Market Prices Are Truth: What is BTC/USD Telling Us? \ stacker news ~bitcoin

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Market Prices Are Truth: What is BTC/USD Telling Us?

2909 sats \ 44 comments \ @denlillaapan 21h bitcoin

So, bitcoin is dead again, etc. (#900000, #875931)

I've never been particularly joyful about price crashing (it indicates a broken, illiquid, immature market; and the direction suggests maybe, just maybe, we were are wrong about this beanie-babies-taking-over-the-world thing). I've repeatedly said Bitcoiners being happy when price puking ("duh, bro; cheap corn; more sats for less dollars!") are idiots. Case in point: "Honey Badger Should Care: Why Bitcoin’s Price Action Does Matter"

Ok, fair enough; when I published that piece the BTC/USD exchange rate was -75% from where it is now (one-quarter). So yeah, everyone been happy since, blah-blah-blah.

But the point remains: this has been the worst cycle in bitcoin's history, while the fundamentals (adoption, information, products, institutions) have been the best. What gives? What's the mismatch?

Does this (point to chart above, putting us back to Nov 10) look like a strongly emerging, global reserve asset, with institutions and government allocating and everyone and their grandma coming in?

No, I didn't think so.

Since I can't explain why this nonsense occurs or make sense of it (you can almost never explain market moves), and my fundamental approach to all economics and financial markets is that prices are truth,

what are we missing?
Was this middle section (Nov 10-March 10) just a big mistake?
58k calling etc, and we should go back to pre-Trump?
maybe zero is calling, and Peter Schiff was right all along?

But honestly, sats to the best explanation for why this increasingly liquid and increasingly established asset does this weird stuff (doesn't "behave") and has us along for the ride. Why doesn't it go away with larger flows and Hass Mccook's "DCA Army?"

Best I've seen so far is Checkmate's "air pocket"; we just flew through the 70s and 80s so there's no market price discovery there... so we gotta do back and re-do it. ("but why?" my monkey brain says... what's the law of nature that rules that?)

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260 sats \ 1 reply \ @siggy47 21h

IMO it's all US market driven. Bitcoin still trades like a risky tech stock. Futures are getting crushed right now. Over the weekend btc was the only trade. Trump tariffs, recession talk. I know you think it's a big deal. I don't.

97 sats \ 0 replies \ @SimpleStacker 19h

This. It's probably from all the idiots (automated trading bots?) that treat bitcoin like a risk-on tech stock

106 sats \ 2 replies \ @Undisciplined 19h

I've been wondering if there isn't something of a let down on the specifics of the SBR. Some amount of SBR was priced in. Maybe there was an expectation of purchasing bitcoin in large quantities and when that didn't realize, some speculators sold.

21 sats \ 1 reply \ @denlillaapan OP 12h

...and the market is so thin/there were so many of them that them leaving meant on the margin, -30% (or wherever were at)?

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @Undisciplined 7h

Exactly. I've also seen people talking about lots of bitcoin buys happening through other channels, so price is a little understated.

137 sats \ 5 replies \ @Aardvark 21h

we just flew through the 70s and 80s so there's no market price discovery there... so we gotta do back and re-do it

I really don't understand why either. It's just like when people claim that we need to "fill the CME gap." We usually do fill that gap, but I have zero idea why.

I just buy the stuff as quickly as I can.

42 sats \ 3 replies \ @denlillaapan OP 12h

"we have to!" uh-hu, says who?

35 sats \ 2 replies \ @Aardvark 9h

Them. They say a lot.

42 sats \ 1 reply \ @denlillaapan OP 8h

the ominous "they" return. Fuckers

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @Aardvark 7h

They never left.

50 sats \ 0 replies \ @ek 19h

Thank you for mentioning CME gaps. Learned something new!

63 sats \ 2 replies \ @jasonb 20h

All the folks with the big money are getting out of “risk” assets right now. Tariffs, that kind of stuff in the air… I don’t like it either, but I think this matches the current scene.

What we really “need” right now is a big Cyprus style (I don’t actually want this for anyone, it’d just be a thing that would make Bitcoin get all sporty again) government misbehavior. In a lot of ways, D.O.G.E. is the ultimate enemy to Bitcoin NGU. They solve the same problem, and it looks like the former is doing an ok job at the moment.

51 sats \ 1 reply \ @028559d218 18h

The US Republican party passed 1.5 Trillion of spending cuts.

