've probably seen this before—and here we go again. Bitcoin has slightly dropped by 0.7%, and its current price is $105k USD.

Still, it's worth keeping an eye on the charts and what's happening globally, because investors don’t live by price alone. While we’ll get to world events shortly, let’s first dive into how the past week's action influences the outlook for our scenario.

I’m convinced that if I woke you up in the middle of the night and asked, “What’s Bitcoin currently playing out?” — you'd answer: an ABC correction. And you'd be absolutely right, since I assume it's hard to forget when I remind you about it every week 🙃.

Alright, but what’s up with this ABC? There was supposed to be a correction, but we saw a rise, then some declines, and now Bitcoin is back to square one — nobody really knows what’s next. Probably not surprising, but I’ll try anyway — we’re in the final phase of the ABC, and further correction lies ahead.

How is that possible when the chart no longer resembles the ABC from recent newsletters?

Well, one structure doesn’t define the world of technical analysis — quite the opposite. You could say it’s just the tip of the iceberg. In a bull market, we often see sideways trends that drive investors crazy because, “How long can we wait for those gains?” 😤

This is when the ABC correction forms on the chart — one that looks more like stagnation due to its stretched-out nature, rather than three swift price movements. You’ll see in the following charts how this can look:

Notice that in almost every "flat" ABC correction, phase B (the rise) ends at or slightly above the beginning of the initial drop? Exactly. That means the price doesn't always go stair-stepping down — it might instead mimic stagnation, hence the sideways trend + ABC combo I wrote about a month ago.

One of the best ways to remember new knowledge is to put it into practice. You're about to get that chance. I’ll show you the current Bitcoin chart, highlighting the ABC structure from its beginning, and your task is to decide which type of correction is the most likely match. Ready? Let’s go!

Be sure to message me your pick, and now let me show you what I believe is most likely:

What you're looking at above is a standard flat ABC correction (like the one from the first image), where phase B ends roughly at the start of the entire correction. In our case, it ends slightly lower — but that’s not a big deal. What’s more important is where it ends.

Following this pattern, phase C should end slightly below phase A, but not by much. For us, this aligns perfectly with the 0.702 Fibonacci level (from a broader view), which recently caused a bounce and several green candles.

This doesn't mean we’ll see a repeat of last week's sharp drops (although that’s not impossible — the war front is still hot), but it's more likely that the price will pause around $105k, then drop a bit lower to the 0.702 level (white line on the chart).

A drop ending right at Fibonacci would fit beautifully with this ABC pattern, as that’s slightly lower than phase A’s end, just like in the schematic.

What next? At this point, I don’t think you need a PhD in technical analysis (if that’s even a thing) to guess what’s likely to happen after the final drop 😉.

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Ethereum

Relax — if you thought ETH took off to Mars during your time away, it looks like the rocket’s still waiting for everyone to board 🚀.

The same thing happened here as with BTC — except the price changed by +0.25% over the past 7 days. Ethereum now sits above $2,500, and guess what? You're right — the price is back in a lovely sideways trend, barely poking above it.

So if you’re wondering what that whole CNBC "kangaroo" thing is about, the graphic below says it all. You know what a kangaroo does?

Exactly that! 🦘

Since ETH is correlated with Bitcoin, we’ll probably have to wait a bit longer for gains, but rumor has it crypto investors are incredibly patient — or so I’ve heard 😅. Can you confirm?

XRP

Even though the bull market is in full swing (or just heating up), looking at XRP’s chart week over week, it feels like a bear market here.

How else can you explain the constant red weeks for this project? Must be a scam going to zero — no point wasting time on it, right? 😅

Just kidding.

The truth is that XRP has recently seen more declines than gains, but it’s a project with solid fundamentals and remains in the top 3 cryptocurrencies globally (excluding stablecoins).

These fundamentals are what give XRP lucrative long-term predictions, which I’ve written about before. If you’re curious about what kind of rock-solid fundamentals XRP has (stronger than WTC itself), check this out:
👉

Panic Drop

Why is XRP performing so well? Fundamental analysis.

Hi all…

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a year ago · 5 likes · 3 comments · Panic Drop - Timothy Assi and CryptoFolks

As for the price — last week, XRP fell nearly 5%, and its current value is $2.16 USD. But this may not be the lowest point you’ve gotten used to over recent weeks.

Traditional Markets

S&P500

I’ve got two pieces of news — one good and… well, also good 😊.
First, SPX recently broke above 6k, reaching as high as $6,058 last week.

