Crypt0 Bros - Are You Still Believers?

Inspiration for this post 

https://www.reddit.com/r/Invest_Voyager/comments/vsj9nx/how_much_crypto…
 

People said the same thing after 2017-2018 boom and bust that topped around $20k BTC: “no intrinsic value,” “tulips,” “crypto is dead”. And then there was a three-year bear market, culminating with the COVID crash in March ‘21, where all the worthless scammy vapor products got wiped out. But during that time, the industry kept innovating, experimenting, and building. And we had another boom that peaked in November of last year around $70k, and now we’re in a bear market. Just like last time, the vapor like $LUNA gets wiped out, but the real quality projects stick around, innovate, and gear up for the next bull market. 
 

Crypto is far from dead. This boom and bust cycle will continue to repeat itself ad infinitum, where speculative garbage is peddled at the top, and quality projects with real world use cases endure through cycles. 

what’s a good valuation for chainlink and ethereum? It’s at $6-7, which seems attractive at the moment.

Should all be called shitcoins 

Wake me when they go to zero (which they will). People who make money on them should get clawed back like any other Ponzi scheme. Believing in bitcoin should be finra license revocation.

I was never a believer. I'm literally only in it for the money. I honestly don't care whether it is in fact revolutionary or ends up a dead end. That being said, crypto is not dead and you'd have to be pretty stupid to say so. BTC has been declared dead like a thousand of times at this point, yet it always comes back after a few years. How dense do you have to be to refuse to take part in this?

Hahahahaha, you just wait until ShitAssBukkakePeepeeCoin goes to the moon, then we'll see who's laughing.

The most notable thing about crypto that no one talks about, is that all these opinions of it being 'useless' comes from people in developed countries. Countries which have stable banking systems, stable currencies, where everyone has a ID's and credit cards. And unfortunately these places are where 99% of financial market transactions and decisions happen.

If you look outside the developed world bubble, not only do you see a NEED for crypto but you see ADOPTION and USAGE already. Everyone may laugh at El Salvador, but a country making it an official currency is no joke, and a second emerging country has already joined. This may be immaterial now, but let's just say that a dozen countries adopt it (and they will, given most of the world is similar to those two countries and aren't the U.S. or U.K.). A dozen countries using a single currency first will require a huge supply of bitcoin, second will start to show the validity. Emerging countries, despite lower incomes and less technology, are using crypto at higher rates than developed countries. Its because crypto is allowing them to bypass the decades that it takes to build a trusted financial system.

To the skeptics that say bUT BitCOin iS sLOw aNd iS ExpenSiVE to TranSfEr...just google 'the lightning network' and read up on layer-2 protocols. People who believe in crypto understand the tech itself is limited right now, but there are already tech solutions making it so you can send bitcoin across the world for 2 pennies in 10 seconds, but Warren Buffett and every other boomer doesn't understand the technology so they just crow on about how much of a ponzi it is and how impractical it is. The funny thing is, I've never met someone who understands crypto, can explain the pros and cons rationally, and was fully against it. Never. Its always people who don't fully understand it. 

Last point: I'm glad to see lots of skeptics yet, because as we all know risk and reward are correlated. If everyone believed in crypto, if everyone used it, if everyone understood it, THERE WOULD BE NO MORE UPSIDE. So go ahead, laugh for the next 3 years while the bear market happens, stare in disbelief when it goes back up and eventually hits $100k, then rejoice when it crashes again to a 'shockingly low' $40k (60% drop!!?!), repeat, repeat. 

I think it’s telling that even after almost decade of being hot and having a ton of VC flow in, almost no sustainable companies have been built with true practical use cases that exist beyond X for crypto. 

I don’t think that crypto is dead, it certainly has at least a few more boom and bust cycles in it.

I didn’t participate in it the last few years but now that it’s crashed, because nothing is ever truly separate from the global equities market, I think this is a good entry point to speculate. If bitcoin goes below 20k, I think an investment there makes sense.

I think blockchain tech is going to have real applications in the future, especially once a country like America incorporates it into a government function of some sort.

I think crypto will eventually level out to a small but dedicated user base in the future, kind of like what happened to the online poker player ecosystem once the US government dropped the hammer on Black Friday.

