Why Retail Always Looses?
It's about you and me, we ain't no J.P. Morgan to begin with, that's why we have to be like them.
Hi,🙋
Welcome to the weekly CryptoFolks Newsletter. However, our launch procedures 🛫 require us to inform you not to consider this article as investment advice, as it represents solely our personal opinion. Always remember to manage your portfolios independently.💁♂️
During a bear market, in the media and beyond, we often hear that cryptocurrencies are a scam and that most people lose money on them. The latter is actually true — most people do lose money in crypto. What’s more, not long ago, a creator on X ran a poll among their community, and it turned out that even though 100% of them were in profit on BTC (because of the price hitting new ATH), more than half still had an overall loss on their portfolio.
You might think: What a bunch of fools — BTC is up 6x from the bottom and they’re losing money? How is that possible?
The answer: greed and pressure.
There is hope
For some reason, so far the retail crowd (small wallets in on-chain data terms) is playing this bull run almost perfectly — buying the dips and selling into strength.
Retail is represented by so-called plankton 🐟 — wallets holding between 1 satoshi and 0.01 BTC (or up to 1 BTC, though 1 BTC is now serious money). Considering growing adoption and new people entering the market, we can clearly see an accelerated rise in the number of these wallets, and a slowdown when Bitcoin’s price was outside its previous ATH.
Such small wallets are often used for utility purposes in various blockchain applications — and of course, some of us here hold more than 0.01 BTC. Let’s now look at wallets holding up to 1 BTC — here, my point becomes even clearer.
In the previous bull market, these people were left holding the bag 🛍️, buying as prices climbed.
Even being stuck with Bitcoin bought at $69k didn’t turn out to be the worst investment — but the real bloodbath happened in altcoins. In 2018, holding Ethereum meant facing a -94% drop. Even in 2021, the drop was still “only” -81%.
Massive numbers.
For a traditional stock market investor — let alone bonds — that’s insanity. And Ethereum is still the #2 project; a big one like Solana dropped -96%.
We can now agree that being left holding the bag isn’t something we want. The problem is, retail has always ended up with the bag — and this time will be no different. The current cycle must have some element of surprise for that to happen.
Someone will have to buy your Bitcoin at $150k or your XRP at $9 — maybe it will be John Smith from Wall Street via an ETF — but that’s another discussion.
Someone must end up buying the top — that’s how the market works.
Where are we now? 📍
Let’s start with prices:
Bitcoin — $117k
+71% from its previous ATH
Ethereum — $4,220
-14% from the ATH.
Let’s zoom in 🔍:
Since the local bottom on April 9, Bitcoin’s price is up 58%, and Ethereum’s is up 205%.
Retail is driven by greed and pressure — the urge to make as much as possible in the shortest time. But that’s not what the market is about — it’s a game of patience.
Anyway — greed and pressure leads us to think:
“Only an idiot buys Bitcoin now at 6x from the bottom — I’ll buy Ethereum because it’s cheaper”
(yes, some really think $117k vs $4,200 is a huge difference - “it is clearly cheaper”, yea right) and because it’s still below its ATH. And that’s exactly what’s happening right now — capital is losing interest in Bitcoin and flowing into ETH. We’re even seeing MicroStrategy-wannabe plays like $SBET, and ETFs are recording net inflows on most days.
Next?
Greed and pressure will decide ETH is “too expensive” and will move to coins worth just a few cents — because you can get more of them than ETH at $5k. That’s when attention will shift to small caps.
On this chart, we’re now at the Big Caps (Ethereum) stage — from here, the street is only one way. This isn’t my original concept — it’s a fairly well-known model of how a bull market unfolds.
Greed and pressure take control not when prices go up, but when they start to fall
“Don’t worry you guys, it’s only a healthy correction, it will be back soon.” - John Smith, 2021
That’s what happens with Bitcoin, Ethereum, and everything else. Think of a bank like J.P. Morgan or Citibank — imagine you run one. They know all about greed and pressure, which is why they don’t wait for the perfect top. I do the same — I’ve sold my BTC and will soon sell my ETH. I’ve still made 5x on BTC and 2x+ on ETH. Some traditional investors wait a lifetime for 5x.
Greed and pressure are mindset of the poor— the mindset of always chasing the biggest gains, never actually getting them, and ending up with losses.
What to do?
Definitely not what this guy says 👇
That’s pure emotional triggering on guys like me and you. Emotions stay at the door when logging into an exchange.
If you’re just starting — not financial advice — but I’ll be waiting for Autumn ‘26. You’ll see…
The altcoin season everyone is waiting for will pass right before our eyes and we won’t even realize it. There will be no time to take profits.
In the meantime — education is the answer.
Books, valuable videos (not those with 🚀 and “million X” thumbnails), not just about crypto, but also about investing in general.
Greed and pressure want to control you in every market. I know this isn’t what you want to hear — you’d rather get a guarantee that altcoin season is coming and your tokens will do 10x. But even if that happens, what good is it if you’re waiting for 11x, 12x, 14x, 20x — and you never harvest the fruits of your capital? 🍏
Great article!