Now for the “bad” news that’s actually not that bad:

After the outbreak of the Israel-Iran conflict, everything dipped — logically. But as you can see, the drop was only 0.4%, bringing SPX down to $5,976.96.

So, the “bad” news is just that SPX dipped below 6k again. But honestly, this kind of drop is no big deal, and it just shows the resilience of this index 📉➡️📈.

Nasdaq100

The tech-heavy Nasdaq100 also saw a similar decline of 0.68%, ending the week at $21,631.04. Just like SPX, this is hardly a cause for concern.

Looking at the bigger picture, the chart shows a relentless upward trend — so all is well for now.

Russell2000

Have you ever seen an igloo pattern on the small and mid-cap U.S. tech stock index (or any other chart)? If not, here's your chance. Over the past week, a rise and fall on the RTY chart drew something resembling a nearly perfect igloo 😂! The index lost around 1.5%, and its current valuation is 2,099.7 USD.

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Dow Jones

On the oldest index in the U.S., unfortunately, there was no room for creative brokerage patterns. On Friday, we simply saw a larger red candle, effectively wiping out the gains from earlier in the week, resulting in a 1.32% loss, bringing the DJI down to 42,197.79 USD.

Let’s check what the media are saying about cryptocurrencies 🗞️

Stablecoins the most important?

Jeremy Allaire, CEO and co-founder of Circle—an American company that issues stablecoins and is the primary issuer of USDC (which means every single USDC enters the market through Circle)—declares that stablecoins are the highest form of monetary utility ever created. Coming from the head of such a giant like Circle, that's no joke 😮.

This might suggest that Circle will begin increasing efforts to develop the stablecoin industry not just by issuing more tokens, but perhaps as part of a larger plan that could involve cooperation with the government to reduce the ever-growing debt. Especially when they had their IPO last week which went well to say the least.

Personally, I agree with Allaire’s statement, since stablecoins are a huge part of the crypto market and serve an essential function. However, in my view, the title of the best version of modern money still more rightfully belongs to Bitcoin.

How’s your meme portfolio doing, investor? 😅

Recently, we got a look at the financial report of President Donald Trump for the year 2024. Curious how much the head of one of the world’s most important countries earns? The answer: around 600 million dollars, out of which 57 million comes from crypto investments.

Honestly, I expected juicier profits after the rug pull on the $TRUMP memecoin 😂.

On a more serious note, Trump's crypto profit accounts for about 9.5% of his total income for the past year — a very strong result, especially for the President of the United States, who should be setting an example for his citizens. And he is.

Name me another president who earned $57 million from crypto in a single year. Trump clearly knows that if he wants his country to become the world capital of crypto, as he’s often claimed during his campaign, he has to lead by example. That’s great, because 28% of Americans already own crypto, and another 14% are considering buying in the future.

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Credit card, debit card... or crypto?

Shopify—the e-commerce platform where you can open your own online store or shop for all kinds of products—has recently enabled crypto payments, specifically in USDC, as seen in the screenshot above.

I probably don’t have to tell you this is another building block toward broader crypto adoption, because by now it seems obvious: more and more companies, businesses, and institutions are starting to accept crypto payments 💳💻.

Is sentiment just as volatile?

Even though some people might feel like War Thunder is happening outside their window, the market sentiment seems unaffected and is holding steady in the 60–72 range, which represents greed.

True greed, however, will kick in when we can once again hear about crypto everywhere—on social media, the radio, TV, newspapers, or even from the proverbial “taxi driver” or “hairdresser” (no disrespect, of course).

As for the current real sentiment, in my opinion, it’s rather neutral, because according to Google Trends, people still aren’t searching for terms like Bitcoin or cryptocurrency.

The fact that Bitcoin recently hit a new ATH (All-Time High) and it wasn’t making major headlines says a lot.

So, as always, we’re left to wait patiently — everything is in place. ⏳

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Average Acquisition Price of Short-Term Holders

This level reflects the average on-chain cost of BTC purchases by investors who bought Bitcoin within the last 155 days. Historically, it acts as support during bull markets and resistance during bear markets.

Why does it work? Many investors follow a strategy of selling everything when their position returns to break-even. We're still a bit away from that level, and it's likely this is where the bottom of the current correction will form. 🧠

Ethereum starts to revive

Recently, Ethereum futures market volume has been higher than Bitcoin's. After everyone jumped off what looked like a sinking ship, it turned out to be a false alarm, and now everyone’s climbing back aboard (including Wall Street) – but can the ship hold? 🚢

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The Bear Market is Coming

Don’t be fooled by the agreement between Elon and Trump, the bear market is really approaching. The statistical probability of even a so-called "Super Cycle" is so low, it shouldn’t even be considered.

