Current Cypto Prices and the State of the HODLer

Ether's price movement post-Merge has been lackluster and downward, the switch to POS on the world's second-largest blockchain and the resulting Goliath energy savings appear to have been priced in already in the months preceding the Merge, when ETH was trading substantially higher than BTC.

Macro market factors are hammering overall crypto performance -- the dollar's strength (DXY), stocks trading lower, flight from risk assets, and the Fed attempting to back-paddle the absurd money-printing practices the government embraced during COVID by raising rates and attempting to slow down overheated wage growth, inflation, and record corporate profits. According to Glassnode research, overall whale cost-basis for currently-held coins is either ~19k or ~16k -- figures that would be quite useful in understanding upcoming price movement, especially because at present, BTC is clinging to 19k with eyes to Thursday's CPI data and Fed comments.

Reading crypto market news sites like Cointelegraph right now harkens back to the 2018 sustained bear market coverage. Back-and-forth speculative opinions: the whales are defending the 20k BTC bottom; the whales are causing panic with exchange inflows; why a certain key level needs to be observed, why it might not; things are bad, they could be worse, more speculation on the price movement, sometimes wildly in one direction, and more, very little conversation about the fundamental technology and industry stories that don't involve price movement, or that could if more of the coverage were focusing on the merits, commits, and literally everything in the sphere not related to price.

For those who experienced the 2018 crash after 2017's euphoric rise, and the resulting 75% price movement, the mood is one of eerie similarity, but, those that were already heavily invested at the time had the context of a blistering drop from 20k to below 5k; as coins held from late 2016 into 2017 were priced at or below 2k at times. Then, as now, coins held for 2.5 year periods, even at their respective lows, be over 100% in the green. If these were sold at ideal times, profits could have been booked at 500% or more gains. But for long-term HODLers, current prices are concerning, but history has shown that a grim obstinance to hold on to coins acquired at cycle lows, come hell or high water, has always been the best long-term strategy. May the HODLers keep this in mind.