A lot has happened in the Crypto market since my October 27th issue; most critically $BTC has been in free-fall since I pointed out several key resistance levels over the past month. Had you simply gone SHORT since Bitcoin poked our $117k resistance level on 10/27, you’d have made a nice 25-30% ROI. +1% ROI per day isn’t bad (if you can capture it).

Last edition I mentioned from a [purely technical perspective I would not open a “set it and forget it” long position] on Bitcoin, as we were seeing a Daily EMA death cross. This is when the 20D EMA crosses down through the 200D EMA. Price ultimately poked the 200D EMA and trendline, before rejecting it AGAIN, and riding the waterslide down from $108k to the low of $80k. You can also see how much more extended the death cross EMA stacks are, with price riding well underneath it.

$BTC 1D:

Looking at my chart above, you can see the major resistance failure from 10/27 circled in yellow, subsequent cascade down to about $100k, where price stalled and tested support for 4 days (long lower wicks) before a final gasping breath up into the $107k green horizontal line area [this points out the price failure which poked just above the 20D EMA (white line) and the Alpha Trendline (red)]

We spent the following 10 days in down-only price action, reaching a wick low of $80.6k, as shown by the low horizontal green line. This was MASSIVE because we lost the long-term $100k psychological support, and ascending yellow trendline.

Last issue we also discussed $ETH and the problematic chart which was showing first warning signs of a 200D EMA rejection around $3,600. Safe to say this came true. Ethereum shit the bed and fell -25% in ONLY two weeks, essentially TWICE as fast as $BTC [which by the way is completely normal and to be expected, ETH is essentially a 2x leveraged chart compared to BTC from a price action perspective].

$ETH 1D

In my chart above you can see the first green horizontal line displaying the $3,600 price rejection which was against MAJOR resistance bands: 200D EMA (yellow curve), 20D EMA (white line), Alpha Trendline (red line). Those 3 levels were intersecting at the exact same time price was retesting those levels, which is almost NEVER a sign of strength or bull momentum. We subsequently puked -$1,000 down into the $2,600 wick (second horizontal green line).

As for the other Alts we discussed last edition, it’s fairly obvious they’ve also been decimated, because if the No. 1 and No. 2 Crypto coins bleed, EVERYTHING else bleeds harder [with very few exceptions].

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• So what now?

To point back to my subtitle, everyone (and I mean everyone) is screaming “it’s over, the 4-year cycle is complete”, and we’re about to enter at least a one year bear market. I’ve even seen some respected analysts on Crypto Twitter (X) flip bearish with the crowd, essentially screaming in the same echo chamber. “Macro signal broken” this, “Elliot Wave invalidated” that. This tells me one thing, most people are losing money, seasoned Traders & Investors alike, which means MM’s, Institutions and Whales are winning (as always). And most importantly, it tells me the majority are going to be offside, again.

Now, I will not sit here and guarantee anyone that we’ve bottomed. It is absolutely possible that the crowd has finally cracked the code, and they’ll be right, en-masse, for the first time ever. But there is no fucking way I am taking that bet. Instead, I will illustrate the reasons why I believe we’re approaching a local bottom, at a higher probability than ever.

First things first, did everyone seriously forget that Powell just put a concrete end date on QT (Quantitative Tightening)? ICYMI, December 1st is the official end date of QT. While that doesn’t signal the automatic start of QE, it damn-sure makes it a lot more likely. If you don’t understand these terms, strongly recommend a quick Google brush up.

Secondly, as I mentioned last edition, Trump announced his plans for a fresh round of Stimulus checks, in order to spread the Tariff revenue with US Citizens. Again, I explained what happened last time the US gov’t handed everyone ‘Stimmies. Crypto went on a 12-month face melting run.

So let’s paint a clearer Macro picture:

We’re still seeing FED rate cuts in the near term, reasonable to think in 2026 the US Gov’t has no choice but to begin QE [the exact reasons being an extremely long discussion, but essentially boils down to stabilizing the economy due to mass-job-loss, bank failure, repo / bankruptcy rates, etc.], Trump wants everyone to love him and his ‘Stimmy checks, he will go to ANY length to bail the US out of debt, he HATES when the markets are red, and we’ve seen Institutional adoption of Bitcoin and Crypto at an unprecedented rate.