Remember these words, even when Michael Saylor tells you there won’t be a bear market – because there will be, and it might be even bigger than expected once Wall Street starts selling instead of buying.

So when the time comes, we’ll continue to take profits, and we’ve already sold the trading portion of our Bitcoin. 💼

Saylor is right

Wait a minute, didn’t I just say he’s wrong? Well, not on this topic. Saylor is right when it comes to his survival concept in case the dollar collapses.

Except the collapse won’t be spectacular – no knives falling from the sky or chaos in stores. The fall of a currency isn’t an explosion, it's erosion.

A slow loss of value that’s been happening since the dollar was decoupled from gold – hard money. And gold might just as well be Bitcoin: uncontrolled, independent store of value.

Saylor is right not because he predicts catastrophe, but because he understands the fundamentals.

Fiat dies silently. Bitcoin will survive because it has traits that fiat currencies no longer possess:

limited supply, inflation resistance, and independence from central banks.
You don’t need to predict the end of the world – just realize it’s already happening. 🧱

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War

We’ve all heard about it, and it’s had an impact on crypto valuations too – oil prices rose by about 20% in a few days.

With that, futures markets on fuel also soared.

Oil is simple – it’s extracted, so when something happens, prices automatically go up. You can even use oil prices to control the exporters.

But it's too early to draw conclusions (Iran exports 2 million barrels a day, placing it in the TOP 7 oil producers).

Oh, and most of Iran's oil exports go to China – just some totally irrelevant data. 🛢️

What matters to us – U.S. stocks (yes, not crypto – crypto rides the train with stocks, that's just how it is)

See anything? Cause I sure don’t.

Alright, now this is something – crypto was really close to new highs, and Middle East news came at the perfect time, like in a simulation.

Exactly what we needed to complete the correction structure, crazy. 🤯

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So, what’s it all about?

If not about resources, then about weapons – specifically, nuclear weapons.
The Anglosphere in all its forms wants to prevent Iran from developing a nuclear program, which would end in Iran building atomic bombs entirely on its own.
Trump wanted a deal with Iran to delay or stop this process, but Israel chose another path.

Since then, key generals and influential individuals in Iran have been systematically eliminated, effectively slowing the program.

A good illustration of this is the photo many of you have probably already seen. 🎯

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Powell stays until the end of his term

After Donald Trump’s words: “I’m not gonna fire Powell,” it’s clear Powell won’t be prematurely dismissed.

And that’s good – Powell, despite his cautious approach, is one of the best central bankers.

Positive interest rates are still being

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Welcome to the weekly CryptoFolks Newsletter—a press review 📰of the crypto world and the current macroeconomic situation, where we explore what lies beyond the right side of the chart. However, our launch procedures 🛫 require us to inform you not to consider this article as investment advice, as it represents solely our personal opinion. Always remember to manage your portfolios independently.💁‍♂️

Meme of the Week

The past week

At first, it seemed boring (just like I warned), but as it unfolded, many investors started sweating, and panic was knocking at their doors due to Bitcoin’s dip toward the 100k range. I mean, when the price of a high-risk asset drops 10% in 2 weeks, it’s only logical to panic, right? 😂

But looking at other events, like the ego battle between Elon Musk and Donald Trump, one might say the real winners are crypto exchanges, scooping up massive profits from liquidations caused by price swings and overall uncertainty 🙃.

Neither you nor I can predict Musk’s or Trump’s next move, but one thing is for sure — we’re getting closer to the beginning of the end of my scenario. So sit back, relax, and let’s see where we stand!

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Crypto Market Capitalization

If we only judged last week based on price action, we’d assume nothing much happened, as prices literally stood still. As you can see from the total crypto market cap, at first glance not much has changed, but this correction and its bounce-back have a deeper layer — which I’ve discussed in my ongoing scenario that I’ll revisit in the Bitcoin analysis.

Anyway, the current market cap holds at $3.25 trillion, with a weekly increase of a whopping 0.10% 🚶‍♂️.

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Altcoins

Since the entire crypto space is on pause, the same goes for altcoins outside the top 10, which are also doing nothing interesting. Their market cap currently hovers around $245 billion, and what sets them apart from the rest is a -0.8% drop over the past week.

