Bitcoin Is Dead (Again)

Joël here! 👋

It’s a tale as old as time: whenever Bitcoin drops by more than 5%, so-called “experts” come out of the woodwork and call it dead.

Doesn’t matter that whales are accumulating, or that we see ETF investors buying the dip (according to Larry Fink in this interview).

All people want to do is to shit on Bitcoin and call it a fad, or they wish for it to be done, so they’re right about it at least once.

I’m not here today to tell you that Bitcoin is not dead; there are plenty of articles out there about this.

Instead, I want to pick out some of the most interesting data points or developments and show how this cycle is distinctive.

Boomers are one of the luckiest generations out there. Coming out of the back of a major world war, the money printer was their biggest ally.

It didn’t matter what they invested in; they were at the right place at the right time and ended up making incredible returns.

Ironically, this is the group most skeptical of Bitcoin.

Why? Because it would break their illusion of success and show that it wasn’t their genius but rather the M2 money expansion that resulted in incredible returns.

OK, enough bashing about the money printer and brrrrrr. Onto the interesting story.

Most Boomers began changing their views on Bitcoin the moment spot Bitcoin ETFs launched.

However, they didn’t change their view because they suddenly understood the advantages of hard money or a scarce asset. NO!

They did so because their wealth advisors and big names like BlackRock told them it was a good investment.

And this data is visible as well with figures or posts such as this one:

Source: X

As you can see, the year so far has been a disappointment if you look at BTC from a fiat perspective.

Especially, the ETFs face an even harder reality, with a YTD performance of almost negative 10 percent.

But it seems like Boomers are HODLing strong and even going after Bitcoin more.

Whether this is because of growing trust in Bitcoin or simply because they saw past performance and expect similar returns.

Nevertheless, if Bitcoin were dead, this kind of investor would be the first one to dump and get out of Bitcoin.

A great sign to see, and with ever-growing trends in the finance sector, we might even see more adoption here.

I already hinted at it, but there is a growing trend in the finance sector regarding Bitcoin.

Whether it’s a giant like Bank of America or PNC, all of them have one thing in common: they started offering Bitcoin exposure.

And this is not slowing down at all! I did a very scientific evaluation (just kidding) and counted how many banks announced new products in 2025.

I stopped counting at 15 because so many smaller banks or clearing houses have gotten on board, and their subsidiaries have begun offering different products as well.

It doesn’t matter if it’s spot Bitcoin trading, joint custody, notes on Bitcoin ETFs, or just exposure via Bitcoin CFDs; all of them are part of the growing institutional adoption.

And again, if Bitcoin were failing or if anything of the sort were true about the “dead” narrative, none of these institutions would offer exposure.

Lastly, I want to highlight one aspect of the whole “Bitcoin Is Dead” narrative that might be right: the retail side.

The 2025 bull run, or whatever we are calling this, was a very weird one.

There is a lot of institutional adoption that came in waves this time. From ETF euphoria to so-called Bitcoin treasury companies, and now banks with their own products.

If you’ve been in Bitcoin for a while now, this is one of the things the community was pushing for back in 2017, but institutions never took us seriously.

Now they do, and you would think we would be celebrating, but that is not the case. We are missing retail investors.

They have always been the backbone of Bitcoin, but the success of institutions seems to have been the turning point for retail adoption.

It doesn’t seem like this is about to change, and for now, we would need to say that retail is the only group that truly believes Bitcoin is dead.

There would be other metrics and things to track as well, from on-chain metrics to hashrate, but that’s neither here nor there.

To me, after the fourth bull run, the situation we see now is new (with no retail adoption), but the feeling is the same.

At the end of the day, Bitcoin is reacting differently to what others think it should, and people take the easy way out.

Calling it a “failure” or saying it’s dead is easier than taking time to understand a new asset class or technology.

However, there is one constant across all these situations: Bitcoin always comes out stronger after these things.

And I expect the same to be happening again.

Maybe not in the same manner as we’ve seen before (you already see this pattern being broken with the four-year cycle), but in the long run, Bitcoin will succeed and turn heads again.

Until then, I’ll sit back, relax, drink some eggnot now, and celebrate Christmas.

I hope all of you are doing the same with your family and enjoying the festive days!