
Bitcoin Dips Again! Bottom Signal or More Pain Ahead? | Crypto Town Hall
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Alex
Check. Can you guys hear me? I tried to speak before and absolutely nothing happened. So give me a thumbs up if you can actually hear me. Oh, it's a miracle.
Roger
Roger.
Alex
Roger. Mr. Wolf, the never ending glitch. The good news is I only embarrassed myself when I was talking for a minute and nobody could hear anything.
Charlie
Actually the good news is alts only fell 1% while you were gone.
Alex
So only 1%. It was like five minutes. We're killing it. Amortized over, you know, an hour. Good. Listen, we have yet another day of macro data to digest. Obviously CBI today coming in a bit hotter than expected and expecting some volatility and to be honest, not that much. Right. I mean bitcoin obviously dropped but it's still trading over 95,000, what $500 off the daily open. So really very little volatility relative to what I think many would have expected if we this hot of CPI data. I mean Dave, kind of give us the first take on what you saw today and what you expected and what's happening.
Dave
Well, I mean you and I have had this conversation many times. I mean the knee jerk reactions are usually wrong, but today was stupid. I mean just like genuinely like schizo. If you believe that the CPI print means that the Fed is going to get tough, then sell bitcoin and gold, okay, whatever. You can believe that if you want. Means you're delusional. But that's okay. You know, understand markets can be delusional but at the same time when the bond yield spikes, you know, 10 basis points like immediately, that's basically people saying ah, they're losing control, the Fed's not going to get tough. And so you get this sort of schizo response. And when you see that sort of thing then it's almost always the right move to fade the open, just take the other side. And so I posted a bunch today. I don't usually do this but just kind of showing technically what I thought was going on, that an obvious 5,600point bounce was in the cards. And then, you know, you get to a real zone which is where we are now. And if you look at it, it's there's, you know, the initial fall, you know, the first candle down, you know, we're kind of halfway through that and we'll see where it goes. And I think from now it's sort of in a neutral stance technically and we'll see what goes, you know, but the other thing, and I think it was Andrew who's on the panel, I can't remember who posted something that I didn't have a chance to verify. But if it's true, it's actually really interesting, which is the entirety, in fact, more than the entirety of the. The excess inflation was from eggs. Now, I don't see how that could be in the core, you know, because food is generally excluded. But, you know, if the culling of the chickens because of suspected avian flu is the major part of inflation, that's literally the definition of transitory.
Alex
I think shelter was also very sticky and a bit higher, but that's obviously always lagging, so kind of hard to.
Dave
Yeah, yeah. I mean, look, you and I have had this conversation a billion times. Well, a billion typerbole, but, you know, at least 100 times. And that's actually not hyperbole that the Fed is stuck. There's this huge fiscal deficit. And, you know, even assuming Elon is allowed to do his job and that the voters will. Will be taken into account, there's still a structural budget deficit, that the only way we can get past it is to grow our way out of it. And so there's very little chance, like zero chance that there's not going to be significant monetary printing, even if it's only just to pay for the fiscal deficit. So think about what all the stuff is you want. You know, the real question, and it is the question for everybody who's listening is will the inflation go into assets or will it go into consumer inflation? You know, for years, governments have been very skillful at pushing the inflation into assets. If inflation goes into assets, Bitcoin is arguably the number one beneficiary of that. And so just tread carefully would be all I would say.
Alex
Bill, you had your hand up.
Dave
Yeah.
Charlie
Good morning. Sorry for the background noise. I'm at the gym. West coast time. But. So look, I've been digging into this a little bit this morning. Haven't had a ton of time yet, but two things. One, there's a huge disconnect with the truflation number, which is, you know, actually printed a lower number this morning. I think it's at 2.07. Housing is generally a trailing indicator. And so the way they deal with housing numbers in core CPI is very suspect, in my opinion. I've been saying that I think we had a space like maybe a year ago March where I was talking about this. And it's not only a trailing indicator, but the way. The way they try to capture, you know, rent versus cost of buying a home versus mortgages, it's just. It's just not Useful, in my opinion. And that combined with the fact that we've got 6 million armchair economists now all basically having an opinion, it's just crazy. I mean, the whole thing is crazy. I think. I think what matters is liquidity. I think TGA is being depleted. I think reverse repo is close to depleted. I think. I think massive liquidity injections are coming. I think Trump gets what Trump wants. Trump wants lower rates. I think, you know, on the back end of duration, you know, the steep end of duration. I think. I think rates are going to come down precipitously later, you know, in Q2 and Q3. I think the housing bubble will reinflate for better or worse under Trump. And, you know, to me, I've made my bets, but, you know, I'm not looking for confirmation bias, but unless something is radically off, this looks exactly like Trump won to me. And I think all this inflation number is just nonsense. The biggest change to me is I'm seeing a slight disconnect between bitcoin and everything else. Right. Bitcoin is showing strong relative strength versus DXY and other things, which is awesome to see. I mean, it's kind of. I mean, we've all talked about that for many years, that at some point it would just do its own thing. I'm seeing the first signs of that now. Right. Because bitcoin should be falling much faster if everything was in repeat mode. Everything else looks like it's in repeat mode, except for bitcoin. Gold is doing what gold should do as. As, you know, risk off, but as risk on. You know, bitcoin should be probably in the 80s. Right. And so I'm super bullish that it's not now that, again, alts and bitcoin are not the same thing to me. So. So that the alt part makes sense. But. But I think I'm seeing. I'll shut up now, but I'm seeing a disconnect on bitcoin, which I'm. Which I think is awesome. So I'm happy to answer any questions on that, but.
Alex
Yeah, yeah, go ahead.
Charlie
No, I just can say that's the only real disconnect I see in the markets. But that's a good disconnect.
Alex
Yeah, I just think it's kind of interesting if you zoom out, even go back six months or 12 months and say, hey, you know, in mid February of 2025, Bitcoin is going to be trading sideways at 95,000. I think literally everybody here would have been exceptionally excited.
Charlie
Yeah, we've. We haven't had the traditional 40% dump on Bitcoin which we've had for, you know, four or five cycles now. So, so that's, I mean look, that's data in and of itself, right? Of course it could happen next week but I, you know, look to me an 85k Bitcoin if that's where we bottom as, as we merge into alt season. I mean that's, that's still a huge break with the past and that may, they, that may not even happen.
Andrew
Right.
Charlie
We just, we don't, we obviously don't know yet. But, but anyway, I'm repeating myself. It's, it's, it's very interesting.
Alex
Jakir.
Charlie
Yeah, I don't think like you know, in, in 2025 considering that, you know, the amount of time so far that Trump has been in the office and.
