MONITOR CYCLES

“We peaked out, you know, October, and we're now six months into this kind of bear market cycle. And we've been in this wealth destruction zone, going back. Really, this we we didn't have wealth destruction confirmed until really kind of earlier this year.”

“We've done a lot of work on, Bitcoin market structure, cost basis, you know, holdings, things like that across different cohorts to understand where we're at in that sort of top buyers rotating coins to sort of long term, you know, stronger hands. And that's, you know, we're we've seen some of that play out. This typically takes about a year to play out.”

“If all the money is in the market and the the sentiment is is still on the side of we're not going into a bear market, that's a pretty interesting indicator to tell you that everybody's deployed. Right? Everybody if if someone's saying that we're going higher, they're in the market. Right? They've already deployed.”

“Typically, the cycle starts at the beginning of 2023, so kind of at the after we saw almost a year long bear market that played out over 2022, eventually that flipped and we had bottomed. Then we went through wealth distribution. That's the part of the cycle where you want to be, you know, leaning a little bit more risk off, you know, looking to to build cash positions.”

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“The rise of direct lending is one of the most important developments in the financial world since the Global Financial Crisis.”

“The change in the interest rate environment has transformed the returns available to credit investors from meager to attractive.”

“When there's too much capital chasing too few deals, the quality of those deals and their terms usually suffer.”

“The success of direct lending is now inextricably linked to the success of the private equity industry.”

“Private credit has moved from a niche sub-asset class to a major, permanent part of the investment landscape.”

“I kind of see happening is I see a slow bleed into the summer with slightly lower highs and slightly lower lows, right? That's kind of what happened in 2019. It wasn't a massive capitulation. It was just a series of slightly lower highs and slightly lower lows. And I think that will likely last into the summer of 2026.”

“Why did it feel so different than the top in 2021? Why did it feel so different than the top in 2017 and also the top in 2013? And I think the reason is because you could argue that if the top is in, we actually topped on apathy rather than euphoria, right? There wasn't really a rotation into alt coins. There was not that euphoric feeling.”

“The bear market and then the subsequent Bitcoin-only bull market essentially started during the time of quantitative tightening, and that's really what happened the same thing this past cycle. The bear market started around the time that you could see the end of QE, and then the Bitcoin-only bull market started before quantitative tightening was over.”

“In fact, one of the craziest charts you'll see, I think, is if you look at altcoins against the valuation of silver, they're actually below their 2022 lows. So the reason why there's just this lack of interest in crypto, even though Bitcoin went up like 8X, is because almost everything else failed to participate in the actual bull market.”

“If you look at the current bear market... it's actually holding up a lot better than all the prior bear markets. Normally at this point, we would have experienced a 50% drawdown, which we haven't experienced yet. But if you actually compare to the one in 2019, it actually tracks a little bit better.”

“And so now we are definitively escalating and not only is the straight not going to be open, but we are going to make it even more closed than it was before. So an interesting, you know, reverse card being played here as always, you know, it's a bold strategy cotton. We'll see how it plays out, but yeah, big, big implications this week.”

“There does appear to be a large redirection of VLCCs, which are very large crude carriers to the Gulf here in the U.S. and that's in response to one of the main oil arteries and LNG arteries in the world, as we've discussed for the last month, getting closed off. So yeah, I think it's an interesting kind of illustration of something that we've been talking about.”

“As you know, the figure I show here is 50% of sulfuric acid exports are used for phosphate fertilizers. And it's important because the first market and the downstream kind of agricultural markets that globally that it depends on, that depend on it, are already very disrupted from everything that's gone on thus far out of the Gulf.”

“But alas, we're not a golf podcast for Bitcoin slash. I think we're macro podcast now. I think I've gotten some feedback. Some of the brightest minds in macroeconomics globally have been listening week in, week out just to come and get your thoughts, John, because they're good thoughts, as you alluded to. Things are chaotic.”

“The market decided last week with the ceasefire announcement that everything was, was Gucci and we were heading back to all time highs. But as we mentioned last week too, let's not get immersed and succumb to the 24-hour news cycle and the changing of headlines and the ping-ponging of ceasefire, no ceasefire, deal, no deal.”

“And so now we are definitively escalating and not only is the straight not going to be open, but we are going to make it even more closed than it was before. So an interesting, you know, reverse card being played here as always, you know, it's a bold strategy cotton. We'll see how it plays out, but yeah, big, big implications this week.”

“There does appear to be a large redirection of VLCCs, which are very large crude carriers to the Gulf here in the U.S. and that's in response to one of the main oil arteries and LNG arteries in the world, as we've discussed for the last month, getting closed off. So yeah, I think it's an interesting kind of illustration of something that we've been talking about.”

“As you know, the figure I show here is 50% of sulfuric acid exports are used for phosphate fertilizers. And it's important because the first market and the downstream kind of agricultural markets that globally that it depends on, that depend on it, are already very disrupted from everything that's gone on thus far out of the Gulf.”

“But alas, we're not a golf podcast for Bitcoin slash. I think we're macro podcast now. I think I've gotten some feedback. Some of the brightest minds in macroeconomics globally have been listening week in, week out just to come and get your thoughts, John, because they're good thoughts, as you alluded to. Things are chaotic.”

“The market decided last week with the ceasefire announcement that everything was, was Gucci and we were heading back to all time highs. But as we mentioned last week too, let's not get immersed and succumb to the 24-hour news cycle and the changing of headlines and the ping-ponging of ceasefire, no ceasefire, deal, no deal.”