Even in traditional markets, that’s not a major move — let alone here, especially during a typical “boring” phase 🙃.

Time to dive into specific projects

Bitcoin

Bitcoin performed a bit better than the overall market cap, rising 0.18%. Yes, I know — that’s less volatility than on some stablecoins. But as I mentioned earlier, the chart tells a deeper story within our scenario.

Can’t remember the details? Here's a quick refresher:

The plan I shared weeks ago involved a sideways trend with an ABC correction, followed by a rebound, a quick pit stop, and then a rocket to Mars (aka the final parabolic move) — just like you see in the image.

Sounds like a flawless plan, right? That’s because it is! 😎

If it’s hard to picture it on a blank chart, let’s bring in a historical example (also Bitcoin, from 2017 😉):

Now it’s clear: we had an ABC correction leading to a local bottom, followed by a rebound, short consolidation, breakout point, and then the pump.

Let’s apply that to today’s chart:

We’ve already completed the ABC correction, with the final leg “C” likely wrapped up thanks to the Twitter war between Trump and Musk, and we’ve also seen the first signs of recovery, resulting in the fact that we’re now seeing Bitcoin back at 105k.

Where we are right now is that moment just before the “breakout point”, separated from it only by a short stagnation or a small correction — or possibly both 😉.

Also, we should naturally expect a bit of a cool-down after such a strong and rapid rebound in just two days.

What follows this — the truly final, final-final correction — should be the moment that you and masses of people have been patiently (or impatiently) waiting for over the past few months: the real banana zone, just like you saw on the earlier chart 🍌🚀.

If you’re wondering how this compares to 2017, I’ve marked it on the next screen with a thick yellow arrow to show where we might be in this current scenario:

But remember — it’s not wise, and frankly not possible, to treat such predictions as certainty. Just because something happened a certain way in the past doesn’t mean it will repeat now. The crypto market is especially known for its volatility, which you’ve probably experienced already. It only takes one piece of news to throw off a scenario that’s been playing out perfectly until that point 📉.

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Ethereum

ETH wasn’t lucky enough to end the week in the green — or in our case, in blue — as it recorded a loss of 1.1%. However, the good news is that it closed the week at $2,500, which always sounds better than some silly $2,400, right? 😅

Just like last week, when I mentioned that such single dips or gains in ETH don’t matter much, the same applies now. These are still price movements within a sideways trend that has already lasted a full month.

You can see that trend in its full glory below:

If you manage to find a more impressive sideways move anywhere else, let me know — I’d love to see it 😉.

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XRP

You know that saying, “after every storm comes a rainbow”? That’s exactly what happened to XRP this past week! 🌈

Remember how for three newsletters in a row, we were complaining about XRP dropping by 8%, 7%, 9%? Well… that streak has finally been broken, and we’ve seen a step forward.

Specifically, a 4.33% gain, bringing XRP’s price to $2.20. And yes — of course, we know it’s not a satisfying price, especially for XRP holders dreaming of $11 😂.

But hey, a gain is better than another drop, especially one toward $1.90 — and I think we can all agree on that 🙌.

How are traditional markets reacting to all of this? 🤔

S&P 500

Is this some kind of inverse correlation?? Looks like the more political drama, the stronger the traditional markets get 😂. The S&P 500, which tracks the top 500 U.S. companies, rose 1.5% over the past week — finally breaking the 6,000 level! 🎉

What does that mean? That the classic, “safe” S&P is back, offering “steady” long-term gains. But seriously now — it’s been a while since Trump’s trade war with China (and the whole world), during which the S&P dropped over 20%, falling into the 4,000s.

From that moment — exactly 2 months ago — the index has fully recovered, hitting 6k on Friday, showing impressive strength and resilience, despite numerous crises over the years.

Just look at how the SPX chart has evolved since inception:

The chart is in log scale, to give you a better idea of the true growth trajectory of the index — which I personally think makes it a solid financial safety net 😉.

Nasdaq100

Of course, it couldn’t have gone any other way than a rise in the Nasdaq, showing similar or even higher gains than the SPX, due to the ongoing correlation between these two indices. However, this past week tech companies came out on top, securing a gain of over 2%, and the current NDX valuation is [insert value].

Just like the SPX, the index has beautifully recovered losses from the local bottom (and continues to do so), with the potential gain from buying during the "blood on the streets" moment standing at around 31% 📈.

Russell2000

One better than the next! Seriously, are we in the heart of the New York Stock Exchange, where everyone’s shouting, "Who gives more?!" 😅??