And and 4.5 Trillion tax break over the next 10 years.

That's a 3 Trillion deficit just for these items alone.

The DOGE cuts mostly of personnel are a drop in the bucket.

44 sats \ 0 replies \ @jasonb 18h

Oh yeah, no doubt at all that long term, we’re always on course. I’m just saying that DOGE has a short term narrative that may be shinier than Bitcoin.

28 sats \ 0 replies \ @MANI 7h

Whales making moves!!!

63 sats \ 3 replies \ @ek 19h

But the point remains: this has been the worst cycle in bitcoin's history, while the fundamentals (adoption, information, products, institutions) have been the best. What gives? What's the mismatch?

I didn’t look at the chart right now, but hasn’t every cycle been the worst one and the fundamentals have always been mostly the same?

Since I can't explain why this nonsense occurs

Isn’t paper hands always the answer to some degree? But I guess that’s as insightful as answering the question "Why is bitcoin crashing???" with "Because people are selling," lol

prices are truth

I would say prices are eventually truth

77 sats \ 1 reply \ @Undisciplined 19h

hasn’t every cycle been the worst one

Pretty much, which is exactly what you'd expect and I've seen @denlillaapan express that expectation, too.

As more value is stored in bitcoin, it's just harder to move the exchange rate by the same percentage. Alternatively, as we get nearer to equilibrium purchasing power there's less arbitrage opportunity, so there's less incentive to get in.

28 sats \ 0 replies \ @ek 19h

Yeah, I’d be worried when we see -20% or more within a day so early in the cycle.

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @denlillaapan OP 12h

I wouldn't say so: fundamentals are much better, while return/acceleration much lower. (From a finance theoretical view that's sort of what I would expect, but not if we're a new neutral reserve asset)

As for paper hands, that's a lovely explanation... but as you say, pretty unsatisfactory!

28 sats \ 0 replies \ @Catcher 9h

Regarding the gaps that need to be filled – I see it this way:

On the way up, only a few people bought in the 70-80 range, while a lot more bought in the 60s and 90s. So when the price drops back into the 70s-80s, there aren't many traders with a strong "attachment" to these levels.

For example, if your average buy price was 60 and you’re scared of further declines, you won’t be too concerned whether you sell at 85 or 79—you’re still in profit. In that situation, you’d likely hit the sell button at market price just to exit quickly.

However, when the price reaches levels where a lot of people previously bought (indicating high volume), a significant amount of selling pressure is required to push through. Since many of those buyers have already sold on the way down, the remaining ones are likely unwilling to sell at the same price they bought a few months ago.

28 sats \ 4 replies \ @79c9095526 10h

I wholeheartedly agree that the purchasing power of money is very important. Bitcoin is money. It literally serves no other purpose than to be exchanged at some point of time for a real world good. You can't eat a bitcoin, live in a bitcoin, drive to the park in your bitcoin, etc... I agree its stupid for people who are heavily invested in bitcoin to act all happy that the price is going down, this is just a "the grapes are sour" type of coping mechanism.

But markets are a fickle beast. 80%+ of the wealth is owned by a tiny fraction of the population, and they tend to have insider knowledge of policies before they are implemented. Prices are also set on the edge, based on the last trade.

Humans tend to follow herd behavior and the algos that do the vast majority of trading are even worse and are hard trend followers.

Throw in the extreme uncertainty and chaos of Trump into the global mix, and yes we have a chaotic stock market which bitcoin is a tiny tiny tiny little subset of.

I am leaning towards the theory that Trump wants to crash the market hard in 2025. Why? Because he can then blame it on Biden and his followers are stupid enough to parrot and believe it. Interest rates will plummet alongside the stock market which will allow Bessent to roll over much of the debt at lower rates. The federal reserve will then implement several cuts this year to combat the weakening economy. The end of 2025 and 2026 will begin the roaring comeback, which plays very nicely politically for Trump going into the midterms.

I wouldn't be shocked if we've seen the bitcoin high for several months and don't revisit the 100k+ until Q4 of this year. But on a positive note, we may not have the typical cycle crash next year and could have another up year...