Tom
There are a lot of financial reaffirmations.
Charlie
That, you know, people are still seeking for, I do believe it's going to take time in 2025. As someone mentioned earlier before me that we do see that bitcoin at that 95 to 100k sideways moment. But yeah, I mean there is like, you know, it's obviously like you know, there has been an excessive spending like.
Tom
You know, congressional spending over the years.
Charlie
Rather like, you know, I'll say decades. So when we come to the alt markets or the altcoin season, the problem in the market right now is not the bitcoin. Bitcoin is doing what bitcoin is doing actually. It's like, you know, outperforming the expectations and thanks to all the ETFs and everything. But there literally is no liquidity into the art markets. VCS have been running up like, you know, completely dry. We have seen, we haven't seen much of the inflows from like you know, major investment firms into any all projects because throughout those last two years we saw excessive number of infra projects trying to like, you know, you can say.
Tom
Layer upon each other. But it really hasn't kind of been effective. If you look at one of the.
Charlie
Major exchange inflows for the newer projects compared to what it was pre built in the last cycle, it is not.
Tom
Even one fifth of it into the alt market.
Charlie
Comparatively all the liquidity sits in bitcoin or it's now considering that majority of the liquidity went to Trump, Meme, Coin and other projects. So yeah.
Alex
Andrew, what are your thoughts? I mean it seems that nobody here is particularly concerned about rising inflation. Go ahead, Andrew.
Andrew
Well, you know, it's rising inflation in the aggregate and it's, you know, in context, it's over the past two years, this is incremental and tiny compared to where we were. It's just a question of where do we go, where do we go over time? Is, is going to be a question of a whole lot of macro issues, economic growth rates and 15 other things. Yeah, there should be concern probably long term in relation to that, but as it relates to, to Bitcoin price, you know, Bill did a nice job talking about it. There's just going to continue whenever there's a, a dip or a drop that's associated with, whether it's macro markets or a piece of data, the participants now associated with Bitcoin versus a year ago, two years ago, whatever it happens to be, they're just in a different place and the bid is much, much, much stronger. And so you saw that immediately with this dip from 96 to 94. You know, we're back almost to 96. If you think about it, Wall street is, is in the process of falling in love with Bitcoin. And there's, there's, there's one meaningful reason why. That reason why is, is volatility. Wall street rarely comes across new assets that they can price as a premium because it's new and because it's volatile. And Bitcoin currently is and will continue to be that asset for a while. So as they create products, derivatives, exotics, lending products around Bitcoin, they're going to continue to put a bid underneath Bitcoin's price because they want more and more and more and more and more participants. I don't know if anybody's noticed, but Goldman Sachs has absolutely been pounding the table to their institutional clients to do everything and anything with Bitcoin and Ethereum ETF, ETFs, swaps, arbitrage, you know, all sorts of stuff to just get involved in the space. And they keep sending notes for people to get involved. And the reason that they're doing that is not some sort of, you know, esoteric belief in crypto now and that it's, you know, a, a life changing, world changing addition to finance. It's because they can make a ton of money off of it because it's volatile and it's going to be priced at a premium. And so take the reality of the levers associated with Wall street and as a retail individual, make money off of it, hold the asset itself. So when there are adjustments and downturns like this, it's an opportunity. Yeah. Philosophically we can talk about the fact that any Any, any downturn in Bitcoin for its entirety has been an opportunity, but short term right now, because there' a high floor, high ceiling opportunity here with bitcoin, take advantage. So when you see a blip associated with inflation, when you see a blip associated with tariffs, when you see a blip associated with Elon Musk saying something weird about his involvement in government, it's going to continue to be an opportunity.
Alex
You mentioned Goldman pounding the, sort of pounding it to their clients and trying to get them all exposed. Well, they also have their own exposure, which, you know, they just filed their 13F a bit early. I think the rest will see more of those probably on Friday. But they own 288 million in Fidelity's ETF and 1.3 billion in Ibit Blackrock's ETF. And that's Goldman themselves. And that's as of December 31st.
Andrew
So understand that that's a function of them wanting to do business with institutional clients. So they're carrying their own inventory to be able execute swaps and arbitrage plays. Right. So, you know, Goldman isn't, you know, sitting around as a company and saying, we want to own spot Bitcoins because, you know, spot Bitcoin ETF because it goes up by, you know, 30% at any given time. They're, they're using that as inventory to use with their institutional clients to execute these exotic strategies that they're sending out in notes that, hey, we're open for business to do this, this, this and this if you want to. Because again, there's significant price premiums associated with a new volatile asset and the length of time that they're going to be able to do that, their betting is an extended period of time. Right. Again, they can point to their clients and say, it's not only us that are pounding the table here on this product and this asset. But, oh, by the way, one of our guys that we're partners with, Larry, thinks it's going 5 to 7x from where it is now. Are you interested in doing any of this? And so that's the conversation that's being had at the institutional level is we'll figure out a way to get you not only access but exposure to the asset. It's going to cost you, though. It's going to, you know, it's probably going to be a little bit pricey. But that's, that's the reason they're doing it, right, is because it's hard to find assets on Wall street where you, you can charge a premium to your clients.
Alex
Sorry Tom and jw. I know you guys both had your hand up before I missed it. So go ahead Tom and then jw.
Tom
Oh, no worries. How's it going everybody? So just a few points. So the housing number in CPI which drove a lot of this print is lagged by 12 to 18 months, which is why it makes it a terrible indicator. And it's about a third of headline and then 40% of core CPI. So that's a huge determinant of these headline figures. You also had a bit of front running for the tariffs which drove a lot of the goods services. So all in all I'm honestly not too concerned about the inflation picture, which means good things for yields, good things for the dollar in the future which drive risk assets. My perspective is great. Market action is a little down today, but more broadly I'm not concerned about that. What I am concerned about is the continued lack of liquidity throughout crypto and the fracturing of liquidity, particularly in the altcoin space. And I don't see that changing for the next, call it four to five months. So what really will be driving markets in the near term outside of maybe the majors, which I think are going to do really well, the majors being like Bitcoin, Ethereum, Solana, maybe even something like Hyper Liquid which has really established itself, particularly on the downside is market liquidity which we've talked about many times. So those acronyms like TGA and Reverse Repo Facility and all those things are going to be really important as we hit the debt ceiling and then continue discussion on tariffs and other things that are going to directly impact bond yields and broader market liquidity. I really don't see anything that will have a near term impact on the altcoins. And I just posted a tweet about this about an hour ago. But the things that I do see potentially could be positive for altcoins are not going to happen until at minimum this summer. Right? Things like the SBR and the stockpile being potentially approved, further ETF approvals, new target allocations from states and other etc. So really, I mean it's just, I don't know if it's gonna be a fun few months for altcoins no matter what happens in traditional markets. But I do like the majors, jw.