“I kind of see happening is I see a slow bleed into the summer with slightly lower highs and slightly lower lows, right? That's kind of what happened in 2019. It wasn't a massive capitulation. It was just a series of slightly lower highs and slightly lower lows. And I think that will likely last into the summer of 2026.”

“Why did it feel so different than the top in 2021? Why did it feel so different than the top in 2017 and also the top in 2013? And I think the reason is because you could argue that if the top is in, we actually topped on apathy rather than euphoria, right? There wasn't really a rotation into alt coins. There was not that euphoric feeling.”

“The bear market and then the subsequent Bitcoin-only bull market essentially started during the time of quantitative tightening, and that's really what happened the same thing this past cycle. The bear market started around the time that you could see the end of QE, and then the Bitcoin-only bull market started before quantitative tightening was over.”

“In fact, one of the craziest charts you'll see, I think, is if you look at altcoins against the valuation of silver, they're actually below their 2022 lows. So the reason why there's just this lack of interest in crypto, even though Bitcoin went up like 8X, is because almost everything else failed to participate in the actual bull market.”

“If you look at the current bear market... it's actually holding up a lot better than all the prior bear markets. Normally at this point, we would have experienced a 50% drawdown, which we haven't experienced yet. But if you actually compare to the one in 2019, it actually tracks a little bit better.”

“Nick Valdez looks at the MAJOR launch of the Morgan Stanley Bitcoin ETF from yesterday.”

“Morgan Stanley ETF = Bitcoin Crash (Blackrock Playbook Repeating)”

“Blackrock launched a gold ETF and a BTC ETF. Both times the price action was VERY similar”

“Protect your BTC From Taxes”

“Only use exchanges for trading digital assets. We never keep our entire portfolio on an exchange.”

“So somewhere between probably September or October of 2026, we should see an all-time low for this cycle, not an all-time low over at all. Before heading to the fourth quarter of the post-having year. So by March of 28, we'll see another having. And then I guess Q4 of 2029 Although it's getting earlier and earlier. So I'd almost speculate it would be the end of Q3 probably of 2029, where we'll see a new all time high.”

“Looking back now on the analytics on 2025, there's no liquidity really in the market to pump all this. And that, with tariffs, with a lot of uncertainty, and then probably the inflation from those ETFs that were exciting this last year, that was definitely fun to see ETFs come online. And that drove a lot of market sentiment. That's probably why we had that early run up that you were just talking about before that last halving, which was April of 2024. So, a lot of excitement, but excitement without liquidity.”

“The House passed it last July 2025 It was passed to the Senate. And there's two portions of the bill that need to pass. There's a Clarity Act A. The A stands for the Agriculture Committee. And they did pass their portion a couple of weeks ago. But there's a Clarity Act B, which is the Banking Committee. And the bankers have dug in their heels. So that second portion of the Clarity Act, they're literally talking to Trump today. Trump has bankers at the White House to see if they can find some common ground.”

“One of the things that, then this is just a theory, of course, is that it appears China and India and some of these other countries are buying gold and silver with their finances, instead of putting it into Bitcoin. And I just wonder, like, how much of that is because of Trump's family's involvement in the crypto space that maybe some of these nation states are, who may have drifted in that direction, are now drifting away from it. So, any thoughts on that?”

“But at least as of 1 o'clock on the 10th of February, this one we're recording, the current price is $69,581, up about 15% from the low, which was $60,074, which was, I believe, 52% below or 52% correction from the all time high we saw in early October. So, yeah, just Will, what's going on? Well, it's good to be here. It's a sad day on one hand. From our last update, you were right in your prediction of Q1 2026.”

“So somewhere between probably September or October of 2026, we should see an all-time low for this cycle, not an all-time low over at all. Before heading to the fourth quarter of the post-having year. So by March of 28, we'll see another having. And then I guess Q4 of 2029 Although it's getting earlier and earlier. So I'd almost speculate it would be the end of Q3 probably of 2029, where we'll see a new all time high.”

“Looking back now on the analytics on 2025, there's no liquidity really in the market to pump all this. And that, with tariffs, with a lot of uncertainty, and then probably the inflation from those ETFs that were exciting this last year, that was definitely fun to see ETFs come online. And that drove a lot of market sentiment. That's probably why we had that early run up that you were just talking about before that last halving, which was April of 2024. So, a lot of excitement, but excitement without liquidity.”

“The House passed it last July 2025 It was passed to the Senate. And there's two portions of the bill that need to pass. There's a Clarity Act A. The A stands for the Agriculture Committee. And they did pass their portion a couple of weeks ago. But there's a Clarity Act B, which is the Banking Committee. And the bankers have dug in their heels. So that second portion of the Clarity Act, they're literally talking to Trump today. Trump has bankers at the White House to see if they can find some common ground.”

“One of the things that, then this is just a theory, of course, is that it appears China and India and some of these other countries are buying gold and silver with their finances, instead of putting it into Bitcoin. And I just wonder, like, how much of that is because of Trump's family's involvement in the crypto space that maybe some of these nation states are, who may have drifted in that direction, are now drifting away from it. So, any thoughts on that?”

“But at least as of 1 o'clock on the 10th of February, this one we're recording, the current price is $69,581, up about 15% from the low, which was $60,074, which was, I believe, 52% below or 52% correction from the all time high we saw in early October. So, yeah, just Will, what's going on? Well, it's good to be here. It's a sad day on one hand. From our last update, you were right in your prediction of Q1 2026.”