As you can see, the Russell2000, which represents small and mid-sized businesses in the U.S., takes the crown this week with the best result — a gain of 2.7%. Its current valuation is $2132.

If only all market results looked like this, and everything was always on the rise… it’d be beautiful — at least until it gets boring and lacks those unexpected twists 😏.

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Dow Jones

If you were hoping for a total domination of other indices by the DJI… well, you’re in for a letdown.

The oldest index in the U.S. performed the weakest of all those mentioned here. True, it didn’t lose value, but compared to the “cosmic” gains of its peers, a 0.8% weekly rise does leave a bit of a bitter aftertaste — let’s be honest.

Still, it’s a good result for a traditional market, and considering it’s not some niche index, we can confidently say: last week was a pretty good one for the DJI 💼.

Let’s dive into the crypto press 📰

Good morning, we’re fundraising for Bitcoin

Donald Trump and his company Trump Media & Technology Group (TMTG) have announced an ambitious plan to enter the cryptocurrency market. The company has already raised $2.5 billion, which it plans to use to purchase Bitcoin, effectively creating a crypto treasury — something like Fort Knox, only digital and with a better kind of money 😉.

This is part of a broader strategy, which also includes a plan to create an ETF called the "Truth Social Bitcoin ETF", aimed at making it easier for investors to access Bitcoin.

Although the idea has many supporters, critics have emerged, pointing out potential conflicts of interest and political entanglements — especially since the Trump administration actively promotes crypto deregulation.

Still, the growing interest from financial institutions and individual investors suggests that cryptocurrencies, led by Bitcoin, are becoming firmly rooted in mainstream finance 🚀.

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I file the application — you promote it, deal?

Trump Media & Technology Group (owner of Truth Social, connected to the Trump family) has filed an S-1 application for a Bitcoin ETF, meant to simplify access to the hardest money in the world for investors.

Cool — but what is an S-1? It’s simply a type of filing that a company is required to submit to the SEC, which can then approve the launch of a particular ETF.

Alright, but why another Bitcoin ETF — and one tied to Donald Trump — when we already have ETFs from Grayscale, Fidelity, or BlackRock?

The official reason is to make access to digital assets like Bitcoin easier for investors (nevermind that the exact same reason is given by the companies listed above).

The less official reason is likely the desire to join the race for Bitcoin while leveraging Donald Trump’s brand, as well as to expand the reach and influence of TMTG’s sponsor, Yorkville America Digital, which formally submitted the S-1 filing.

What does this show us? Aside from the obvious profit motive, it reflects a growing awareness — not just by this company, but also by financial institutions — of what Bitcoin really is and why it’s worth accumulating 💰.

Thanks for the unban!

Remember how I mentioned in previous newsletters that the UK hasn’t exactly been pro-crypto?

Well, news just came in that the FCA — basically the UK’s equivalent of the SEC — has officially unbanned retail investors from investing in financial instruments based on Bitcoin 🪙.

In plain terms, this means that in the UK, people can now invest in Bitcoin-like ETFs.

Who knows — maybe this is the start of major changes, and the UK will begin deregulating more and opening up to crypto.

Do you think we’ll see a future showdown between the UK and the US for the title of global crypto capital?

Honestly — I’d love to see that clash 🇬🇧 vs 🇺🇸⚔️.

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The Street

Wall Street was buying BTC ETFs like crazy not that long ago—guess what they’re doing now? But first, let’s look at Bitcoin. 📉

Reasonable, slightly down, nothing fancy—now look at this.

And it's been like that for quite a while!

So… is Wall Street becoming “the retail” in the crypto market? 😏

So far, ETFs for other altcoins haven't been introduced yet, but to me it’s just a matter of time. Once the “big players” see there's demand for an ETF on Hedera or even XRP, they’ll roll them out—and the money will follow.

Not saying I’m betting on it, but there will always be people reinstalling Coinbase on their phones.

Even worse than a few weeks ago, last time I checked.

But let’s be real—it's way easier to just buy an ETF on a specific altcoin or even an ETF covering the TOP 10 altcoins, which will probably go up a good % too. No need to open an exchange account, wire funds, go through KYC/AML, pull your tokens off the exchange, then go through all that again when you want to sell. Buying an ETF is just simpler.

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Despite Bitcoin’s high prices, over 62% of tokens haven’t moved from wallets in over a year.

