CRYPTO CRASH OR TRANSITION? NAVIGATING UNCERTAINTY AND DOUBT IN A WEEK FULL OF FEAR
There’s an old saying in crypto: when your aunt or your neighbour – the ones who know nothing about blockchain – start asking how to get involved, you’re probably at the top of the market.
That’s when seasoned people say it’s time to sell.
So after a wretched week in crypto, when my brother texted me, simply: “Crypto? Ouchy”, I had two immediate thoughts. One: ouchy is right. Two: if he knows how bad things are, is this the bull-market saying in reverse? Could someone who doesn’t know a bitcoin from a token from a blockchain have called the bottom?
First: maybe.
Second: this is the kind of magical thinking that comes from despair.
The last few weeks have brought out levels of FUD — fear, uncertainty and doubt — that I haven’t yet had the displeasure of witnessing in this space. Editorials and headlines have been soaked in “told you so” smugness from people who have never taken the time to understand this ecosystem, now gleefully declaring the bull run over and bitcoin “done”. At the same time, it’s become easier to believe the voices insisting that markets are manipulated by institutions trying to scare retail out so they can get in cheaper. And all around us, average people who know very little about blockchain are scoffing with superiority because prices fell so dramatically.
(I’ll never understand how people who are ignorant of a subject can be so confidently dismissive – and sometimes downright cruel – towards those who actually engage with it.)
Inside my own head, all my old money stories came roaring back. They sound like this: “Why did you ever think you could do this? This is another bad financial decision. You’re destined to be a poor old woman. You’re going to lose everything.” They hit especially hard because this dip of the dip’s dip has coincided with my decision to wrap up a major consulting contract and go all-in on Hotflash Inc, the global perimenopause and menopause platform I founded in 2020 that now serves more than 60,000 women around the world.
Having my crypto portfolio slip into the red for the first time – even by a few percentage points – was absolutely not on my bingo card for this transition.
We already know I didn’t take profits a year ago or during the peaks this summer. Rookie moves. And for my first real bull run (I knew too little in previous cycles for them to count), I’m getting pretty tired of the constant macroeconomic uncertainty. Waiting for possible rate cuts. Listening to predictions of some looming “black swan” event. Bracing for anything that might derail my investment thesis.
At times, it feels like I’ll never actually be able to take profits.
But this, I also know, is what happens in times of major change: more questions than answers, more noise than signal, more naysayers than visionaries.
Because here’s the truth I can’t shake – the one that sits deeper than price charts and headlines: this sell-off isn’t a crash. It’s a transition.
No short-term price movement can convince me that we’re not in the middle of a massive structural shift in the global financial system – one that fundamentally changes how money works, how trust is established and who gets to control value. This moment is messy, painful and confusing. But it’s also the window where the picks, shovels and rails for an entirely new world get built.
So, whether it’s my long-term conviction in bitcoin, my medium-term positions in XRP and other large caps, or the risky low caps that have fallen off a cliff but are still building, still innovating, still here — this is the first time I’ve ever invested in something I truly believe in.
It isn’t perfect. It isn’t clean. There are scammers and bad actors and wild uncertainty. But there are also brilliant minds creating something more open, more accessible, more transparent and more inclusive than anything finance has ever been.
Eventually, when the dust settles, we’ll understand what this revolution has really meant. And no matter what happens in between, I’m staying in long enough to find out for myself.
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