Bitcoin continues to set new all-time highs, but it is becoming increasingly difficult for retail investors to make money

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Source: Talking about Li and other things

Summer vacation is still going on. Yesterday, I was taken out for a walk by my friends in the scorching heat. It feels more tiring to go out for a walk than to write an article, so I slept very deeply last night and didn’t even know that it rained heavily in Beijing at night. I woke up in the morning and saw through the videos sent by others that many roads were flooded. However, compared with the extreme weather, the market performance in the past two days seems to be generally good. Bitcoin has once again set a record high of $112,040, and the discussion in the group is also more lively than a few days ago. As shown in the figure below.

At the same time, some Altcoin also performed well, with many currencies seeing daily gains of more than 10%, as shown in the figure below.

Since the beginning of the year, many people on the Internet have been shouting about a bear market for what seems to be a long time, but Bitcoin always disappoints these people by reaching new highs again and again.

In the previous article, we mentioned a speculation: In the past year, Bitcoin seems to be entering a structural redistribution of funds. Early whale have begun to withdraw, while some medium-sized players such as institutions/funds have begun to take over and gradually build positions. In the short term, the selling of whale may suppress the price of the staged market, but as long as the medium-sized players can continue to complete the accumulation of funds, the market is still worth looking forward to in the medium and long term. However, in this game of human wealth migration, the retail investors may still be the ones who suffer more in the end.

Here is a Bitcoin price forecast chart (July 10, 2025). Judging from the trend of the forecast chart, we may see Bitcoin at $150,000 this year, and then the market will usher in a relatively deep correction. In 2029, the price of Bitcoin may reach $260,000. As shown in the figure below.

Of course, the above forecast chart is only based on the price trend of the past 1,458 days, and the possible price trend of the next 1,458 days is inferred, and the result may not be accurate. As we mentioned in our previous article, the market price is determined by multiple dimensions such as macro, policy, supply and demand, and sentiment, and the accuracy of such predictions mainly depends on whether Bitcoin's next behavior can perfectly repeat the historical cycle.

However, the market is always changing, but human nature is often difficult to change. Although there may be many unknown situations in the future we face, if you still believe that Bitcoin has a future, then it is still the sentence in our earlier article: If your goal is the next 10 or 20 years, then the current Bitcoin is not expensive no matter when you buy it.

Everyone has a different understanding of cycles. Some people consider 1-2 months as a cycle, some consider 4-5 years as a cycle, and some people consider 10-20 years as a cycle. When it comes to making money, some people focus on the current price, while others focus on the law of the cycle.

If we simply recall the existing encryption cycle rules:

The bull market in 2017 was mainly due to the hype of ICO. At that time, retail investors had the opportunity to obtain relatively large returns as long as they participated in a small investment. Of course, this kind of return is proportional to the risk. At that time, it felt that there were "thousands" of projects raising funds through ICO. Some people became rich overnight, while others stepped on thunder and went to zero (at that time, there were a lot of empty and fraudulent projects that also raised funds through ICO). For example, the ICO price of BNB was $0.11 at that time, and the ICO price of EOS was $1. After a simple check of historical data, there were about 2,300 documented ICO projects in 2017. So far, only about 5% have survived, and the remaining 95% of the projects have either disappeared or become zero projects or zombie coins.

The big bull market in 2021 mainly benefited from the influx of a large amount of funds (the outbreak of the new crown epidemic, the Federal Reserve’s large-scale interest rate cuts + quantitative easing), and it was also a bull market in which institutions began to enter the market (represented mainly by Musk and Tesla). It was also the bull market with the most crypto innovation. We not only experienced the L1 public chain war, but also experienced the golden moments of various innovative narratives such as DeFi, NFT, GameFi, and Metaverse. At that time, the prices of many projects were pushed to historical highs, especially in the craziest stage of the bull market. It is no exaggeration to say that it feels like you can make money by buying in OK or BN with your eyes closed. That bull market is probably also the time when many people started to rush into the market and officially come into contact with cryptocurrencies.

The big bull market in 2025 is mainly driven by institutions. Major institutions have finally officially entered the market and begun to control a certain voice. With the successful compliance process of ETFs, the inflow of macro funds (traditional funds), and the hype of auxiliary narratives such as AI and RWA, Bitcoin has successfully broken through the historic integer mark of 100,000 US dollars , setting a milestone. Coupled with the Bitcoin strategic reserve plan announced by the United States and the continued advancement of various bills/policies targeting cryptocurrencies, it can be said that this round of bull market seems to have become a key stage for cryptocurrencies to officially move from marginal assets to mainstream integration.

In fact, if we recall the past few bull markets, we can easily find that with the continuous deepening of large participants (represented by countries and institutions), this market seems to be becoming less and less friendly to retail investors (in simple terms, it is becoming more and more difficult for ordinary retail investors to make money). But from another perspective, this seems to be a sign that a new market is beginning to mature.