On that final point alone; when you have the BlackRock’s, Fidelity’s, VanEck’s, Grayscale’s, and Microstrategy’s of the world bullying their way into Bitcoin at MAMMOTH scale, you can bet any semblance of normal structure or cycles ARE OVER.

There is a near zero percent chance that we will simply repeat the same cyclical behavior when retail once dominated the asset. Retail is now the minority, so you must pivot your thesis and pay attention to Institutional charts if you’re going to have any chance of predicting future cycle or chart behavior. For this, I look no further than the SP500.

On my above $SPX chart, we have approximately 6 years worth of data, which includes the previous BTC cycle of 2020-2024. There are 5 major vertical horizontal lines pointing out cycle lows and highs.

March 2020, Bitcoin bottomed literal days before the SP500, and both assets rose nearly in unison over the following 420 days (1.16 years) before Bitcoin put in its first local top around $63k. This was the first deviation between BTC & the SPX, it was also during the time of the FTX collapse, which directly influenced Crypto, not the stock market.

December 2021 into Jan 2022, Bitcoin put in its second local top WELL before the SPX topped (approximately 55 days earlier) creating a divergent top which ignited the year long bear market. SPX followed suit, albeit with more volatility and bouncing along the way. BTC fell from highs of $66k down to $16k, -75% in a year. In contrast, the SPX fell from highs of $4,800 down to $3,500, -26% in a year. That’s essentially 3x more downside for BTC.

October 2022, the SPX actually bottomed BEFORE Bitcoin, about 30-50 days sooner. We all know Oct-Nov 2022 was the local bottom across financial markets. Had you bought ANYTHING there you’d be laughing today. Over the following 900+ days (2.5 years) the SPX gained +70% and BTC +575%. Everything wobbled around December-February last winter, SPX crashed -20% in 45 days and BTC -30.6%

April 2025, another local bottom across the board. You could’ve bought SPX at $4,800 and BTC at $75k give or take.

Which brings us to now, the last green vertical line, November 1st 2025, and we’re watching both assets roll over in real time, Bitcoin still leading risk markets approximately ~30 days earlier. BTC is down -36% from it’s $125k ATH, and SPX is down -5%.

Do you see the pattern yet? Bitcoin’s corrections are becoming less severe, the chart looks more similar to the SPX from a structural perspective after 2022, it’s more muted, almost like it’s being guided. Am I saying they are the same? No. I’m saying you cannot deny the Institutional adoption and price patterns which are forming in real time.

Explain it like I’m 5

Hopefully you’ve already put together what I’m trying to argue, that BTC looks poised to mirror the longer term SPX chart patterns, with more “stair stepping” rises and falls. There will absolutely still be volatility to capture, but I personally believe at a much more muted rate.

I believe what we’ve witnessed over the past 30 days is more likely Crypto OG’s who’ve held 3 digit entry prices, exiting into fantastic liquidity for the first time ever. If you held billions worth of Bitcoin a few years ago, what incentive did you have to sell, if your orders nuked the price? Institutions are now HAPPY to buy up every single BTC sold by the early adopters, which protects downside and gives them orderbook liquidity. This is what REAL ADOPTION looks like. For Chrissakes’ we have governments buying the asset!

• Having said all that…

There are invalidation areas and technical zones which would make me wrong on all counts. Let’s review the charts:

BTC 1W

On my above Weekly Bitcoin chart we have a very interesting potential bottom forming. We’re in fact 90 minutes away from a weekly close well above the 100W EMA. This is a great signal.

Looking at the yellow arrows, if you had bought BTC after any Weekly EMA wick over the past 3 years, you’re in profit AND you would have essentially bought the absolute bottom each time.

Now, if we lose the previous local low price of $75k, things start getting invalidated really quickly, so this is PIVOTAL. It would be very hard to argue we continue a bull run if that price is lost, even if we went down to the 200W EMA and bounced, it would be nearly impossible to run back up from $65k and create new ATHs.

