Was That It?

Welcome to the weekly CryptoFolks Newsletter. However, our launch procedures 🛫 require us to inform you not to consider this article as investment advice, as it represents solely our personal opinion. Always remember to manage your portfolios independently.💁‍♂️

Bitcoin set a new ATH just 10 days ago, and you might have already forgotten about it because of how much has happened since — you’re not alone in this. Today, I’ll reflect with you on whether that was the top and the end of Bitcoin’s bull market. We’ll consider all the signals coming from the market to answer this crucial question. The answer most likely won’t be black-and-white (as it usually isn’t), but at least we’ll get closer to the truth.

We’ll take into account four segments — all equally important. Without one, the picture isn’t complete. That’s why it’s crucial to look at the market from every possible angle — so we don’t fall for just a single narrative.

Let me share my perspective in TLDR style:

I don’t think this was Bitcoin’s final peak — it’s still relatively early (timing), there’s no frenzy on the streets yet (lack of retail mania), and so far this has been a Bitcoin-driven bull market (leaving time for capital to flow deeper into altcoins). There are also many other reasons, such as the rate cuts recently almost confirmed by Jerome Powell, which the retail crowd sees as a bullish environment.

In one of the future newsletters, I’ll show you what really happens after rate cuts — you don’t wanna miss that 😉 like the market missed your take profit.

Everyone has probably heard of cyclicality (I hope so) — and despite that, it continues to work. This bull run is practically no different in timing from the previous ones.

Assuming it stays this way (and we don’t fight the tide like rookie traders selling the top only to buy back higher), the peak according to the 4-year cycles should land on October 21st, exactly 4 years from Bitcoin’s bottom. Of course, the chart you see today may not look like a perfect 1:1 replication because the moves are smaller — but that’s how financial markets and liquidity work: the bigger the market, the lower the volatility, especially with such a high number of long-term hodlers.

We’re also in the post-halving cycle window (April 2024), where historically BTC peaks 12–18 months later. That means a potential top between September 2025 and April 2026. In the last cycle, it happened just 11 months later (assuming you count the first top as the real peak — that’s also when many altcoins reached their ATH). Today, we’re in month 16.

So, what do we know about timing? We’re right in the sweet spot — a 2–3 month window for Bitcoin to set that top. My bias is that it hasn’t happened yet, but nothing can be excluded.

So far, we haven’t seen the famous parabola at any stage of this bull run — a key difference from previous ones.

See the difference?

What is Bitcoin telling us? Honestly, not much. The channel between $80k and the current ATH looks more like a huge Wyckoff distribution — and we’ll probably stay in that range a while longer to fill it. I like to view the chart from an inverse perspective to cut away the narrative and focus only on facts.

From that angle, if you ask me whether this was already the top (or bottom), I’d say yes. But if you ask whether the trend can still continue — I’d also say yes. Elliott Waves suggest we’re now waiting for the fifth and final wave upward — and that’s where the true top may be set.

That said, this is nonsense in practical terms. An investor profits when they buy lower and sell higher — not by aiming for the perfect top or perfect bottom. Chasing perfection only reduces profits by a few percent but drastically increases the chance of failure. Keeping that in mind — we’ve sold our Bitcoin.

I hope you agree that at the end of the bull run, it’s usually smaller projects that outperform Bitcoin. Since April 9th, Bitcoin has risen 54%, while ETH is up 245% and Solana 119%. This is capital rotation happening right in front of our eyes.

Soon, we’ll start hearing about the flippening — the moment when Ethereum’s market cap surpasses Bitcoin’s.

I’ll just leave it here. 🔥

I asked Grok to outline the current sentiment toward crypto on platform X, here’s what it said:

Powell’s speech significantly improved sentiment, and the narrative around rate cuts is picking up steam 🚀, but still, it’s not that moment. We don’t see random celebrities tweeting about Bitcoin, or everyday people on X asking how to get started. Google searches for terms like crypto or Bitcoin are also still fairly although not fully empty.

Some of the retail crowd loaded up when Bitcoin first broke $100k — that event had real hype. Since then, emotions have cooled, even though the price continues to climb, and small wallets are sleeping…

The demand side of the market is filled with institutions.

👉 59% of institutional investors plan to allocate >5% to crypto in 2025,
👉 $3T of pension fund capital could flow into the market.

These are insane numbers 🤯, and I think we can already call this an institutional bull run. That’s where the FOMO and euphoria are happening: buying without much thought, adding Bitcoin to their portfolios just to announce it on X — and then their stock price jumps.

Maybe that’s exactly where the surprise factor lies: this time, we might not get the retail frenzy of your average John Smith. The bull run could end once institutional FOMO fades.

The surprise won’t come from interest rates — Powell already came out and said cuts are coming, and the market priced that in accordingly (BTC +5%, ETH +16%). Unless further cuts don’t happen (which I doubt), that card is already played.

Why do I bring this up? Because markets always carry an element of surprise. The market is a zero-sum game — for someone to win, someone else must lose. Until now, the majority usually lost. This time, the majority seems to be winning — unless the real majority hasn’t yet entered crypto. If the crowd hasn’t flooded the market yet, we don’t know.

So, if the majority is to lose, something must shock them — and we’re still waiting for that. The key is not to get caught off guard ⚡.

If you want to talk about this, feel free to join the subscribers chat! We will discuss all of this there (really).

Timing itself might be the big surprise. At the start of this year, many thought the bull run could end before April — shocking everyone. That didn’t happen, but that doesn’t mean it still can’t.

Somehow, cyclicality has been working for years — and when it stops, it will shock many. The bull run could end next week, or it could stretch into 2026. It goes both ways.

At the end of the day, we know that we know nothing. Be sure to not feel like you’re wasted your time reading this, a lot of people take decades to get the randomness of what happens in the future. This is the time to watch the market closely and remain cautious — just like 4 years ago at the bottom.