Especially since 2025, major institutional investors have continued to accelerate their accumulation of Bitcoin, and the regulations/bills that the United States is introducing or planning to introduce seem to be accelerating the global popularization of cryptocurrencies. Bills such as "The GENIUS Act" and "The CLARITY Act" mentioned in our previous articles are likely to become an intuitive catalyst for trillions of dollars of market liquidity in the long run.

This is the worst era, but also the best era. As for the current crypto market as a whole, the infrastructure has become relatively complete after years of construction, and the regulation of the crypto market (mainly in the United States) has become increasingly clear. In the past, cryptocurrencies were for small and retail investors, but now they belong to institutions, and in the future, they will be global. As ordinary retail investors, we need to have the courage to burn our boats. The failures and successes of the past decade have only opened a window for us. In the future, we may see a door. Going out from here, we may continue to see a different and vast world.

Lu Xun said: There was no road on the ground, but when more people walked on it, it became a road. In fact, the development law of any market is basically the same. The road of cryptocurrency was gradually developed by early believers. The initial cryptocurrency was just a thing called "geek toy" and "Ponzi scheme". Although the ICO boom in 2017 contributed to the transformation of cryptocurrency from bubble to paradigm, it is still regarded by many as "worthless" and "air scam". However, as time goes by, mainstream finance has gradually accepted cryptocurrency.

In short, if you believe it, hold it and add an extra bet to your future. If you don't believe it, stay away from it and continue to do what you think is right at the moment. In the end, everyone needs to be responsible for their own choices, and everyone can only be responsible for their own choices.

Many people, looking at a bitcoin worth $110,000, will miss a bitcoin worth $1 ( in January 2011, the bitcoin trading price exceeded $1 for the first time ), and hope to find the next quick-get-rich-quickie product like bitcoin. However, no one can predict what the next quick-get-rich-quickie product will be. What we can do is to seize the current opportunity (if you also believe that the price of bitcoin will reach $1 million within 10 years), and at the same time take a longer-term view, be prepared, and always keep an open mind.

As for trading, for some people it is investment, but for others it is just speculation. But in the final analysis, there are only two things we need to do, namely: how much money can we make when we are right, and how much money can we lose when we are wrong. For example, since the current bull market, many people have watched Bitcoin rise from less than $20,000 to the current $110,000, and then they sighed, why did they not buy Bitcoin at the beginning, why do they have so few Bitcoins now... At the same time, they also sighed, why did they keep adding positions after losing money on a certain copycat, why did they listen to others' words and FOMO on-chain meme, causing their investment to go to zero...

If we summarize this situation, it can be roughly divided into two aspects: on the one hand, it is difficult to form large-scale or continuous investment in the face of "certain" trading opportunities. For example, they believe that Bitcoin will rise, but it was already $20,000 at the time, and the increase was relatively limited, which could not bring them greater profit opportunities. On the other hand, facing "uncertain" trading opportunities, they will bet more, believing that their theories are definitely correct, and their cognition or technology will definitely beat the market and bring huge profits.

As for myself, I would mainly consider doing "deterministic" transactions, because although the potential returns of "uncertainty" opportunities are huge, the risks they face are also huge, and this type of transaction is difficult to fully master through some or certain fixed techniques or skills (at most it can only increase the probability), but deterministic transactions can be continuously improved and optimized through certain methods.

Investing seems to be a very simple thing, it is nothing more than buying at the bottom and selling at the high, but making correct investments (that is, the two things we mentioned above) is actually very difficult. You need to find various balance points between your own investment theories and market changes.

Therefore, the investment experience over the years has only taught me one most important thing, that is, you must strictly manage your position (risk management), especially never be too obsessed with those losing trades, no matter what your operating strategy or theory is, remember, the market is always right.

As long as the market is still there, we will not lack trading opportunities. All we have to do is to keep going and not be eliminated by the market. If you don’t manage your positions well or are not self-disciplined enough, causing your portfolio to lose (or be trapped) most of the funds, then we will not have enough funds to seize new or even better opportunities.

Therefore, clarifying your own risk tolerance is a very important part of investment. We need to deeply understand: how much money can be earned when it is right and how much money can be lost when it is wrong. Over the years, I have seen too many examples, and I have also met many people who have larger funds and better technology than me, but many people have left this field because of losses, but I am still persisting. Looking back on the past few years, especially the first few years after entering this field, I have also made a lot of transactions and suffered many losses, but from the actual results, most of the profits are actually only obtained in a few transactions (BTC, ETH) categories, which is why I have always insisted on that sentence: stay focused, keep thinking, and stay patient. At the same time, I also put this sentence in the signature of the official account, and I hope to continue to encourage everyone~

That’s all for today. The sources of the images/data cited in the text have been added to Notion. The above content is only personal opinion and analysis, and is only for learning records and communication purposes, and does not constitute any investment advice.

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Disclaimer: The content above is only the author's opinion which does not represent any position of Followin, and is not intended as, and shall not be understood or construed as, investment advice from Followin.
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