BTC 1M

One month is even more interesting. We have 7 days left to close above the 20M EMA, and Alpha Trendline. This is the first month we’ve potentially lost the Green Dots since October 2023. I can’t overstate how important the next few weeklies and monthly close will be.

BTC 1D

Going back to our Daily Bitcoin chart, we’ve got some work to do. For now, we’ve theoretically made a higher low, which is a good sign for bull market continuity. But we could be looking at weeks of chop, or sideways price action to get through these EMAs. One thing to note, everyone underestimates how violently and QUICKLY Crypto charts can repair themselves and recover. If we see some kind of news or liquidity catalyst, we could blow through these zones.

We’ll firstly need to bounce into $95k zone, and probably reject on first touch, from there we’d need to close higher than $85k and start climbing over the 20D EMA. Based on the curvature of the longer EMAs, it looks like we’re going to find heavy resistance all the way back up to $100k, and if $100k rejects again, you can pretty much guarantee this bull market is toast.

In terms of mental preparation, Bitcoin is known to chop sideways for months on end. We suffered a brutal 7 month accumulation zone between March-September 2024, before finally resolving higher. And, not before the market faked everyone out by wicking down into $50k territory and threatening similar EMA death cross structure.

Market Makers, Exchanges, and Whales are incentivized to push the majority offside because it creates liquidity, which is the exact thesis I’m betting on again. Bitcoin drives the entire Crypto market, so whatever happens to this asset will cascade across the rest. Unless we truly enter an Alt season, where ETH could out perform and run up while BTC chops around sideways. If large players and Institutions start rotating into ETH, this could be the Alt season catalyst everyone has been waiting (longer than ever) for.

If the above liquidity scenarios pan out, such as QE, Trump Stimmy checks, and Institutional step-ladder bidding, then I believe we have a lot of gas left in this bull run. But I am cautiously optimistic at best, based on how fragile these charts look. I’m simply unwilling to accept that the masses are going to be correct about the start of a true bear market.

For me, failure is losing $75k Bitcoin price – which opens its own opportunities to short the bear market. Until then, I will not pivot from my bull thesis.

Until next time, Trade Smart & Reduce your Risk!

—DTS

There is a huge amount of data to unpack from the past 30 days, so let’s get into it. Last update we focused on a potential blow off top for $GOLD (now confirmed), we looked at market structure for $BTC, $ETH, $BNB, and I talked about their key resistance levels. It’s been two weeks since that issue, and nearly 30 days since the October 10th market-wide manipulation event that wiped out ~$20B from Crypto markets.

For a quick $BTC refresher, on last issue I noted, “Next up is $117k, minor horizontal resistance, but still expecting some volatility around there.” & boy did we get volatility. Not even I saw the nuke to $98,000 coming. In hindsight it’s very clear on the charts, as you’ll see below:

$BTC DAILY CHART:

On October 27th we poked the $117k resistance level (green horizontal), as well as the descending Yellow Trendline, then two Daily topping tails formed, and we closed under our Alpha Trendline. There was a small bounce off the 200D EMA (Yellow) into the 20D EMA (White), which very quickly rejected again. Over the following 8 days we saw $BTC fall and retest the CRITICAL $100k support zone, falling -15% — which is holding up, for now.

Could this be the local bottom on Bitcoin? My bias leans towards yes, especially since Trump just announced a fresh round of ‘stimmies. But from a purely technical perspective, we’ve witnessed a death cross on our Daily EMA stack > 20 EMA now sits below 200 EMA. Which means at MINIMUM, we need to reclaim the $108k level to feel even remotely safe that we aren’t heading lower.

Day trading is great here to capture intraday volatility, but I would NOT be buying a “set it and forget it” Bitcoin allocation here. Way too much downside risk.

Now on to Alts, last issue we plotted Alt strength / resistance levels for $ETH and $BNB. You’ll recall that I said regarding $ETH, “The first brick wall is the descending Yellow trendline sitting around $4,300.”

We didn’t quite get there. In fact, at $4,250 we fell through the floor. This was expected, while I didn’t quite see $BTC falling back to retest $100k, we knew Alts would be weak while $BTC failed to sustain it’s All Time Highs. $ETH subsequently fell -30% from my last issue, which would have been a beautiful short trade for any of you who followed.