JW
So I'm always the contrarian in this space to say that I don't know how to trade crypto short term. I haven't found any data that's really useful, really reliable predictor about what happens to Crypto short term. I think that what we're all doing right now is we're. If it were possible, we're going back in time and we're trading on applications in the burgeoning Internet in the 1980s. So the burgeoning Internet where it's just a hobby of a few thousand people at universities figuring out new ways to talk to each other. So we're trading on applications built on top of technology that's very, very, very nascent. It does seem to mostly be driven by macroeconomic indicators, I'll agree. But I don't know how to use it for short term trading strategies because it is just so noisy in response to information. I worry that kind of what we do in the short term is not all that different from people standing around a roulette wheel and saying there seems to be a lot of odd numbers out there, let's bet even. Which from a statistical point of view is just nonsense. I think the only thing I know how to do is look at Electric Capital's annual report on number of devs that are pulling GitHub code for a particular blockchain.
Alex
Ethereum should be booming.
JW
Well, that doesn't mean Ethereum should be booming. That just means I'm willing to buy Ethereum bags, put my seed phrase on metal, put it in a hole and come back in five years and be surprised. That's all it means. I don't know how to play any of that stuff short term, but the only thing I know how to do long term is look for bets where, particularly to me in Deepin where what they're building is consistent with cypherpunk philosophy. What they're building is something that helps to decentralize something and there are a lot of devs pulling the code from GitHub and working on it. I buy those bags, I etch it, but my seed phrase in steel and I forget about it for at least five years. That's all I know how to do. It's pretty simple, but that's all I can do.
Alex
Yeah, Dave and then Bill.
Dave
Sorry, I'm in the gym.
Alex
Dave and Bill are working out together, guys. Secretly.
Dave
Yeah, I'm working out in my Miami gym and looking out over the beach. It's definitely a sight. The point I wanted to make was to piggyback on Andrew was saying before two things. First, I wanted to explain because a lot of people, a lot of the listeners in the audience don't know what, what he means by exotics. And to be blunt, it's not necessarily just because they can make money. Of course it's because they can make money. It's not that they're necessarily expensive, but the kinds of products we're talking about are things like principal protected notes. So it's a really simple idea. So you get five by a zero coupon bond and you take the, you know, whatever the percentage that's left over in five years and you buy call options on Bitcoin.
Alex
Right.
Dave
So you end up getting upside of Bitcoin with downside protection that is extremely popular and easy to sell to institutions who have seen all these massive runs but are afraid of volatility. Wall street will always make more money selling these sorts of products than anything else because you can take a big spread out of it.
Alex
Dave, a couple weeks ago, I can't remember the issuer, it was actually someone I hadn't heard of, begins with a C. But there were, I think three ETFs launched that had effectively exactly that one with 100% downside protection, 90% and 80%, obviously your upside is capped, but basically zero downside ETFs on Bitcoin, which I've gotten no traction that I've seen or anybody really talking about them. But they exist and they're on the market.
Dave
Yeah, but it's not retail that wants these, it's funds. It's funds who need to be able to explain to their board that they've made a bet and that they're not taking risk. And so, you know, it's, it's actually really interesting. There's some of the, there are some banking, you know, there's some distribution networks for those sorts of products to retail that are kind of within the private banks all throughout Europe and they're generally the biggest ones. I remember being on the desk of Solomon Brothers and I can tell stories about this, but it's a big deal. So if you want to know what Wall street cares about, these are the products that make the most money on. But there's another thing that people really need to keep in mind. And you got to be patient. I mean, it's not etching in steel for five years, but in two quarters you're going to have every single brokerage firm able to offer crypto trading services. Right now, none of them can, you know, Robinhood had to set up a separate affiliate. So if with, you know, with Quintenz and Paul Atkins, who will work together, you will end up with a regulatory regime that all the broker dealers are going to be able to offer this. So now, in addition to just the structured products you're talking about. Every financial advisor, every broker dealer, every RIA will be able to offer things that you know in the crypto world. And that opens up an enormous pool of capital. So that's the real money to watch. That's not going to change tomorrow, it's not going to change the next few weeks. But you want to look back six months from now. That's your, that's a large part of your catalyst. And, and the last catalyst I want to talk about, which was a really funny one if you think about it, is Max Kaiser said something this morning which kind of tickled my interest. I don't know if he's just speculating or if he's right, but evidently there are rumors that companies like GameStop might be looking at adding the bitcoin treasury. And we all understand what GameStop is and who follows and why.
Alex
Yeah. That was based on a photo of the CEO of GameStop and Michael Saylor together last week.
Dave
Sure. Now think about what that means though, in terms of the aping in process. And it's just a question of is there supply? These are all bitcoin things that matter. Ultimately. The reason that we haven't seen the 40% dump is because there's buyers at these levels that don't want to chase, but are happy to let the market come to them and it's going to continue to be that way. That's why bitcoin is outperformed all by so much.
Alex
I would say. Yes, there's like the active bid you're talking about of gobbling up any dip, but I also think there's just enough passive buying at any price on a day to day basis that it also prevents those bigger dips.
Dave
Exactly. But that's all part of the same thing. So when you look at this market, you know, I think when you look back six months from now, you're going to look at this and say, what the hell are we thinking? You know, you know, the people who, you know, if you think people get fomo, you know, when things are going up and they didn't participate, what if they actively ignored it or sold because they took profits? And there's a lot of that in the crypto community. So I mean, you know, tread carefully as you say, look at the cycles and don't be surprised if they align with, with the narrative after the fact.
Alex
100%. Bill, I know you had your hand up before, then we'll go down the line.
Charlie
Yeah, just. I was partially responding to what Tom was saying before Which I thought was really great. Comments? Look, my number one focus at Abbott right now is extending our SMA platform into the RIA space. And I, obviously that makes me biased because I believe that that is a better way for clients of advisory firms to be holding crypto versus securities. But I'll actually say that it's way worse with Altcoins than it is for Bitcoin, right? I mean, securitizing gold, I mean, you can make a. I mean, look, I'm fine that all of it exists. I think it's a free market, but. Or it should be a free market, but I think securitizing what effectively amounts to, you know, gasoline and fuel for smart contracts makes very little sense to me. And you know, at least with the SMA model, you're actually holding the underlying and you're actually staking and you're providing real value to these networks that represent the future of computing. And I think that, you know, we really need a broader, broader understanding within the institutional world of what it means to actually enable decentralized computing. Enable. Enable smart contracts and, you know, how to add value to that ecosystem and make money at the same time. I'm all for making money, but the right way to make money, in my opinion, in that world is not to securitize. Solana Sui, Ethereum, whatever. I mean, I'm fine that they're doing it. I just personally think that if you want to make money in that space in the long term, buying ETFs beyond Bitcoin makes no sense to me at all. And you know, yeah, obviously, obviously totally biased, but since I'm building a competing platform, but I'm just putting my money where my mouth is.