Because there will always be an element (criminals, drug users, businessmen trying to avoid taxes, scam artists, etc) that will use digital currency. But I’m pessimistic it will become a mainstream currency, because major countries won’t easily accept such a competitor to theirs. And I also think the reason the dollar and sterling pound are the leading currencies is because people in general have faith in the tax, financial justice and bankruptcy systems in those countries. A decentralized currency offers none of those protections yet. I mean it’s all about trusting the system propping up the currency right?

So I would advocate treating crypto as part of your speculative segment of your investment portfolio. The money you set aside to bet on short term movements of commodities and buy options on small growth stocks, use that same bucket to take shots on random coins. But don’t let it become too large a part of your portfolio. I’ve read too many stories of people betting it all.

I also read a concerning article the other day that said some 401k plans are considering allow crypto as an investment option. That would be a real failure of the safeguards if that happened.

This isn't the first time crypto has tanked and it's not even remotely the worst it's happened either. Huge financial institutions and corporations like Google are jumping into crypto now. Sure, a lot of scams and crap are going to get shaken out - same thing happened during the tech bubble in the late 90s/early-2000s. The idea this slump means crypto is dead or as a whole is a scam is ignorance of the highest order. I bought $10k each of Bitcoin and Ethereum when they dipped below $20k/$1k respectively and I will happily do it again. If you liked something at >$60k/$4k why on early would you not like it even more at a 60-75%+ discount? I expect it to go even lower once USDT/Tether blows up but who knows when that ponzi scheme will be realized. Once it does I'll be right there with my wallet looking to buy even more.

There are two kinds of crypto bros.

The true believers, who genuinely think crypto has real world use cases. Those guys are obviously still going to be big believers in crypto. Always will be.

Then there are the crypto bros who are in it to pump and dump their crypto of choice. Those guys were never believers.

Whether you like it or not, crypto regulation is coming. All other shit coins will be decimated. Bitcoin will be deemed a commodity because there was no pre mine, no third party, no ceo. Don’t believe me listen to Gary gensler. Bitcoin goes through cycles and it’s going through it’s first recession. Remember Hal Finney who commented basically every day bitcoin survives is a another day where new information is being priced into the market about its longevity and survivability. 

Well the macro economic factors were bad and that's the reason crypto fell. It will take some time to recover but the recovery will happen

This (and the next 6-12 months) is when you should load your fucking bags, since crypto will inevitably rise again as it has done in the past. Bear markets make you rich. 

As usual, you hear a ton of "crypto has no value" comments from prominent investors who were embracing it as the future of finance just a few months ago. I think this will be the period of consolidation defined by the trust and utility that projects can construct around themselves. A lot of small projects will die but perhaps that's what the space needs to move forward: better for the ponzis and scammers to go away anyway. 

Long run, the fundamentals have not changed and I continue to think that this space will become something TradFi can't ignore. Depending on how severe this slowdown is (primarily based on how bad macro gets), this may take a while longer than many initially expected.

Most of shitcoins will die, but we are still really early in multiple fronts. The technology is not mature yet for trillions of real-world asset to be put on-chain because of speed, security, privacy and regulation.

Most banks are experiencing heavily with tokenising real-world asset or assets being issued directly on-chain. It is estimated that only $200 millions of real-world asset now are on-chain, mostly t-bill.

Fidelity is estimated that $16trillions of asset to be tokenised by 2030. Larry Fink also think 'Next Generation for Markets’ Is Tokenization.

Also institutions are working to bring cash on-chain. With digitalised cash and digitalised asset on-chain, it will significantly increase velocity of money (e.g. 24/7 stock market vs 9-5 stock market), unlock more liquidity of less-liquid asset( your home, mortgage, etc.) and open the door for new use cases.

In order to secure those asset, the token price of network helped to secure them (e.g. staked ETH) will increase.

On other fronts, a more mature gaming and Decentralised social media experience will challenge the status quo and create new use cases for users.

TLDR: most shitcoins/ pump-and-dump projects will die. But with more clarity on regulation, tokenisation of RWA, gaming, social media is inherently bullish for crypto.

This is not 2018-2019 when there were no products, no use cases. Most big financial institutions/ VCs know it is the future, and investing billions in it.