The Brutal Truth About the Fourth Halving Bull Market: We've All Been "De-Risked"

Who would have thought that this highly anticipated halving bull market would ultimately turn into a collective funeral for retail investors?

This is not an ordinary bear market; it’s a precise explosion targeting faith itself.

When "HODL" Becomes the Most Expensive Faith Tax

In 2021, Hold On for Dear Life was the most sacred slogan in the crypto world—just hold tight, and time will give you the answer; by 2025, the same approach has become the most expensive fuel in the wealth destruction machine.

A big player I know with a nine-figure net worth last year heavily concentrated on the traffic narrative leader PNUT, firmly believing that "value discovery" would only be late, not absent. The result? Instead of institutional favor, liquidity dried up completely—from a high point, down 90%, more thrilling than a roller coaster.

This is not just the pain of account shrinkage but also the nihilistic sense of cognitive system being overturned. When you do everything right but still lose badly, what is this market actually rewarding?

Old Maps Cannot Find New Continents: We Are Still Playing the 2025 Game with 2017 Thinking

The underlying logic of this bull market has been rewritten, but most people haven't understood the script:

Past: Central banks flooded the market, all ships floated together, even trash coins could tell stories of hundredfold gains.

Now: Institutions buy only BTC through ETFs, retail investors are digging into each other's pockets in the MEME casino.

Data does not lie: Bitcoin’s light boat has already crossed ten thousand mountains, while those once "fundamentally solid" altcoins in your hands have long since fallen below the darkest moment during the FTX crash. This is not a correction; it’s a systemic withdrawal of liquidity—exchanges are deeply drained, and a moderate sell order can cause a 10% drop.

De-risking is not a conspiracy; it’s a strategic move.

The Final Game on the Macro Chessboard: Good News or Smoke Screen?

The current situation is full of magical realism:

Bullish chips: The latest US CPI hit a new low, inflation is firmly held down, and expectations of rate cuts in Q1 next year are rising.

Bearish cards: The Bank of Japan’s rate hike failed to reverse the yen’s decline, and the market is betting on both a US recession and the death spiral of Carry Trades.

The key to this game is: Will the liquidity released by rate cuts flow into the crypto market?

The brutal reality is that institutional players’ ETF channels only recognize BTC. Even if the Federal Reserve opens the floodgates, funds will only flow into Bitcoin along the most compliant and "safe" paths. Those deeply trapped altcoins, lacking ETF backing and market makers to support, are doomed to become corpses in the liquidity desert.

Q1 Next Year: A Window to Escape, Not a Good Opportunity to Prosper

A wake-up call for all still holding onto illusions: abandon the obsession with "breaking even," and treat next year’s policy rebound as a window for self-rescue.

If the rate cut expectations in Q1 bring market warmth, remember:

• This is not a rallying call for you to aggressively increase positions

• This is your last bus for rebalancing your portfolio

• This is your escape ladder to reduce risk exposure

If liquidity does not spill over, old coins deeply trapped will only be zombies; exchanges not onboarding new blood, old stories won’t create new prices. Don’t be that stubborn "diamond hands" who refuses to let go—survival begins with admitting: some assets will never come back.

What is more terrifying than losing money?

It’s that in this structural reshuffle, your "experience" has become the biggest negative asset.

Getting wiped out in this round of suppression is not shameful; what’s shameful is leaving the market with broken faith. The market never pities stubbornness but rewards evolution. As long as your principal is still there and you’re willing to open your eyes to see the new situation, there will always be a place for you in this circle.

Winter will eventually pass, but spring belongs only to those who endure the winter and change into winter clothes.

💬 Is your altcoin portfolio still okay? Do you think the Q1 rebound is a trap or an opportunity?

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