$ETH DAILY CHART:

You can see we’re now at real risk of the Daily chart rejecting its 200D EMA. If this happens, it’s game over for $ETH for a while. It we reject here around $3,600 — you bring into reality several key prices, firstly $2,200 and then $1,500 if that doesn’t hold up. I don’t think I have to tell you what happens to the rest of Alts if $ETH shits the bed here. It NEEDS to reclaim its EMAs for any hope of higher or Alt season.

Which brings up $BNB, last issue I noted, “$BNB broke $1,000 for the first time this year as one of the strongest Alts. [It’s accepted the $1,000 price level (for now)], If today closes with a steep upper wick like we are currently seeing (10:52 EST) it would be a bad sign. If we close under the trendline ($1,115) it reopens the possibility for $BNB to move lower”

$BNB DAILY CHART:

That topping tail turned out to be a very clear omen, as we nuked -25% over the following 8 days. $BNB now sits below its psychological $1,000 number — the good news is it seems to have bounced off its 200D EMA, but I don’t trust this until we reclaim $1,000. It has huge significance now.

You can see how irrelevant trendlines are also, note the ascending Pink Trendline, price did not respect it AT ALL. It blew straight through it with zero hesitation. So while it’s useful to draw trendlines to visualize potential support / resistance zones, they don’t represent anything meaningful from a purely technical perspective.

So now what?

I mentioned Trump just announced fresh Tariff ‘stimmies. He’s trying to launch another round of stimulus checks on the back of his “Tariff Profits.” Essentially every US Citizen would received a few thousand bucks, this represents hundreds of Billions worth of liquidity, and if it hit’s the equity / crypto markets… things could go vertical quickly.

We saw this movie in 2020 already. Huge pandemic, economic crises, money printing, end of QT, start of QE, stimulus checks. Had you bought virtually any Cryptocurrency between March-May of 2020 you’d have made a killing. $800B+ in stimulus checks went out, and Bitcoin rose nearly +800% over the following year.

Am I saying we’re about to go vertical for the next year straight? No. But the current global macro-economic state of affairs REEKS of 2020.

What does my portfolio look like?

Well for one thing, I’m a Day Trader, so I carry a lot of weight in USDT (stables). I need dry gun powder at all times. That’s because I trade intraday swings, it’s how I extract USD value from the market on a daily basis, using my customized VWAP system. It means I don’t usually care what the ticker is, I care whether the price action meets my trigger system. Is it firing on my indicator alerts? Do I have 6/8 “triggers” going my way? I want high probability trades, not 50/50 guesses.

This strategy is for a very select few individuals. You need to meet the following criteria: losing money doesn’t bother you, you can handle far greater stress-loads than the average human, you are determined and driven to escape the grind, no matter the cost, and you possess a non-human level of discipline. Day Trading will annihilate your portfolio if you don’t have expert level comprehension of technical trading fundamentals.

Now speaking long term investing, Alts in general mean little or nothing to me. If it’s not Bitcoin I generally don’t GAF about it. But that doesn’t mean I don’t trade Alts, in fact, 90% of my Day Trades are on Alts like ETH, TAO, DOGE, FET, to name a few. This is because they are extremely volatile, and offer sizeable returns day to day for those who can interpret signals correctly. But the vast majority of plebs (ordinary people) should probably just convert their entire 401k / RRSP into $BTC and never look at it again. If you have 5-10 years before your retirement, that’s what I’d be doing. I would stick every single fucking dollar of my savings into Bitcoin alone. You just cannot comprehend how much Institutional & Gov’t money has flooded into this asset. If you don’t accumulate Bitcoin now, you’re essentially betting AGAINST Wall Street. People who make those bets lose every single time.

So, other than being nearly 80-90% in Bitcoin long term, I have made a few asymmetric bets on projects which I believe will outperform. They are Ethereum, Bittensor (TAO), Artificial Superintelligence Alliance (ASI or FET), and Dimitra (DMTR). In a sea of thousands of tokens, you are far better off deeply researching a select few and betting big on them. If you sprinkle holdings into dozens or even hundreds of tokens, sure you might win a few gambles on a 100x, but unless you have meaningful size allocated to it, it won’t yield life changing money.

