A muted response from crypto may suggest long-term market manipulation more than any point in history.

The crypto bull market of 2017 and 2021 did appear more grass rooted compared to today. Commentary and speculation from everyday people on crypto was rife. Engagement on sub-reddits such as r/cc was through the roof. The markets back then definitely seem to be more reactionary to news.

The vibe of this bullrun of 2024 feels distinctly different. Less noise, less visible engagement. Many could point at a shift to more institutional investment particularly in the advent of ETFs however the tapering of wider crypto engagement does seem a little odd.

Love him or hate him, towards the end Trumps pro-crypto narrative has been the strongest yet out of any US presidential candidate in political history. When you couple that with the fact that the US is the world's largest economy and financial epicentre, many could argue that the crypto market should be going parabolic on his shock victory. However as I write market movements are fairly muted in crypto volatility terms with BTC +6% and ETH +8%. In past cycles this news against the odds would have sent markets skywards 🚀

It could be that this observation is premature and that's still to come. It could be that people don't believe that trump will really follow through on his pro-crypto narrative. It could be that people just don't care. However in the past reactionary news has tend to be one of the biggest drivers of price. Having a pro-crypto us president is arguably one of the biggest results for crypto in its history. As someone that's become increasingly cynical of the involvement of stablecoins within the crypto industry, if the upside move doesn't transpire I'd lean more towards the possibility that is more evidence of long-term market manipulation in this cycle than previous cycles.

TL;DR

In the grassroots hype cycles of the 2017 & 2021 bullruns news of pro-US president would have sent the markets to the moon. If this doesn't transpire it could be further evidence of long-term market manipulation, possibly via stablecoins. The questionable backing of many dollar pegged stablecoims could very well be FTX on steroids for genuine decentralized, open-source cryptocurrency projects and think it's important to differentiate/ disassociate from them until they are.