Dave
Can I just make. Oh, sorry. I just want to make one, one really quick one, Bill, because I'm good, dude.
Alex
All right, Dave. I think we lost Dave in the middle of his point. Go ahead, Dave.
Dave
Yeah, did you hear me? Yeah, I was gonna say someone called me right at that time. Is that index ETFs not individual things, but index ETFs which allow people passively in their brokerage account buy it will be a popular product until everything that you're saying is solved from a custodial point of view, where someone who's computer literate without a computer literate wife doesn't have to worry about what happens if they die, right? And things like that. And I know you guys are working on all those things, but I do think index ETFs are going to be an enduring product that'll be very popular.
Alex
That's the way Americans invest. I mean, that's what they want.
Charlie
Well, RIA solve that problem. In general, it's not the securitization of the assets that solves the problem. It's the broker and the RIA that solves the problem. So at the end of the day, what is the product that the RIA or the broker is offering and what is their feature for enabling inheritance? I think that's the. I, I understand the point you're making, but I think, I think the bigger question is, is, are people being smart about, you know, figuring out their own estate issues within their family? And, you know, it's, it was not an issue in the early days of crypto and it's a big, big issue now. Huge issue.
Alex
Dom Sen. Lu.
Dom
G'day, everyone. Dom here. I believe there's a big wave of buying that's going to hit us like a brick. And that's going to be when some of the US States start not only establishing, but start buying bitcoin. There just won't be enough bitcoin out there. In the last 60 days, Texas, Wyoming, Utah have all put together legislation to actually establish bitcoin reserves. And I think this is going to be a domino effect. It's going to start with the states, then it's going to go at the federal level, and then I think we're going to see countries around the world follow suit. And my money's on bitcoin all the way.
Charlie
I just want to mention, I think one of the most positive things I've seen the last week, I don't know how much you talked about it, was the Ondo summit in New York last week, February 6th. When I first got into crypto in 17, the best conferences were in New York. Consensus was the best conference, but because of laws, you know, the regulations, everybody left. Masari was kind of the last one standing and it was a really pretty sad conference. But Ondo held this conference and it was awesome.
Roger
I don't. Did anybody else on the call go to the conference or watch it?
Alex
I wasn't there, but I was following along and it seemed exceptional.
Charlie
Yeah, I thought it was the best conference in New York in years. And Ondo really did an amazing job, not only getting the tradfi companies like Fidelity and blackrock and Franklin Templeton, but they got a lot of leaders from government and they got a lot of the best leading crypto companies to come there. The CEO of Uniswap was, I thought, the best speaker of the whole day. And so it's just, you know, it's anecdotal, but it is awesome to see, you know, and it was a packed house. They had more than 200,000 people watching on the stream.
Alex
I mean, I think it's anecdotal, but I think it also speaks to the narratives of the future for crypto and which may actually come into fruition in the coming months or years. And Real World Assets is clearly one of those. Right, and that proves it.
Charlie
Exactly.
Roger
And Ondo really is emerging.
Charlie
It's up 5x in the last year. It really seems to have emerged as a leader, if not the leader of our platform for rwa.
Alex
Yeah, tokenization is definitely coming BC you haven't had a chance to jump in yet. Any thoughts?
Dom
Yeah.
Bill
Cheers, guy. Actually, to be honest, just sitting back and listening to all the really good points raised by everyone and to be honest, a lot of of the things I was thinking have been brought up by, by some really, really good kind of some good points and some good counterpoints. I think for me, one of the things, if we look at what everybody's talking about in general here isn't, you know, it's not. It doesn't seem to be this question of if anymore. It's much more around when, okay, what are the catalysts that are coming into the market? Looking at this from a position of, okay, you know, where are we positioning ourselves moving forward here? When is it going to be the right time to, you know, look at investing in. Towards are we in this situation where, you know, everything has been very heavily narra driven AI for example, we saw the big shock that came into traditional markets with the emergence of China in that space and what that did to Nvidia that then obviously had the impact on the indexes that were being propped up quite heavily by that. I like Dom's point about supply and demand. I think that often gets overlooked here when states are looking to build these reserves, are really looking to step into this. I think we could really see a big shock in here, but the biggest one of all is the fiscal deficit. The money printers are going to have to come on at some point. We have a pro crypto president and I know that's kind of your headline banter really, but overall I think we're stepping into a very kind of unrealized world here. And I agree, I think Q2, Q3 can see the rates really starting to come down, freeing up some of that capital. We align that with any kind of major injection of liquidity and finance into that space and this thing can really explode. Sorry, one last point. I'd raise as well, looking at this more of a kind of degem hat, which is rare for me. I'm very, not very often my most DG person in the space by any means. But looking at things like the Fear and greed index, right, Looking at that chart, but also just the general kind of sentiment that's washing over people, a lot of people kind of getting tired of this. Bitcoin's basically sat in a massive range from the early Hundreds down to 90k region. And people are getting a little bit washed up by this. You see the sentiment dropping. I mean, that's the kind of stuff that really then starts to excite me and I'm thinking, look at what point. So I want to start accumulating. I'm happy here, I'm happy. Lower. But once some of those major catalysts start to hit, I think people are really going to struggle to get involved with this. And I think a lot of people are going to be left on the sidelines.
Alex
That's what we were talking about before this institutional appetite that we have right now for the asset class, especially bitcoin and this depression that seemingly retailers and do not align. And if the big money is going to be buying it up, we know what retail does and they buy much higher. So it's going to take. I always kind of joke that the best marketing for bitcoin is higher prices or any asset. And I think that that's going to prove to be true. Bitcoin at 120 or 110even is going to be in the headlines and retail is going to get very excited again. Go ahead, jw.
JW
Yeah, I'm grateful to my registered investment advisor friends on the stage here who are going to help my wife with the scaveng scavenger hunt she has ahead when I die, because I make the.
Alex
Same scavenger hunt joke every. All the time.