As always, Trade Smart and Reduce Your Risk!

—DTS.

It’s been about two weeks since I launched my inaugural newsletter on the heels of the worst mass-liquidation event in Crypto history. If you haven’t read the last edition, I highly recommend catching up on it for context; as we’ll reference it a fair bit moving forward. ICYMI, more than $20B was liquidated from Crypto markets on October 10th — millions of retail Traders lost everything, and virtually everyone who held a leveraged position was wiped out.

Fast forward to today, and it looks like we might be seeing the first signs of true recovery, and the setup required to break-out, thereby continuing this bull run.
Let’s dig into it.

Has $GOLD topped?

Gold is showing late-stage behavior. If we look at the weekly charts, we don’t yet have a confirmed reversal, but we HAVE received a legitimate reversal on the Daily chart. Why does Gold matter? Because Gold is a RISK-OFF asset, it’s where the world parks its money during extreme uncertainty. BTC is still a risk-on asset, and more closely tied to the S&P500. This isn’t to say both can’t rise at the same time, but if Gold is topping here, it’s potentially a great sign for rotation into BTC & risk-on markets in general. We know Bitcoin performs well during Q4 historically…

1 WEEK:

DAILY:

How do you spot this reversal? On the Weekly you can see that the candle did not close below the previous body candle. However on the Daily you can clearly see the top candle fell aggressively through the previous close. This is classified as a “bear engulfing” meaning downward selling pressure engulfed the previous Daily close by a significant margin.

Going one step further, from a technical analysis perspective: we’ve not lost the trendline yet, but a -5% fall on $GOLD in a single day is the largest negative move on the asset in FIVE years. This is NOT a place I would buy Gold. The probability of it being a local top (or even blow-off top) are much higher than anything else.
I won’t truly say the top is in until we lose $4,000 — but we’re close. *Edit* Since writing this last night 10/26/2025 11:00pm EST, Gold has moved down further and is losing the $4,000 price (currently trading at $3,995) this is almost certainly a top confirmation if it closes here today.

For extra context, the last time Gold showed >200 on the TSICCI was August, 2020. Gold subsequently fell -18.75% over the next 214 days, and then chopped around for another THREE years before starting its next leg higher. I’ll say again, not a place I want to buy Gold.

So should I sell all my $GOLD and buy $BTC?

Short answer: probably. But there’s nuance here.

On October 10th Bitcoin was relatively unharmed. Compared to the rest of the market it only fell -17% in a single day. Sounds volatile, until you compare it to Alts. All of which fell anywhere between -25% to -80% over the same day.

This liquidation event gave us some interesting data points to analyze on the charts:

Typically when we have these flash (nuke) wicks, it’s common for price to rebound aggressively, and then bleed off, filling at least 50% of that wick. As you can see in the below image, we’ve filled more like 80% of that wick. We crashed to $101.5k, jumped aggressively back up to $115-116k, and over the next week bled back down into the $103-104k range.

We finished this week on a nice little recovery, getting back up to the $115k range. Now we have some significant resistance levels which MUST be reclaimed in order to confirm Gold holders are rotating into BTC. The good news is our bottom Yellow trendline has been reclaimed. If this rejected, it likely would have been game over.

Next up is $117k, minor horizontal resistance, but still expecting some volatility around there. Would love to see it smashed on first run-through and then turned into support.

And finally, we have the previous ATH (all time high). $123-126k needs to be left behind. Whether we see it break through, bump up against it a few times, and then finally get over it and turn it into support; we can’t confirm anything until that price is taken out. If we get beyond the $125k blocker, it becomes easier to see the case for $150-200k $BTC.

What about my PRECIOUS Alts?!

Don’t panic Gollum. To be sure, some Alts look decimated and I personally can’t see them recovering any time soon. But the majors look alright. Two weeks ago $ETH collapsed -22% and we’ve since put in similar PA (price action) to Bitcoin. We flash recovered from the $3,350 wick, jumping back up to $4,300 before bleeding off back down to $3,600 a few times.

It looks like we’ve put in a proper higher low, and the EMA stack has a chance to turn bullish on the Daily chart. But we’ve got significant resistance ahead. In the below image you’ll see the fake out reversal which should have informed us that a breakdown was coming (Oct 6 + 7).

