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Sections Below
My 100th Post
Something dumb I did, I'm sorry
Post Inauguration Market Predictions
Scratch that, here's the right mindset
Let's dive in.
My 100th Post
Happy Friday TOC fam!
This post is a special one for me because it's my 100th deep dive since starting this newsletter
My first piece went out on December 18th, 2023 so that's about a post every 3.5 days!
When I first started Terminally Onchain, I had no idea where this was going to take me. But I challenged myself to get a 100 posts done no matter what and hoped that things would figure themselves out.
With that being said, I still have no idea where this is going to take me 😂
BUT at least I can confidently claim that my writing has gotten significantly better and that I truly love cranking out these deep dives even though it's so frustrating at times. It's clear to me now that I want to do this long term.
Looking back at my past year, these first 100 posts were just getting me started. Setting the foundation. Things were mostly quiet for the majority of 2024...it was just me writing out deep dives and sharing with close friends on Farcaster. If anything, I'd say the majority of my brand awareness came post GOAT launch in November & December.
Now, as I've hit some "bullish signals" for TOC, I'm ready to double down and go all in on the research and writing these next 100 posts.
I've cut down all other side quests work wise and have fully committed to making Terminally Onchain the the best content covering the onchain economy.
Mindset for 2025...just keep on writing.
Your superpower is outlasting everyone, especially when the excitement of it being fashionable has long faded. You just keep going.
773
For those of you that have supported TOC so far, I truly appreciate it and your feedback & shoutouts mean the world to me 🙏
Something dumb I did, I'm sorry!
Okay, last thing before we get into today's post.
Last weekend, a close friend and reader of TOC texted me this.
I WAS SHOCKED.
I don't get e-mail replies!! I quickly checked with the Paragraph team and it turns out I never connected an e-mail to my account (just a wallet).
This whole time, I've been trying countless strategies to get feedback / e-mail replies and just thought none of you cared enough to do it and that it was a skill issue from my end 😭
But it turns out that people have been responding, I just had no idea. So if you've replied to me in the past, I AM TRULY SORRY....I promise I wasn't ignoring, I literally just didn't get the message.
I've fixed it now and attached a new e-mail to this newsletter.
If you can take like 3 seconds and just reply anything you want to this e-mail, that would be very helpful to make sure we're good to go here on out!
Post Inauguration Market Prediction
(As always nothing published on Terminally Onchain is financial advice, do your own research)
For those of you that are on X, I'm sure you've been seeing the wild bull posts inspired by the Trump administration.
Apparently crypto is a national priority as of next Monday.
Not only that, but if this headline below is remotely true...then we may finally see the bizarre news that the American government is buying Bitcoin??
NYT: Trump is considering "a government program to buy and hold billions of dollars in Bitcoin." On Day 1.
Let that sink in.
Let that sink in.
Polymarket odds shot up yesterday to the ~35-40% range.
BREAKING: Trump is considering "a government program to buy and hold billions of dollars in Bitcoin", per NYT
Bitcoin reserve odds just shot up to 40%.
Bitcoin reserve odds just shot up to 40%.
So what's my take on all this?
* Takes a deep breath *
I believe we're about to enter a 6-9 week euphoria phase starting next week after the inauguration or the last week of January.
We'll see some amazing pro-crypto headlines in the news about Trump pardoning Ross Ulbricht, states lining up to buy Bitcoin, America becoming the self-proclaimed crypto capital, new policies going into the pipeline, more ETF proposals for seemingly everything, etc.
Bitcoin, XRP, and maybe Solana will probably be the first to start pumping and retail will naturally start feeling the fomo as mainstream media locks in. Naturally, this will lead to some quick overinflation and money will start rotating into Ethereum and alts. The eth maxis will finally be able to enjoy their brief moment of glory especially as EIP7702 gets ready to merge around March.
Contrarian take : Ethereum pump is around the corner and its going to absolutely melt faces
But...all of this will be short lived. My guess is that something similar to 2021 plays out but at an accelerated rate.
Remember in May 2021 when the market tanked going into the summer and continued to drawdown even in July? Dreadful period.
There's bound to be a similar moment this year but I think most people are expecting it. So in some weird self-fulfilling prophecy kind of way, I could see the eventual drawdown get expedited to before tax season in April.