JW
Yeah, that's a heck of a thing. Look, guys, I think I'm really excited about what Hester Purse is doing as head of the crypto task force. I imagine probably a lot of that focus is going to be on offering reform, private offering exemptions for crypto enforcement reform, all kinds of stuff. Let's make sure what doesn't get lost in the shuffle is important reforms to help RIAs do their job, to onboard, you know, boomers to crypto. So this is a call to action, y'all. Please email cryptocc.gov, send your ideas, send your thoughts. I'm sure they want to hear from you. And I really hope they're hearing from the RA registered investment advisor community about what you need to do your jobs because I think they want to listen. So make sure you all write to them, meet with them, do zooms with them and stuff like that.
Charlie
So one, one funny anecdote about the scavenger hunt, if I may. So everybody thinks that the best trader in the world is Nancy Pelosi and all the inside traders, but it's not. It's actually historically dead people whose accounts have been lost because they don't do stupid with their investments and they just sit there compounding year after year after year.
Tom
So.
Charlie
So there is something to be said for the scavenger hunts as much as we're trying to address the problem.
Alex
So makes that Marcus go tells that story all the time. It's like you know what, you know what the best performing accounts. Yeah, I think it's. It was. It was. It was Fidelity accounts of dead people. I think it was specific to Fidelity or Vanguard.
Tom
Yeah.
Dave
Yep.
Alex
It's really an unbelievable stat though. I mean it proves that just sitting there and dollar cost averaging and doing nothing.
Charlie
I told my lawyer, you can't tell my kids where my brokerage accounts are for 15 years after I'm dead.
Alex
They'll do exceptionally well. They might actually have to get a job too, which is helpful.
Charlie
I think it's a win win.
Alex
I guess the next natural question before we head to Buzz in a few minutes is I think we're all in agreement that the macroeconomic data is hard to read, it's lagging and maybe you shouldn't overreact to it. I think we all agree that Bitcoin has established itself as a legitimate asset class. It's when altcoins that's the question. I think everyone wants to know what's going to be the catalyst that finally maybe diverts the attention of crypto natives out of the mem. That's where they obviously are and gain some sort of retail traction, you know, with the alt car altcoin market writ large. Tom, you kind of mentioned some of these catalysts before. Yeah, I knew your hand would throw up, so go ahead.
Tom
Sorry. I got up my desk treadmill I have next to my desk here to be in unison of the road. I don't have to shut it off.
Alex
But I'm jogging the planes and doing jumping jacks now.
Tom
Just it's exercise morning I guess for everybody. Yeah. So I am really bearish on almost all these altcoins until the summer, but Even more unpopular. I think the only thing that stops this is actually a clear market structure bill, and what is allowed and what is not. So Hester Pierce came out yesterday and says not so many words that she doesn't really understand this stuff in terms of where the jurisdiction lies, et cetera. You have David Sacks saying these things are collectibles along with NFTs. And I think until we have very clear rules of the road in the U.S. what is legal, what is not legal, you're just going to keep having this continual hot ball of money being thrown out there. There's 11 million coins. I was just looking at this yesterday, and whatever, thousands launched every day. It's really hard to fight for attention. So you alts are just really going to suffer from that until we have clear regulation, which is kind of hilarious because we're in the space for decentralization and less regulation, but regulation might actually save us in this case.
Alex
I think there's 11 million now. I think there's 11 million now listed on Coin Market Cap. Right. So that doesn't even include the bulk of pump fund tokens that are being launched and don't exist three hours later.
Roger
Well, for a lot of these listings on CoinMarketCap projects are needing to pay about five grand. So think about all the tokens that just don't have that budget. There's probably what, 10, 20x that number of tokens.
Alex
Yeah, exactly. So, I mean, these are just the ones that somehow made it to Coin Market Cap. Go ahead, Lou.
Charlie
I'm just saying, I think the one person who can really save the market.
Roger
If he floats a coin is David Portnoy.
Alex
The jail. Jail stool has not been going particularly well for him of late, I think. Although I will say, if you follow him, no human being has publicly gone through the entire crypto roller coaster that everybody has probably quietly suffered than that guy. I mean, exactly.
Charlie
He's done it very publicly.
Alex
I mean, you know, all the things you would never say out loud. He screams into the camera over and over again. It's pretty, pretty remarkable.
Charlie
That's why he's got a massive audience.
Tom
He's symptomatic of what this cycle is though, right? He's a marketer, pure and simple. He has been for 15 years. That's how he grew barstool and how he grew his empire for every single sort of business he does. And that's really what each one of these protocols is right now, is a big marketing engine right now. Partnerships don't matter. TVL doesn't matter. Transaction volumes really don't matter. It's these marketing engines and who can actually get the attention to suck in the capital. So fundamentals matter in the long term, yes. But right now it's just a big game of marketing. And he's like the exact, in a very specific example what this market is.
Roger
I don't think it's going to. To stop either. I think he, he got his first fat finger operation that happened yesterday. I think he lost about 800 SOL and I think he's going to revenge, trade his his way back. So I'm firmly listening to that narrative every day. But we, we do have a sponsor today and we have Dom from Havelo, a Deepin company, which is going to be exciting. But before we get started, I just have a disclaimer that Mario's company, ibc, does marketing, incubation and investing, and sponsors on the show are not directly affiliated with Crypto Town hall, but IBC specifically and not, not myself or Scott or any of the other speakers here. So, Dom, while we get the Havelo account up here as well, why don't you get started with just a little bit of an elevator pitch about what Haveo is?
Dom
Yeah. Fantastic. Thank you. Thanks for that. Havelo is think of Havalo as the Airbnb for your, your computer, basically allowing you to generate income by basically sharing your computer resources. And we're tapping into a Web3 segment called Deepin. And I know there was a couple of discussions around Deepin earlier on, and that's a sector that is expected to grow to 3.5 trillion by 2028. And for those not aware, Deepin stands for decentralized physical infrastruct infrastructure networks. And what Havalo does is basically make it really simple for both Web3 and Web2 users to get involved in the Deepin space to share their resources and earn tokens.
Roger
And for people who are tuning in, we're still getting the Havelo account up in a speaker spot. But if you do want to click on the Havelo official profile, we've just changed the title of the space so you can click on Habelo Official there. And as we're doing the ama, feel free to scroll their Twitter account, check out their website and just see what they're all about while we're talking here with dom. But Dom, typically for this show, it's a large finance audience, typically talking about what's going on. I'm sure today they covered a lot of the CPI results and what that means for Bitcoin and whatnot. So the audience is very financially astute and has heard about a lot of different projects. So maybe go into a little bit of how Havelo differs from other Deepin projects that people may have heard of.