The first brick wall is the descending Yellow trendline sitting around $4,300.
Best case we get through this quickly over the next week or two.

After that, we’ve got our ascending Yellow trendline sitting on the $4,600-4,800 range. And lastly, the previous ATH sits just under the all important psychological and round number of $5,000. Expect a TON of volatility between here and there. There’s always the small possibility of blasting up through these levels, but if we’re playing probabilities this is the lower likelihood.

$BNB broke $1,000 for the first time this year as one of the strongest Alts, peaking around $1,300-1,400 and it’s done little since; as arguably one of the strongest movers this cycle. The good news is, it’s accepted the $1,000 price level (for now) which is a large psychological barrier for traders. I expect $5,000 is a similarly strong psychological price level for $ETH, and will therefore lead to volatility. If we can turn $5,000 into support, there is no stopping Ethereum.

You can see below on $BNB the double top which formed against $1,300, we then bled down into the 50EMA ($1,050) and price is attempting to reclaim the Daily trendline. As one of the strongest movers this cycle I expect we will move beyond the trendline and reclaim the $1,160 zone, but so far today (Monday) it’s struggling to gain acceptance. Mondays are typically days to avoid in the Crypto market. If today closes with a steep upper wick like we are currently seeing (10:52 EST) it would be a bad sign. If we close under the trendline ($1,115) it reopens the possibility for $BNB to move lower, possibly targeting the ascending Pink macro trendline which sits between the 50 & 100EMA. (Exponential moving average)

What’s my position in the market?

Mostly I’m building long positions here with tight stop-losses. There’s a lot of air to gap up through between here and significant price levels, which can be a good opportunity to scalp / swing some gains on your portfolio. But I’m cautiously optimistic (at best). There’s a lot of weight overhead, and it will probably need a catalyst or bullish headline to blast through them all.

Based on what I’m seeing in the charts today, I don’t see a clear setup for higher on anything, and there is a risk that a mass selloff on Gold brings the rest of equities down as a whole, if the market interprets this as extreme fear. If a trade deal is reached between the US & China, that could be a real catalyst to move higher in risk markets.

There’s no such thing as easy mode in Crypto.

So as always, Trade Smart, and Reduce your Risk!

—DTS

What Happened — In Plain English:

Between 10am–6pm EST on Oct 10th, Crypto was annihilated:

• BTC dumped -10% from ~$122k toward ~$102k
• ETH dumped –20% poking its 200D EMA at $3,500, and major Alts cratered!

Double-digit slides everywhere; some mid/small caps lost up to ~80% or more of their value in hours. This is not natural or organic price action, to be sure. Is it manipulation? I don’t have any concrete data, but it sure as hell cannot be considered “fair market” pricing.

Total liquidations amounted to $19–20B; which is exponentially worse than the $LUNA collapse (<$1B), the FTX collapse (<$5B), and the COVID collapse (<$5B) —because the cascade was faster and the market was more levered. Meaning, the Alt market specifically was propped up on borrowed money and exchange leverage, not spot demand.

The Immediate catalyst? Trump’s “100% tariffs on China” post [on a Friday no less.]

So was this “Just” the Tariff Headline?
Or Was It Inevitable?

The short answer is actually both. The tariff headline was the spark; the tinder was already stacked, and written in the charts for days leading up to it.

Pre-crash tells:

Overextension: $BTC had just printed a new ATH and was failing to breakout or turn the $125k level into support; several Alts were stalling at resistance. $ETH had just printed a Daily fake-out at a major resistance level.

Below: $BTC failed ATH push

Below: $ETH fake-out pattern

Structures deteriorating: H&S-style tops, lower highs, and failed breakouts across major Alts.

Sentiment was frothy → fear: Greed readings flipped to fear overnight.

Leverage stretched: OI heavy; funding not insane everywhere, but risk crowded into Alts.

Breadth was weak: Fewer alts making higher lows; more names leaking below 4h 200EMA—my “uh-oh” zone.

When the headline hit this caused forced “risk-off” selling, then thin order books did the rest.

