Now I’ve been on the receiving end of a bit of stick over the past many months for not being bullish on crypto and have been the”‘bad guy” on quite a few X spaces, saying this is the top, while crypto denizens have been singing the seductive moon song of bitcoin infinity.

Yet, here we still are, between $100,000 and $120,000.

So, what’s next?

To me, the current bitcoin chart is not weak. It’s actually quite strong, but my call that around $120,000 marks the top before the next crypto winter remains my position.

In my model, global tension is keeping bitcoin afloat because bitcoin is for flight, while gold is for war. Think of it in meme terms: bitcoin is digital exit gold. While the possibility that many wealthy individuals might choose to exit their regimes in the future exists, bitcoin’s flight-use case will be a strong tailwind for the price. Every moment of nerves for the many fragile regimes in this stressed-out world will goose bitcoin while their future looks perilous.

However, rather than speculate about where crypto is now, let’s examine what different groups in the market will do, and how that might impact the future.

The Novice

The retail novice is not really on the radar anymore. Today’s novice is actually the B2B player FOMOing in – either with the crypto reserve play or the final “we better join the party” group that always me-too’s into a trend near the bend in the end. This group is noise.

The Established Crypto Holder

Not BTC maxis – this group should be sitting on nice profits or waiting for them. Most of this group are getting bored and fretful. This is the group that could start an avalanche of a crash. If they bail and push prices below $100,000 significantly, it will hit the me-too B2B late-to-the-party crowd, who will fold like origami.

The Trader

The Degen, or simply the trader who loves the 24/7/365 action or knows no other market but crypto, leans bullish. They like being long; the short side, as in equities, is a minority sport. They stay in while volatility flows, mainly long, and are supported at almost any level. They are likely neutral.

The Bitcoin Maxis

They simply do not care about the direction. In their minds, bitcoin won’t just hit $1,000,000 a coin – it could reach $20,000,000. This is more possible than you might think. A beer might cost $10,000 eventually, though that’s not what they are dreaming about. Even if bitcoin dropped to $100, they’d still believe.

These classic groups are currently in balance , but there’s another group, more prevalent this time around, and growing:

The Drainers

Think of all the newer players in crypto now: government, Wall Street, tradfi converts, and Jonny-come-latelies, plus corporation treasury reserve FOMO-ers – not to mention hackers with record-breaking heists, dodgy projects with worthless tokens, and pump-and-dump schemes. These players have always been part of the space, but now the market seems to be relying on these “institutions” to somehow push crypto to the next level. The trouble is, they don’t care about crypto – they care about fiat, and will drain fiat out of crypto, effectively deflating it. The above old-schoolers, the non-drainers, become exit liquidity for the drainers, who are highly skilled and remorseless. The drainers are growing, and that’s not good.

Woe is me, oh such doom and gloom… but wait, there is good news.

Crypto is about blockchain and use cases. However, this original driver has been stunted by hostile regulation, limiting participation to risk-hungry players in a sandbox constrained to printing private-sector money. Now, with the regulatory boot off the neck of blockchain – at least in the U.S. – the real value-add can begin, which in turn will drive the next cycle, with or without a crypto winter.

That’s where I’ll be looking for the next x10 – not bitcoin, because this boomer sees $250,000 in 2029, not this Christmas, and investment returns lie elsewhere.