Dom
Yeah, Havelo is a Deepin aggregation and orchestration platform. So ultimately, if you look at it from a financial or an investment perspective, a bet on Havalo is really a bet on the whole Deepin sector. And the way it works, maybe just to double click on that, is users go into our website, havalo.com, download a Windows, Mac or a Linux application and what Havalo does, it works out your system configuration, your ram, cpu, your gpu and then it will install the most appropriate D pins to maximize the roi, whether it's for storage or GP GPU to train AI models, and then over time using our AI agent, it will optimize the deep ins that are running on your machine in order to maximize that particular your roi. And so from our perspective, we're really bringing Web three deep in to a Web two audience. My personal view, just to take a step back, my view is that that Deepin will actually help bring in the next 100 million people web 2 people into web 3 like I also believe RWA will as well. And you know, what Havalo is doing is really pioneering that whole process. We've got First Mover advantage and we actually just only 24 hours ago launched the Havalo HVLO Token on a number of exchanges and just actually launched a couple of hours ago on Raydium as well.
Roger
Oh, congratulations. Well, that's a good segue to asking sort of where you are in your roadmap. Obviously it sounds like you just launched the token, which is very exciting, so congratulations. But in regards to the rest of the roadmap, where are you at right now?
Dom
So the product we released earlier a product about three months ago in beta, right now we've got around 20,000 nodes running and that's starting to grow quite rapidly. And obviously with the introduction of our Token, that's going to help cold start and really help accelerate the growth of Havalo. And for those that are not aware, there's a concept in Deepin called a cold start and particularly important when you're trying to build a network from scratch. So effectively using Token and the Token reward system in order to incentivize those early users of the software or of the hardware in the case of some deep ins, to really accelerate the growth of that particular network and the way that it relates specifically to Havelo is that particularly the early users, they'll be able to download the software, earn multiple deep in tokens, but also be part of the Heavelo airdrops that will be happening on a very, very regular basis. So certainly encouraging those that are early on in the ecosystem, they will be rewarded not only with the Deepin tokens that they're mining, but also with the Havelo token that we've just launched.
Roger
So for consumers who are tuning in, can they sort of think of Havelo as a, a passive income engine that allows them to be deep in agnostic, use their computing resources and just earn depin tokens while AI kind of optimizes where the best yields are for them?
Dom
Absolutely. The way that we like to position it, One of my favorite sayings is people can make money while they sleep. We know that particularly in emerging markets, the whole play to earn phenomena, particularly over Covid, you know, the tens of millions of people that got involved in that, and they literally had to spend hours and hours a day playing in order to be able to earn an income. And the whole premise around Havalo is let your computer sweat. Let your computer be utilized and your resources, your CPU and your GPU and basically all the, all the facilities that it has to contribute in growing a global decentralized network and actually getting paid for it. And I think for me, that's kind of a really important point. And if I once again take a step back, because I think as some of your earlier speakers spoke about, it's not just about the money, it's really about what we're able to create that actually betters society. And that is ultimately, we know that bitcoin and crypto allows you to be your own bank, while in my view, Deepin it allows you to build, help build decentralized infrastructure and get rewarded for it. And so Havelo is really the aggregator, a bit like the example I gave, like Airbnb for your computer, specifically for the Deepin space.
Roger
So I have an ongoing joke that I often share that on red days in the market, those are the days where I get sent the most invoices and get asked about people getting paid, because on a red day, people are always thinking, how can I look under the couch cushions to get some money? How can I look at some more passive income opportunities? So I think this is a great opportunity, just given the state of the market today with cpi, to kind of highlight what a consumer who might be tuning in can do with havo. Have you guys done any analysis on your average consumer? Say somebody who just has a MacBook at home. What could they possibly earn by using Havelo and plugging into this?
Dom
So right now, just to set expectations, we're talking about some fairly small dollars anywhere, sort of from 10 to $30 a month. That's the target for, let's call it a lot of low spec machine. Where the money is today is really on assets or computers that have a Nvidia graphics card because as we know there is significant demand for GPU cycles because it's GPU cycles or GPU hashes that train AI models and is obviously an explosion of everything AI and specifically in that segment of web three associated with Deep in, if you've got a really good Nvidia graphics card, you could be earning an extra 30 to $300 per month. So it's really the gamers out there who frankly are the ones that are going to be the major winners in the space. And not to say that 10 to $30 is anything to sneeze at, particularly if you are in an emerging market. That's enough to feed the family for a day or a week week or potentially even a month. And, and, and just to sort of elaborate on that, we just recently closed our investment round that was led by Animoca Brands. For those that are not aware, Animoca Brands is, you know, one of the leading gaming investment companies and metaverse companies in the space. And part of the reason they, they took a strategic stake in us was not just financially but they've got a significant gaming audience and specifically one that would be very strategic with regards to Havalo. And just to double click on the AI aspect, training AI models using decentralized infrastructure is materially cheaper. And when I say materially cheaper, I'm talking 80 to 90% cheaper. And it was only when I went down this rabbit hole that I discovered why if you're a consumer, you can buy a consumer grade GPU for about a thousand dollars. If you're an enterprise, that same GPU in terms of output costs about 10 times as much. It's, you know, it comes in a rack with nice management software, but it's basically 10x. So hence sense, because of the unique economics are a fraction of the enterprise version. It just means that consumers around the world can effectively put together their decentralized networks and make them available to AI companies. And we just integrated Nasana who's a leader in the space specifically when it comes to training AI. We're now looking and working with the guys at a cash and Ethereum and GPU NET and IO Net and many others. And they'll all be in integrated into the Havalo platform.
Roger
Wonderful. And when you were Talking about the 10 to $30 a month just for sort of a basic setup in terms of what somebody could earn, you went exactly the same direction that I would have of how people in North America or developed regions may sort of sneeze at that amount per month. But it's very meaningful for emerging markets. And you made the same parallel that I would have to play to earn earlier. Play to earn was very much so dominated in emerging markets as well, and people made a livelihood off of that in the last cycle. So I've looked at studies before just how much technology a lot of these emerging markets own in terms of hardware. So it could be a really, really great opportunity, what you're doing for these emerging markets to access it.
Dom
And electricity is also cheap in a lot of these emerging markets. So, so they've got computing power and electricity is cheap. And obviously the Internet is omnipresent. And so that makes a lot of sense to emerging markets. But in, let's call it more developed markets where they're gamers, there are tens of millions of gamers around the world. And so tapping into that particular network who have got those Nvidia GPUs also makes a lot of sense for Havelo.
Roger
Certainly. I want to double click into the token as well. That's very exciting that it just launched the other day and the token is mostly used as additional yield generation for people who are using the product, is that correct?