There’s nothing else like Bitcoin—even if you searched the entire market. It truly acts as a digital hard asset and does it well. Even at these valuations, we’re not seeing massive sell-offs. Coin Days Destroyed tells the same story: old tokens just aren’t being spent like they were when BTC hit $100k.

Oh, and as of today, it’s been a full month since Bitcoin first went above $100k. That was 31 days ago, and we haven’t dropped below it—even with everything going on, like the recent Trump vs Musk feud.

Even the CBBI (which has all the predictive power of climate activists glued to asphalt claiming 52 genders exist) doesn’t show we’re at the peak of this bull run. 😅

We haven’t even had the altseason yet. No final euphoric BTC rally. No caps-lock Twitter spam shouting that ALTCOIN SEASON IS HERE—well, except for a few.

Crypto—whether we like it or not—is tightly linked to two people: Elon Musk and Donald Trump.

Know what ended the last bull run? Elon Musk on Saturday Night Live.

During his campaign, Trump talked a lot about saving money and cutting debt, which Elon liked. He even became head of the DOGE Department, whose job was to dig through government expenses and cut the unnecessary stuff—and they actually did it pretty well.

Unless, of course, we really want to fund a 320-year-old Social Security recipient, plus thousands more over 200 years old (not to mention 150 and even 130). 😂

But just a few months after Trump’s win, the bromance ended. Apparently, the breaking point was the Big Beautiful Bill, which includes tax cuts but increases the deficit and national debt even more. Not exactly what was promised—or what Elon expected.

Trump’s new domestic policy bill includes major tax cuts, boosted border security, and removal of EV credits. Musk called it a "disgusting abomination" on CBS, then doubled down on X, saying it adds $2T in debt and kills DOGE’s cost-cutting mission. 💥

Everything exploded on June 5.

At a press conference with Germany’s chancellor, Trump said Musk went “CRAZY” after losing the EV perks. Musk clapped back on X, claiming Trump would’ve lost without him, and hinted at starting his own political party.

Then it got personal.

Musk accused Trump of being named in unreleased Epstein files and even called for his impeachment. Trump fired back on Truth Social, threatening to cancel federal contracts with Tesla and SpaceX. 🧨

The good news? Tops are usually marked by positive headlines—this definitely isn’t one of them. 😬

Feeling a little pessimistic today—but hey, I don’t control the simulation.

You won’t believe it, but it looks like BTC might soon become... illegal in the EU.

Seriously.

The European Data Protection Board came up with the brilliant idea that a public key = personal data—because it could, theoretically, lead to identifying the owner.

And if it’s personal data, then it’s subject to GDPR—which means users should have the right to erase it.

The problem?

Blockchain is immutable. You can’t delete anything from it—that’s the whole point. So this creates a conflict with GDPR.

But wait, the circus continues 🎪

The EU, in its infinite wisdom, suggests anonymizing public keys before recording them on-chain.

The catch?

That’s already prohibited under another EU package—the one for anti-money laundering (AML).

So on one hand, GDPR wants anonymization, and on the other, AML bans it. Good luck figuring that out. 🤷

Consultations are still ongoing—some countries say end of June. But either way, if a public key is officially considered personal data, then the whole blockchain could be deemed illegal.

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Absurd? Exactly — debt is one too. Let’s kick off our weekly chat about that. 💬

If the Big Beautiful Bill passes, the projected debt in 2034 will be $54 trillion — yes, you read that right, fifty-four. That’s twice the amount from 2020, in just 14 years. Without it, it’s still nearly $50 trillion — not much better.

There’s no escape, just none. Can you imagine Jerome Powell coming out tomorrow and announcing the dollar will be backed by gold even at a 1:5 ratio? That’s not even in my bingo card — heck, not even Zelensky or the Chinese have that in theirs.

So we need to accept this reality — and here lies the opportunity. Let me show you something. 👇

This is how the dollar is priced in Bitcoin:

And this is the dollar priced in gold:

Two out of the three assets shown here have the characteristics of hard money. You don’t have to participate in the debt system. You can still choose to follow a gold standard — or even a Bitcoin standard. 💡

FIAT money has only one feature of hard money: it’s useful and widely accepted, and that’s what we should use it for — not for storing value. That’s not its role.

We talk about debt here for a reason. What do cryptocurrencies have to do with it?
Cryptocurrencies can possess the traits of hard money — and Bitcoin has them all.

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Unemployment

remains unchanged, right in line with the forecast — steady at 4.2%.
Lately, I’ve been skipping most of the U.S. economic data for one simple reason: it’s all over the place. Sometimes better

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