The Whale Story (Why Everyone’s Furious)

On-chain sleuthing points to a brand-new Hyperliquid account (tied by some analysts to an old BTC “OG” wallet) that:

Loaded massive BTC/ETH shorts in the days leading up to and the final 30 minutes before the tariff announcement (≈ $1.1B notional).

Closed most shorts near the bottom for ~$190–200M in profit.

Then flip-traded around the cascade, and reportedly positioned for the bounce.

Is that insider trading? It’s definitely foreknowledge (at best). Direct proof of illegal coordination hasn’t been presented publicly. But the timing is too perfect for most people to call it luck. At minimum, one or more whales front-ran the move and extracted nine-figures while the crowd got rinsed. This suggests close ties to Gov’t, or insider info being shared. This is no different than insider trading by politicians — which happens en masse, and is seldom penalized. Why would DeFi be any different? Especially with one of the most corrupt Presidents in history sitting in office.

FYI I don’t lean to any political party; if you do, you’re allowing yourself to be part of their system of control. In Finance, and in life, it is MUCH better to be suspicious of ALL politicians, regardless of creed or party ties.

Winners vs. Victims:

Relative survivors: $BTC, $ETH, $TRX, $BNB.

TRX barely flinched (~10%) and defended its support.

BNB fell ~33%—bad, but less bad than peers.

Everything else: widespread -50% to -80%, with smalls/memes being pulled LITERALLY to zero. $PENGU was an extreme meme casualty and its Daily structure is destroyed. Price deeply underneath EMA stack.

Interpretation: In a liquidity crisis, capital flees to “blue chips” and stable ecosystems. The rest gets repriced fast.

CeFi vs DeFi: Who Broke, Who Breathed

CeFi (some majors): throttling, API hiccups, dashboards lagging. Panic worsened because traders couldn’t act.

DeFi rails (Aave/Uniswap/Hyperliquid): no downtime; smart contracts liquidated as designed. Painful? Yes. Operationally robust? Also yes.

Takeaway: The pipes worked on-chain—even if they transported carnage. My rule: if one alt looks bad, they all look bad. We had many looking bad.

Conclusion: The tariff didn’t create weakness; it accelerated it and synchronized the exit. Was it likely orchestrated / coordinated? High probability.

What I’d Tell a Friend Over Coffee:

Don’t try to buy insanity; buy the reclaim. Treat flashy wicks as liquidity events, not value unlocks. A whale with a signal (or a phone call) can move first. Your edge is process, not prediction.

Where We Go From Here

Bull case: This was a massive deleveraging event that “reset” the board; “shakeout before higher-highs.” BTC/ETH holding key long-term structure could support that view.

Bear case: Confidence damaged and lingers. Some sectors (Alts / Memes) won’t recover quickly. If macro (tariffs, policy) worsens, we could chop or bleed further.

My base case: Expect range and repair, not a V-reversal. Patience gets paid—and the second move (the reclaim) is safer than the first.

Final Word

Oct 10 wasn’t random. It was human decision → headline → leverage cascade, amplified by someone moving first. Markets will do that again, and again, and again.

We don’t need to catch the wick; we need to survive the flush and buy acceptance with defined risk. How do you do that? YOU DON’T PLAY WITH LEVERAGE.
Anyone following me for a while has heard me repeatedly explain this:

• You do not own ANYTHING on a USD marginated leverage contract.
• This means you are not “Invested” in said project.
• You are borrowing money from the CEX to gamble on price action.
• During liquidity events like this, you are first to be farmed.

Do you know who survived October 10th? SPOT INVESTORS. With the exception of maybe (up to) 4x BTC/USDT leverage traders. THAT’S IT.

This should tell you how important it is to focus your portfolio on Bitcoin, and if you dare venture into Alts, it should be long-term, macro based spot token holdings. If you don’t think a project can withstand 5-10 years, why would you buy it? Just to get rich quick? Believe me, after losing money through the COVID collapse, LUNA, FTX, and now “Tariff Tantrum,” this will not be the last time DeFi gets rugged in a single day.

Your portfolio survives when you custody tokens yourself, and when it’s not leveraged. As always; stay focused, and reduce your risk.

—DTS