0 sats \ 2 replies \ @028559d218 3h

I wholeheartedly agree that the purchasing power of money is very important. Bitcoin is money. It literally serves no other purpose than to be exchanged at some point of time for a real world good. You can't eat a bitcoin, live in a bitcoin, drive to the park in your bitcoin, etc... I agree its stupid for people who are heavily invested in bitcoin to act all happy that the price is going down, this is just a "the grapes are sour" type of coping mechanism.

until the overall education level improves considerably (and i believe it will eventually) the 'market' is in no position to price bitcoin accordingly. the 'bear markets' and 'crashes' are the way of the market feeling out and figuring out what if any risk factors bitcoin has. after bitcoin 'crashed' post ftx... regular people (idiots) said that 'crypto was dead' and by extension bitcoin 'was dead' without being able to differentiate between the 2.

after the memecoins and nft nonsense washes up the bitcoin protocol simply... remains and keeps working. that's what gives it value and imo risk-off qualities but speculators have to go through these cycles to understand that

0 sats \ 1 reply \ @79c9095526 2h

Generally agree with you. But the market price is the market price.

While I believe bitcoin is worth more than $500k/coin, the market will only give me $78k for that coin should I require trading my money for a car or a banana.

Hopefully over time, more people will understand bitcoin's value, but it increasingly looks like the market rate of increase in price is slowing dramatically cycle after cycle.

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @028559d218 2h

the market rate is wrong. in my opinion way wrong. imo bitcoin has just begun it is a 130-year experiment and it's year 16.

in addition, look at the broader US markets they are down significantly since the inauguration and self-imposed trade barriers to the G7

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @denlillaapan OP 10h

...or ever?

The monetary system and the financial markets, fickle by nature, seem to always be in chaos.

35 sats \ 1 reply \ @ca 9h

Trump doesn't understand free trade and economic liberties.

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @denlillaapan OP 8h

mayhaps... what Presidents and Prime ministers "understand" is usually unimportant; what their team/advisors understand is much more relevant.

35 sats \ 0 replies \ @028559d218 21h

We need to 'redo it' because of the lack of education. The overwhelming majority of 'crypto' critics are critics of 'crypto'... NOT of Bitcoin.

And their criticisms... that 'noone uses it' or it's all 'scams' like the trump coin or the blowjob coin (hawk tua) aren't inaccurate... in fact we all basically agree that 'crypto' is a scam too.

What the authors of articles and opinion pieces critiquing 'crypto' haven't done is:

Roll a seed phrase or have one generated open a lightning channel spend Bitcoin via Lightning quickly or cheaply on forums or on goods to improve the 'customer service' experience or anything else actually related to Bitcoin.

'Crypto' critics (who write magazine articles or write for newspapers) don't know what a 'seed phrase' is, they have never heard of Lightning before, they don't know what a UTXO is, they know nothing (or nothing meaningful) about Bitcoin mining...

They don't know what a Bitcoin node is, what hashrate is, a block explorer absolutely nothing... all they see is $Trump coin used to "get rich quick" and their reaction is...

Crypto (and Bitcoin by extension) is a scam. And because it's a scam who would want it?

So no-one wants to buy it, it's all "greater fool" and it 'goes to zero' because 'crypto' like the scams on Youtube, Twitter, or Social Media are completely worthless.

THIS is what the world knows to be true... because this is what many journalists, who don't know what a Bitcoin node is, write about Crypto.

And the president releases his Memecoin to make insiders hundreds of millions so... that's where the focus is. So why should people 'buy crypto' (memecoins obviously) again?

139 sats \ 5 replies \ @krispy_donkey 14h

Personally I subscribe to the 'it's the liquidity, stupid' school of thought. On that topic, the Bitcoin Layer did a video about this in the past few days which I found quite educational for my dumb ass: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sJinwqKz7zQ

While I wish it weren't the case that institutional investing is what is driving the price right now, speaking for where I live, a western, developed economy, joe citizen is not buying bitcoin at this point in time. Joe citizen ain't got two nickels to spare. And if a few are, it is not to gain access to some kind of anti-fiat freedom technology, it is as a speculative investment. Still a huge amount of education needed out there.

100 sats \ 4 replies \ @denlillaapan OP 12h

Niiiice! Yeah, I started watching it last night, but was too tired to comprehend much

As for your point: doesn't that mean the fundamentals are worse than we thought? Everybody know of bitcoin (it's hard not too), nobody just have a clue what it is and don't really care?

28 sats \ 3 replies \ @optimism 5h

Everybody know of bitcoin (it's hard not too), nobody just have a clue what it is and don't really care?

I subscribe to this. The "what it is" part is obscured by: Exchange narratives, "crypto" narratives, Greenpeace narratives, ETF narratives, Sen. Warren narratives and now SBR narrative.