Dom
That's correct. So we're using the token in a couple of different ways. One is as you use Havalo and you earn multiple Deepin tokens, the ones that you're mining or that are sharing your computer resources, you're in addition also earning the Havalo token, which you can then stake and earn a high percentage of the rewards. So we've created this network effect, you know, within that, within our platform. And, and so the, the way to utilize Havalo is, you know, that's one aspect I'm going to call that the, that's the loyalty side of Havalo. And you know, the other side that I think will become increasingly more important and maybe just to sort of take a step back, to be able to use a lot of these D pins, you need to be able to own and buy the native DPIN tokens. You know, whether it's a cache or IO net, you need to actually buy those tokens and stake them to be able to use that particular Deepin as well as the gas based upon the layer one, whether it's Solana or, or Arbitrum or other. And so part of the other use the utility around the Havalo token is that you will be able to stake at once and then get access to all of these depends that require their own native staking without having to go and deal with private keys and gas and all of the technical challenges associated with that. And then as our AI agent kicks in and basically starts to to change the D pins on your computer to maximize the roi, you don't have to worry about all of that staking and unstaking. All the technical jargon that I think we as within the web 3 audience sometimes get too focused on. Because my view is in order for Web3 and Deepin to be mass marketed needs to look and feel like using Spotify. So an average user can basically point and click and experience the technology and earn passive income.
Roger
You know, I Remember back in 2017, I think it was Kyle Samani, who's a big VC in the space, large Twitter account. I'm sure many of the audience has heard of him. I remember he was really pushing, I think, is it helium or Helios? He was pushing it very hard. And I remember fading it back then when he was pushing it how you could put this hardware device in your house and earn tokens. And I faded it just for the same reason where it was like, oh, $10 a month. Like maybe it's not worth my time, but every time I look back at these opportunities that I've seen in crypto, a lot of them have performed really well to just take the time to set it up and earn passive income. So I definitely want to check it out. Don't go ahead.
Dom
Yeah, yeah. And I think ultimately, you know, what we're all doing as part of the community is that we're building decentralized networks. Really going back to the ethos of the Internet. When was first created, everything was decentralized in, in Web one and it's only through Web two that things became, you know, much more centralized. And I think with obviously blockchain technology and specifically Deepin, we're going back to the ethos of things ultimately will be become much more decentralized. And just to kind of relook at Hevelo and what we're doing in the space because we're taking an aggregation model, you know, a bet on Havelo is basically a bet on the whole deep in space because we're ultimately not trying to pick what who the winners are in terms of the deep ins. We're going to let the data and AI determine what are the best D pins to run on your particular machine in order to maximize the roi. And as I mentioned earlier we just launched on both GATE and mexc which are sort of more Asian Australasian based exchanges and, and earlier today we launched on Raydium on Solana.
Roger
Yeah, I like it because you don't necessarily have to pick a Deepin horse, so to speak. And it can be deep in agnostic for how consumers are really helping to not only earn from the space but grow it as well. As he eloquently said earlier. So for people who are tuning in, Dom, you mentioned a couple places but Radium was one. I think there's a few exchanges where else can people take a look at potentially purchasing the token and doing some more research for themselves?
Dom
Absolutely. I think that the first step is and I should have just touched on Havalo's business model. Our app is free, so there's no cost for the user. All they need to do is go to the havalo.com website. We've got a Windows Mac and a Linux version. So they just literally click a button, you log in with an email or with Gmail to authenticate and you're basically up and running earning deep ins in literally two minutes. And, and then at that point you know, there are many other things that you can, you can do with the software and, and to basically learn more other than going and using the software. You can follow us on X on our official Twitter account or X account and we've also got a very, very large discord community as well. I'm going to call it for the, for the hardcore Havelo users. And, and so that's basically the, the best way for, for people out there to get involved. And we're currently listed on GATE and MEXC and I know that those exchanges may not be available to North American users, but obviously Radium, Radium IO it's basically a decentralized Solana exchange. We're basically just launched on there. But what I'd suggest for everyone always go through the official pages because that way you've always got the right ca. The right contract address just to make sure that you're clicking on the right thing.
Roger
Yeah, I want to make another specific call out to just following the official link. So the Havelo account is now up here in a speaker spot. So if people are tuning in, wanting to check out the app or look into the token further. Make sure you are clicking that Havelo account, give it a follow while you're at it. But they have a link tree in their bio which can bring you directly to the official website and that's how I would recommend people, if you are looking to, to download Havelo, check it out, make sure that you are following official links because DOM is, as we know in crypto there's a lot of scammers out there. So make sure that people are following official links, especially when it's something that people are downloading onto their device.
Dom
Absolutely, absolutely. And I should note that we've already announced our first airdrop at the end of this month. So as people are using Helvelo, they're earning points as well as the native Depin tokens and then we're going to convert those points into the Havelo token as well, just as a way of once again cold starting and growing out our community. And frankly we're just at the start and what excites me, and I was at a conference the other month and there was a lady from a research firm whose name escapes me and she basically said we are basically at the stage of where the Internet was in 1997. We are still so early in the development of the cycle. And 1997, Facebook or meta and Amazon weren't even born yet as organizations and so know sometimes people say, well, have I missed the boat in terms of the cycle? My personal view is, you know, we are just at the start and I think ultimately those that are early in terms of the ecosystem will be the ones that will be rewarded longer term.
Roger
Well said. Well, well, Dom, I appreciate you joining and the Habelo account as well. So when listeners are tuning in, make sure that you click on DOM and the Havelo account, give them a follow. And I appreciate everybody tuning in. A little bit of a bearish morning with cpi, but I did put out a tweet earlier from my personal account, just noting that I don't remember a time when CPI being hot was bearish for crypto. So CPI hot, maybe inflation's going to go a little bit higher, but I encourage people to recognize that we are in this industry as a hedge, so to speak, against traditional financial markets. So. So I'm hoping that this is bullish long term. But Dom, I want to appreciate you for joining. So thank you again and congratulations on the token launch yesterday.
Dom
Yeah, thank you. And if I can just maybe make one prediction, having been involved in the space, my personal view is that 2025 is a bull market, a bull year. I think we're going to see the top towards the end of this year if 20, 21, 17 and 13 seen has anything to go by, because I think, you know, history does to a degree repeat itself. I think the wild card is the new administration. They are obviously pro crypto, but I think the biggest change that I've seen over the last 10 plus years is it really started off with the geeks and the nerds and then obviously, you know, growing out that community and now finally, you know, who would have thought, you know, 10 years ago that major institutions like BlackRock would actually be advocating for bitcoin, you know, and, and that, and that. I think that should really be the, the bellwether for all of us in the industry. It's like the big guys have finally woken up.
