It feels like every six hours I see a fresh "news" article on my feed about how "the bubble is on" or "BTC has crashed" because of a 15-20% price motion.
I worry that these people are missing a history lesson.
Here's the period between the 2011 and 2013 bubbles:
So the 2011 bubble follows a pattern that even new folks, who joined in 2017, should recognize: a dizzying rise, followed by a year of gradual, painful losses.
But between when the price hit bottom (when six figures of BTC changed hands at the $2 pricepoint), and when the 2014 bubble began, there was a third pattern: long periods of
relative stability (with fluctuations in the 20% range), punctuated by brief bullish periods (Dec 2011 bringing us to a semi-stable $5, July 2012 bringing us to a semi-stable $13, and the time spent around $100 in mid-2013).
As an example, we can zoom in on the $5 period:
Clearly, there are big daily moves going on here! Imagine what people might have been thinking on March 19th, or April 20th!
But in the end, these moves were just a random walk around a somewhat stable price.
Similar behavior can be found in the 2015-2016 chart, after 2014's despair had run its course but before 2017's fever began.
This historical behavior, to me, implies two things:
1) For cryptocurrency as it is today, even "stability" sees 20% fluctuations.
2) Months-long periods of this "stability" are normal; not everything is boom or bust.
So today, with prices going back and forth between (roughly) $11k and $13k, I can't help but think that folks who are taking every motion as an omen of a larger trend are wearing themselves out needlessly. This might just be the start of another stable period - a chance for the ecosystem to get comfortable with the idea that $12k is the "normal" price of a bitcoin.
Calm down. "It" doesn't have to happen today, or even this month. It'll happen when it happens.
