I really wanted to use this quote for the article, so I spent an entire night tracking it down. In my view, it perfectly captures how markets actually function. That’s also why observing behavior and analyzing market structure matters so much. And that’s exactly why this piece exists.
Let’s look back at crypto during its past peak phases:
Back in 2017, when the ICO wave emerged, it was fair to say that as long as a project carried the blockchain label, it could raise capital and ignite FOMO. Participants at the time largely believed in ideas such as:
“Blockchain = the new internet,”
“Tokens = internet-native equity,”
“Getting in early = guaranteed wins,”
Along with other vague assumptions. These beliefs, while imprecise, were strong enough to create the sense that “this was something capable of becoming very big”.
As the game gradually became familiar and fewer genuinely new ideas emerged to fill the massive gap between expectations priced into the market and the actual value that could be created, participants found themselves playing a game where everyone could more or less predict what everyone else would do.
→ The ICO mania came to an end.
The same behavior repeated itself during 2020–2021, when DeFi, GameFi, and NFTs took turns stirring up the market. The 2024–2025 memecoin wave followed the same path, eventually fading once there was nothing new left to sustain speculative momentum.
Amid constant shifts in market psychology, behavior, and conditions, this naturally leads me to the question:
What will Crypto 2026 look like?