So realistically, my timeline is that the "inauguration pump" starts correcting by March / end of Q1. This roughly also lines up with the first 100 days of Trump's presidency. There's only so much news the administration can push out in such a short period of time...realistically these things take time and as the headlines start dying down, folks will naturally hop on the "it's so over" train.
Then we'll see a choppy period of slow price momentum for a couple of months. Many of us in the space will still feel a lingering rush of excitement as there's announcements of fresh venture rounds, cool UX updates, interesting examples of large tradfi/web2 players "partnering" with some crypto company, etc. But to be clear, price wise, it'll feel dead and the Phantom screenshots will be on hold.
And then finally sometime in between the end of July to early September, there will probably be another catalyst moment for what the industry calls the "blow off top" phase of the market. Where prices give everyone an "aha I got you" moment and start pumping again at an even faster rate. This will lead to another euphoria moment similar to October - November of 2021. It'll be quick. It'll get messy (with scams/hacks). And worst of all, many people won't want to miss out on life changing gains and will probably make some irrational financial decisions.
Then dread will really set in as the market corrects once again before the end of 2025. But this time, not just from a price standpoint but also a narrative standpoint. My guess is that aside from any large exploits and bad actors, there's a good chance of what I call the "Trump uno reverse card" happening. This is basically the moment a year into his term where it feels like crypto regulation will actually take longer than expected and things are not that easy. I'm not saying that Trump will reverse his crypto stance, but more so that any new updates for the rest of his term will be evenly spread from 2026-2028.
And then 2026 onwards, we'll probably see a higher velocity of smaller market cycles. Less crypto volatility than what everyone is used to. And a very different vibe from the normal "bear markets" all of us are expecting. I believe we'll see a ton of progress for the rest of Trump's administration but it'll happen at a reasonable pace. Perhaps that's why the 4 year cycle narrative also starts to die down - it won't go away, but the Bitcoin halving in 2028 definitely won't be anywhere close to being the most important market factor.
Scratch that, here's the right mindset
Okay, the section above sounds pretty confident right? Don't you feel like I just gave you grandma's secret recipe to making generational wealth?
Wrong!
Scratch everything you just read above and internalize this...
The market does not give a fuck about your predictions or your timeline.
It also does not give a fuck about your favorite KOL's predictions or your favorite KOL's timeline.
Markets act how they want to act, no strings attached.
The only thing that I can say for sure in terms of what's going to happen in the market very soon is that there will be many people trying to act as market oracles and they'll sound damn convincing.
Don't fall for it. And take everything with a grain of salt.
Some may be spot on. Others might be the literal counter-signal (the Jim Cramers of crypto). And it's pretty hard to tell who is who.
In that last section, I'm willing to bet that 50% of you felt pretty convinced. Let me clarify...I don't really understand the markets. And I sure as hell can't predict the markets. The whole point of providing my prediction is to demonstrate that anyone can string a narrative together and make it feel like the holy truth.
There's a chance that the complete opposite of my guess happens. No inauguration euphoria. A bullish summer. And an extended bull run. Who knows. Only time will tell.
My suggestion to all of you is the same thing I keep on repeating to my self:
Take it day by day and form your own opinion on any news
If you're investing, take a moment to write a few notes before any buy or sell
There's only so much gas a tank can hold, even the fastest cars need to stop for a refuel
The funniest part about this post is that I genuinely did start off thinking I would provide some market clarity on how I see things playing out. And the thoughts above do in fact reflect my best guess on what happens.
But as I was writing it...there was a "what the fuck am I doing?" moment and decided to add in this section.
Out of all my 100 posts, this is the first time I've ever talked about prices / markets / predictions and it'll probably be one of the rare moments this happens.
But I do feel like it's my job to just give everyone a heads up and a friendly reminder that if things do get crazier, try your best to think for yourself no matter how hard it is. I struggle a ton with this but am making sure to be super conscious of "doing me" going forward.
Okay end of my lecture...on Tuesday we go back to talking about projects, tech, and interesting developments happening in the space.
I've been reading a ton of 2025 outlook reports on what sectors in the space we should all be paying attention to in the coming months as well as any key metrics. Although I don't agree with everything, I'm noticing there's definitely some blind spots in my thinking. But more on that next week!
Reminder to reply to this email, just say hi or if give me any thoughts on my market outlook!
- YB
really great job