The number one thing I deal with in talking about Bitcoin with people is that the raison d'être isn't even known. In the normie mindset I mostly encounter is that its a speculative virtual casino thing. I can't remember a single normie ever telling me that Bitcoin fixes something.

100 sats \ 2 replies \ @denlillaapan OP 5h

that is sort of the best reasons, I think, that it won't succeed: you have no more people/money to move into. Peeps want more fiat, now a better world. So, who's gonna buy this thing to 100k, 1mil, 10mil?

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @optimism 2h

I personally don't see NgU as a first principle. Its a potential (and likely, and thus far proven-ish) effect of programmatically sidelining the peeps at the monetary controls with a consensus enforced fixed supply.

Because its consensus enforced it only works if Bitcoiners are willing to defend it (the supply limit). This answers your question:

So, who's gonna buy this thing to 100k, 1mil, 10mil?

Bitcoiners.

This is not a battle of exchange rate, its a battle of merit to having something the Fed doesn't control. They definitely control the exchange rate with the dollar tho, because that's half of the trade pair. So NgU vs the dollar will have to be in the face of adversity. After all they can shred and they can print. Manipulate both ways

The ultimate question is: what appeal does the orange pill have? And perhaps that answer is sovereignty more than NgU at this moment. At least that's what I personally pitch: freedom.

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @028559d218 3h

i believe that 'people' have no choice but to partake in systems that are more energy efficient. fill a seed phrase up with bitcoin, put it in a safe... and the mining hashrate keeps going up requiring more and more energy (which is the trend) and you have a fantastic 'digital battery' of sorts.

or you put that seed on a smartphone... open channels with it and pay + get paid over lighting from anywhere in the world 24/7 at any time.

everyone with economic capital will want and need such a system eventually

92 sats \ 1 reply \ @flat24 18h

I immediately think the following after reading your publication:

Obviously the price matters, but it is not the most important thing.
The actors who handle the market manipulate the emotions of all of us.
The price will never rise only parabolicly, the price moves in a fractal way, both down and upwards.
After a whole year going up and moving from 16k to 109k and people still complain that it doesn't rise anymore. (It's amazing) Although not so incredible when you discover that most do not even know how Bitcoin works, we will know how the game really works worldwide (economy, geopolitics, politics, among others where Bitcoin directly impacts)
With everything that is happening right now around Bitcoin worldwide, it is impossible not to continue bullish. obviously in the long term that is really the only term worth

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @denlillaapan OP 12h

Nice reflections. I'll think about them

36 sats \ 0 replies \ @Bell_curve 21h

I think it is related to Trump's accouncement of a bitcoin strategic reserve

Price manipulation via forced and voluntary liquidations especially ETF outflow

10 sats \ 0 replies \ @justin_shocknet 9h

Tech stonks are hurting even worse, liquidity is running for cover as DOGE slows down the money printer, and uncertainty about the geopolitical shoes left to drop from these structural changes have de-leveraged markets

Even the DXY is down as assets in US Markets deflate, and this can't last long because every other fiat is even a bigger piece of shit than the dollar

Looking at Nvidia Tesla and other high vol stonks, Bitcoin is actually holding up really well...

Might get worse before it gets better but Bitcoin is quickly showing it's lower risk than just about everything else

0 sats \ 3 replies \ @Satosora 9h

Whenever bitcoin goes down, bitcoin becomes dead. Just dont become one of the sheeple.

10 sats \ 2 replies \ @denlillaapan OP 8h

I mean, that's cool, but now what I'm asking.

Like @ek above, this is tantamount to saying "price fell because more people sold."

Give me your best explanation for why all the sheeple are on the right-hand side and not on the left-hand side (= currently)

7 sats \ 1 reply \ @Satosora 8h

People have weak minds and discipline. They are either selling now because the price is falling and buying the fear that is being sold to them. How many people that you know are buying btc now that it is falling? Try to tell people it is a good time to buy when it is falling and they will look at you like you are crazy.

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @denlillaapan OP 8h

Everyone I know, basically... (But that's not a good test: I know too many wacky Bitcoiner peeps).

I imagine most people look at me crazy even when price is rising. What's the difference?

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @DarthCoin 12h

Price is an illusion.

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @Coinsreporter 16h

The bottom or the top both are just illusions for the weak. I don't think the strong even care a little bit about it.

But I agree that the strong can be the weak if they don't ignore the shit.