💭Market thoughts
Bitcoin only dropped about 2–3% overnight, but that small move hit a pivotal level & triggered the largest liquidation wave of the year: over $1.7B wiped out from late-longers and overleveraged degens:
No surprise the sentiment turned sour and a bit doomerish over night - nobody seems happy, the market structure on lower time frames looks shitty and more and more big accounts are convinced August already marked the cycle top and this is the final sell-off. The End of the cycle. Others argue this is just the last shakeout before the final leg up - (I am others).
What almost everyone agrees on is that we’re in the last inning - and probably also that this cycle has never seen a true parabolic $BTC mania phase or a widespread altseason. History has taught us that we’re at a now-or-never moment for it to happen:
To me it feels like the market needs just a spark. Some kind of ignition. Idk really what it will be, maybe just a boring capital rotation. But as long as we haven't lost meaningful market structure, I am relaxed, bullish and keep betting on the familiar gold -> BTC rotation (+ M2 Expansion correlation) we’ve seen in past cycles to push us into new highs.
The gold-tailwind pattern has been fairly consistent: gold rallies first while BTC chops, then when gold consolidates or corrects, BTC catches up - often violently:
At the same time it's important to also accept that we’re facing a headwind from stocks (BTC dumps when they dump but doesn’t pump when they pump).
So for staying bullish, it most likely requires stocks to remain bid (or at least don't correct sharply) & gold to find a plateau for re-accumulation.
My bullish bias would also be broken if major market structure fails & it becomes likely from a technical PoV that the cycle top is actually in. For me, this would mean a break of the Ichimoku Cloud bottom / 30WMA (blue line - around $100k), which has served with 100% accuracy as cycle support since February 2023:
My base case is straightforward:
– If gold consolidates and BTC starts gaining momentum, we get the last leg higher.
– If BTC fails to move when gold consolidates, or if we close a daily candle below 100k, it's time to de-risk. A weekly close below 100k would be the final confirmation that the cycle top is in.
Same logic for alts: many behave like $BTC on leverage. Even a setback to 108k or 104k BTC (which I would consider "wiggleroom") would be devastating for weaker alts that are (a) fighting to hold daily support (e.g. $XRP) or even worse (b) already have lost that fight (e.g. $APT). Cutting exposure there can make sense if one is overexposed.
Still, some names like $SOL or recent parabolics (e.g. $ASTER) have progressed enough that they carry the same wiggle room as BTC. If you can stomach the possible haircut - and if, like me, you don’t believe this is the cycle top - you can hold or even add as long as you can define for yourself a clear invalidation.
For me, it’s still BTFD season. The cycle isn’t done, the final leg hasn’t played out, and the bear market will only start once it’s confirmed. We’re not there yet.
