Darkest Before Dawn
Not terribly much has happened in terms of price action or news over the past week or so. The majors such as Bitcoin have mostly been moving sideways. The markets are in the grip of late summer slowness. The eventfulness of some recent weeks has subsided. But if you think that traders are using this calm period to catch some breath, you would be wrong. The overall state of most crypto traders is disillusion bordering on depression.
This is partially driven by disappointment. Many had hoped that the bull market would lift all boats. Yet, only BTC and Solana rallied significantly. Other coins, Ethereum in particular, have had disappointing years. The main narratives of this cycle have been memecoins and airdrop hunts. Both did not provide anywhere near the same excitement or returns compared to previous parabolic altcoin rallies.
What is more, a lot of the things that the community has been excited about, such as restaking, Layer 2s, and some innovative new Layer 1s such as Monad or Berachain, have hit the trough of disillusionment in major ways. News that Eigenlayer, the leading team in restaking, had directed projects to airdrop to its employees seem to confirm the cynicism that has taken hold. That this was ferociously denied by the Eigenlayer team has not helped to calm down nerves. In the meantime, hyped Layer 2 projects such as Starknet or zkSync launched at high valuations only to see the token prices drop considerably after launch. Meanwhile, early investors are still up 100s of multiples. This is not what Crypto and Blockchain were supposed to be about.
Bad sentiment in crypto tends to coincide with bad price action. Bearish sentiment often swings to extremes when prices are at their lowest. This is where markets currently seem to stand. However, even with peak pessimism, Bitcoin is still holding around $60,000. ETFs for Bitcoin and Ethereum allow large institutional investors to allocate funds to these assets. The technology, albeit not moving as quickly as we all would like to see, is nonetheless improving each cycle. The night is darkest before dawn.
This is partially driven by disappointment. Many had hoped that the bull market would lift all boats. Yet, only BTC and Solana rallied significantly. Other coins, Ethereum in particular, have had disappointing years. The main narratives of this cycle have been memecoins and airdrop hunts. Both did not provide anywhere near the same excitement or returns compared to previous parabolic altcoin rallies.
What is more, a lot of the things that the community has been excited about, such as restaking, Layer 2s, and some innovative new Layer 1s such as Monad or Berachain, have hit the trough of disillusionment in major ways. News that Eigenlayer, the leading team in restaking, had directed projects to airdrop to its employees seem to confirm the cynicism that has taken hold. That this was ferociously denied by the Eigenlayer team has not helped to calm down nerves. In the meantime, hyped Layer 2 projects such as Starknet or zkSync launched at high valuations only to see the token prices drop considerably after launch. Meanwhile, early investors are still up 100s of multiples. This is not what Crypto and Blockchain were supposed to be about.
Bad sentiment in crypto tends to coincide with bad price action. Bearish sentiment often swings to extremes when prices are at their lowest. This is where markets currently seem to stand. However, even with peak pessimism, Bitcoin is still holding around $60,000. ETFs for Bitcoin and Ethereum allow large institutional investors to allocate funds to these assets. The technology, albeit not moving as quickly as we all would like to see, is nonetheless improving each cycle. The night is darkest before dawn.
Disclaimer
The information and publications are not meant to be, and do not constitute, financial, investment, trading, or other types of advice or recommendations supplied or endorsed by TradingView. Read more in the Terms of Use.