Roger
Yep. It's a good reminder for people who are on crypto Twitter to kind of that often miss the forest for the trees. So looking back 10 years ago, it's, it's incredible to see where the trees the industry has come. And Dom, I commend you for building something that can really help the industry and help users as well. So thank you again for joining and everybody have a wonderful day.
Dom
Thank you.
Podcast Summary: The Wolf Of All Streets - "Bitcoin Dips Again! Bottom Signal or More Pain Ahead? | Crypto Town Hall"
Release Date: February 12, 2025
Host: Scott Melker
Alex kicks off the episode addressing a technical glitch experienced by Roger, lightening the mood before diving into the main topic: Bitcoin's recent dip. Bitcoin is trading slightly below $95,000, reflecting a minimal volatility despite hotter-than-expected Consumer Price Index (CPI) data.
Dave provides a critical analysis of the day's CPI report, labeling the market's immediate reaction as "stupid" and "schizo." He argues that the CPI's implications are often misinterpreted, leading to misguided sell-offs in Bitcoin and gold. Dave emphasizes the resilience of Bitcoin's bid strength:
Dave [01:10]: "When you see that sort of thing then it's almost always the right move to fade the open, just take the other side."
Charlie adds that other components like shelter costs remain "very sticky," complicating the inflation narrative.
Dave further elaborates on the Fed's constraints due to the massive fiscal deficit, suggesting inevitable monetary printing. He posits that inflation's impact will likely favor asset classes like Bitcoin over consumer goods:
Dave [03:04]: "Governments have been very skillful at pushing the inflation into assets. If inflation goes into assets, Bitcoin is arguably the number one beneficiary of that."
Andrew discusses the increasing institutional appetite for Bitcoin, highlighting Wall Street's strategy to capitalize on Bitcoin's volatility. He points out that firms like Goldman Sachs are aggressively promoting Bitcoin-related products to their clients for substantial commissions:
Andrew [10:02]: "Wall street rarely comes across new assets that they can price as a premium because it's new and because it's volatile. And Bitcoin currently is and will continue to be that asset for a while."
Alex corroborates this by mentioning Goldman Sachs' significant holdings in Bitcoin ETFs:
Alex [13:41]: "They own 288 million in Fidelity's ETF and 1.3 billion in iBit Blackrock's ETF. And that's Goldman themselves."
Dave adds that Goldman Sachs uses its Bitcoin inventory to execute sophisticated financial strategies, further embedding Bitcoin into institutional portfolios.
Charlie and Tom delve into the struggling altcoin market, attributing the lack of liquidity to institutional focus on major coins like Bitcoin and Ethereum. Charlie notes a "disconnect" where Bitcoin shows relative strength despite broader market volatility:
Charlie [08:05]: "The biggest change to me is I'm seeing a slight disconnect between Bitcoin and everything else. Bitcoin is showing strong relative strength versus DXY and other things, which is awesome to see."
Tom echoes these sentiments, pointing out that altcoins are underperforming due to minimal institutional inflows and a saturated market with over 11 million tokens listed on CoinMarketCap alone:
Tom [15:57]: "We're just going to keep having this continual hot ball of money being thrown out there. There's 11 million coins."
JW provides a contrarian viewpoint, expressing uncertainty about short-term altcoin strategies but remains optimistic about long-term potential based on developer activity:
JW [19:07]: "I worry that kind of what we do in the short term is not all that different from people standing around a roulette wheel."
The discussion shifts to regulatory concerns, with Tom emphasizing the need for clear regulations to stabilize the altcoin market. He highlights ongoing legislative efforts by U.S. states to establish Bitcoin reserves, anticipating a domino effect at the federal level:
Tom [36:13]: "Until we have clear regulation, the altcoins are just really going to suffer."
Charlie supports this by advocating for responsible investment strategies through Registered Investment Advisors (RIAs) rather than relying on volatile, securitized altcoin products.
A significant portion of the episode is dedicated to Dom from Havelo, a sponsor of the show. Dom introduces Havelo as the "Airbnb for your computer," enabling users to generate income by sharing their computing resources in the Deepin (Decentralized Physical Infrastructure Networks) sector.
Key Highlights:
Product Overview: Havelo offers a user-friendly application compatible with Windows, Mac, and Linux. It optimizes system resources to maximize returns from various Deepin projects.
Token Launch: Havelo recently launched its HVLO token on exchanges like Raydium and aims to incentivize early adopters through airdrops and staking rewards.
Market Potential: Dom forecasts significant growth for Deepin, positioning Havelo as a pioneer that bridges Web2 and Web3 audiences.
Dom [40:54]: "Betting on Havelo is really a bet on the whole Deepin sector."
Roger and Alex engage with Dom, discussing the potential earnings for users and emphasizing the importance of following official channels to avoid scams.
As the episode draws to a close, panelists share their forecasts for Bitcoin and the broader crypto market:
Dave anticipates a bullish trend for Bitcoin, citing strong institutional backing.
Dom predicts 2025 to be a "bull year" for crypto, aligning with historical market cycles.
Bill offers a balanced view, acknowledging macroeconomic uncertainties but remains optimistic about liquidity injections and rising institutional participation as key catalysts for market growth.
Bill [26:21]: "Looking at this from a position of, okay, where are we positioning ourselves moving forward here."
Alex reinforces the idea that Bitcoin's institutional adoption serves as a bellwether for the industry's maturity, suggesting that increased mainstream acceptance will drive future growth.
The episode concludes with a reminder to listeners about the ongoing developments in the crypto space, encouraging participation in community initiatives and staying informed through official channels. Roger emphasizes Bitcoin's role as a hedge against traditional financial markets, underscoring its long-term bullish potential despite short-term volatility.
Dave [01:10]: "The initial fall... we'll see where it goes. It's sort of in a neutral stance technically."
Charlie [08:05]: "Bitcoin should be probably in the 80s. Right. And so I'm super bullish that it's not now."
Andrew [10:02]: "Goldman Sachs has absolutely been pounding the table to their institutional clients to do everything and anything with Bitcoin."
Dom [40:54]: "People can make money while they sleep. Let your computer sweat."
The episode offers a comprehensive analysis of Bitcoin's current standing amidst fluctuating macroeconomic indicators, institutional maneuvers, and the struggling altcoin market. With insights from industry experts and a focus on emerging projects like Havelo, listeners gain a multifaceted understanding of the crypto landscape and potential future trajectories.