I actually posted this before BHW underwent its upgrade but the post disappeared (mainly due to the upgrade I guess).
Everyone says BTC is facing a bubble and will crash horribly. However, they have been saying that since it hit $400-500. Then it soared to $1K and more people said it will crash. Then MTGOX happened, followed by a crackdown on one of the biggest marketplace in darkweb that collapsed its price back to $400. Then it went back to 1K, then to 5K, then to 10K, then to 15K. Economist, bankers, even politicians were warning about this 'extreme bubble' but today it stands at $18K.
Yes, it IS a bubble. But it wouldn't pop so soon yet because there are still many FOMOs (Fear Of Missing Outs). Just see all the threads of people having issues opening an account and getting their account or payment verified... And just see how insane the mark up prices of bitocins are in localbitocins.com, yet people are still buying them. Then there's the futures market (CBOE) that's being launched last Monday; CME is gonna launch theirs this coming Monday/Tuesday (depending on your timezone). So this 'bubble' may just last a while more... I wouldn't be surprise if it last till bitcoin even hit 50K due to its excess demand from new speculators hoping to make a quick buck.
I've been observing the crypto market and noticed something terrifying. It isn't about the fees being charged by exchanges, but rather, how sheepish the speculators are. Let's take Litecoin for an example. When it started rising, many new speculators dump whatever altcoins they have to buy litecoin, this pushed the price further and further up. Litecoin, from my understanding, doesn't have any interesting or revolutionary prospects... the price is going up because it is going up. Those speculators think the price will become the next bitcoin (from xxx to xx,xxx) so they just jump in. Guess what? Some of these speculators knows about this and have already placed a stop limit order to sell their holdings on certain prices. Now? It has dipped badly. I don't know why so many people still say you should get them and hold on to them. PRoblem is the people who have been holding on to them or have bought them at higher prices are now waiting to sell them back at certain price points it will hit later. So the price may, and I say MAY, never go back to its high. It still can but there must be a lot of buyers of litecoin, if not, some speculatar news about litecoin that make people want to buy em' (like companies are accepting litecoins over bitcoins officially....).
ANd from what I've observed, they usually set their exiting price points (or start selling immediately) through technical analysis - when the prices touches and sinks below the moving average, or when the 7-day moving average crosses and dips below the 25-day moving average, or when MACD crosses each other - basically any 'bearish' signals. They also set to sell at certain prices like previous high, rounded off digits (e.g: $500, $600, $700) and so on. However, whenever some positive news step in it will push the prices further up. Take IoTA for example... it was hovering around $4 before some rumours of them partnering with Microsoft came up. The prices shot up to $4.80 and nearly to $5 before the selling begun. Then news broke that it was fake news... that IoTA developers never have any formal agreement with Microsoft. BOOM! Speculators start exiting... and it worsens as the other speculators worry they will lose their capital and everyone starts exiting. The price now is at $3.60-$3.80. It didn't sank any lower because everyone started putting stop-loss to buy them at its previous low ($3.60-ish). And this morning it nearly broke through the $4 resistance but those who had been holding started selling it off again. Then it fell back down to $3.60-$3.70. My opinion is it will break out of the $4 resistance point and reach new highs IF there is some spectacular news - a new big company partners with them, .etc. So where did those speculators who sold off IoTA went? They start parking it on other altcoins.
That's why you see some unknown, never-heard-of altcoins started soaring. Some even as ridiculous as 50% in a few hours. When Bitcoin price was tanking yesterday, all altcoins went up. But now bitcoin price is going up, most altcoins are going down - without a doubt that altcoin holders are cashing out to hold on BTC again.
So in conclusion? Market doesn't make sense. The market is illogical and irrational. It doesn't care what you think. It doesn't care what we think. It just goes where it wants to go. But the whole altcoins market is behaving sheepishly.
If all this is happening to altcoins, imagine what would happen to BTC. All we need is a major unfortunate news to happen to burst the bitcoin bubble. And it must be big. Even when BTC-E was shut down by U.S government BTC's prices wasn't even affected. So the unfortunate news needs to be bigger than that. It has to be like government steps in to regulate bitcoins, financial instuitions ban cryptos, bitcoin's blockchain security can be cracked by quantum computing, a major cryptocurrency exchange gets hacked, .etc.
If you think about it, this whole bubble is exactly like the dot-com bubble. Websites with no actual business model have their stock prices booming. Everyone is just jumping in the wagon to throw their money in thinking it will make them rich. Envious, fear of missing out speculators. This is happening exactly to the whole cryptomarket.... some of the coins have little to no uniqueness from other altcoins yet its prices are going up. There are even fake twitter accounts posing as the official altcoins to trick the public to create like a pump-and-dump movement. It has happened to power ledge altcoin.
So far I'm still going long on IoTA due to its tangle technology and it is quantum-proof. And also XRP (Ripple) as it could really make an impact on the banking industry. If this whole crypto bubble is indeed like the dot-com bubble, then I believe IoTA and XRP would be the dot-com bubble's Amazon and Google. The dot-com bubble exploded and many dot com companies went broke. Many speculators and investors lost their cash. All companies stock prices tanked. Amazon and Google were even hit... but today they are the dominant ones. And I believe the same for XRP and IoTA (like many keep claiming that IoTA is the Bitcoin 2.0 or 3.0). I am not spamming IOTA or XRP here... this is what I've researched and learnt about them.
Then again, it has its flaws I know. But it is way different than the other cryptos. Again, they can promise the world and can they actually deliver? I know its risk and I have a big risk appetite. I've also know that the money I have put in may *poof* disappear. But I am prepared for that. And for you, remember that you should only speculate with money you can afford to lose... not your kids' college fund, not your emergency fund, not a bank loan.
P.S: I am not trying to offend anyone here. I apologise if I did. Just my opinion. And remember.. when you do enter the cryptocurrency world, prepare for the risks. Most importantly, don't just read and immediately buy after reading what people have recommended. Do some more reading and research about them first. Good luck!
P.P.S: It is Friday night and I just had some wine... my head's swimming.
