Is the 4 year cycle theory dead, or did we just get impatient?

[jossiel]

It's way better that there's not that much hype and the market just grown from the ETFs that have been there all along.

This is a better outlook of the market because lesser projects and distribution of market cap to different projects and it has mostly stayed to bitcoin.

I do think that institutional money changes the game, there are more of them that would like to hold than to sell as they increase their reserves.

[ultrloa]

No it is not dead and it is not changed either. But there are other factors that are affecting the market. Most important ones these days are inflation and recession.

It started from 2020 when the COVID19 pandemic destroyed the global economy and brought about recession. In recession people who run out of money, will have to sell their assets to make ends meet. That sell pressure not only stopped the rally but pushed market into a bear mode.

We again saw it after NATO-Russia war broke out in 2022 and caused another recession.

And that trend continues these days as well.
Each time inflation goes up, bitcoin rises too.
Each time recession gets worse, bitcoin drops.

You made a great point, since actually Bitcoin did not change at all it remains the coin we know even before, but macro environment change a lot. Those global changes like recessions and inflation somehow push something in opposite direction.

What supposed to be happening when there's inflation is Bitcoin should pump up, because at that situation many people will provably look for best asset to buy. But when there's recession happening people usually choose to sell their asset to save their asses from that issue and some includes to liquidate their Bitcoin holdings. Last few years we have experience lots of recession due to those situations you have mentioned and undeniably this interrupts those natural growth or cycle of Bitcoin.

[Cointxz]

There are already a lot of things to consider, especially the market cap, the trading volume, ETF, the institutions coming in, etc. 
Plus, this is how the market works: a lot of expectation, so for me, the 4-year cycle is not relevant for me anymore.

Exactly.

In the past, this 4 year cycle was being used for manipulation as mind conditioning to people to purchased Bitcoin especially the event of Bitcoin halving that usually occurred close to the cycle timing to go up.

FUD, hype news and other manipulation news can be easily used as catalyst to dictate the trend due to this pattern like TA as self fulfilling prophecy since everyone is looking forward to that cycle.

Everything change when big player enter since they don’t buy and sell based on the news and so on rather they trade smart so the market now is more control compared before.

[Tiaramane]

There was terra luna kind of coins. Did you not know what happened to Rave? From over $6 billion marketcap, it is now around $63 million marketcap.

No FTX and FTT because Sam Bankman-Fried was an example that will make some people understand that they should not misappropriate their users money.

Or maybe because bitcoin did not fall much, but as of now, the 4 years cycle still holds, but diminishing.

Rave was like 90% controlled by 3 wallets, wasnt really real liquidity to begin with, just popped once zachxbt called it out. terra and ftx actually dragged the wider market down with them, Rave crashing barely moved anything else and tbh btc just didnt fall as much might honestly be the simplest explanation here, maybe overthinking the whole cycle dead vs diminishing thing when it might just be alts got hit way harder this time. curious if the diminishing pattern holds if we get another leg down or if it just falls apart completely

[Tiaramane]

Well, there is a slight difference today; the theory has changed from 70-80% now looks like we dump only around 50% to 60% compared to previous years, but remember why BTC prices dropped so hard at the time? We are in a pandemic when Bitcoin and altcoins fall that low.

I believe the cycle still the same but with slight differences; it's not totally the exact same scenario, but still the price movement is still the same as before. There are just many things added in this new era, including the ETFs so I believe the pervious cycle will still repeat but with slight differences.

70-80 vs 50-60 framing is interesting though, hadnt thought of it that way but kinda makes sense. like the pattern's still there, pump into a new ATH then dump hard, just each time the dump isn't quite as violent as the last. More capital in the space each cycle probably cushions it a bit even if the shape stays the same. Guess the real question is if that keeps happening every time going forward or if this one was just mild for its own reasons and next cycle could still be a full 80% dump regardless.

[Finebone]

There was terra luna kind of coins. Did you not know what happened to Rave? From over $6 billion marketcap, it is now around $63 million marketcap.

No FTX and FTT because Sam Bankman-Fried was an example that will make some people understand that they should not misappropriate their users money.

Or maybe because bitcoin did not fall much, but as of now, the 4 years cycle still holds, but diminishing.

I believe that the four year circle is only alive for Bitcoin, not alt or meme coin, because this past end of the four year circle, it was only Bitcoin that did pretty well. Their was no alt season as we expected to happen, like in previous times when alt and meme makes a lot of money for investors, so that is how I still expect things to play out in the next three years time, even though I might be wrong about that.
So I  agree with you in you last statement that the four year circle still hold , but it's happening on only Bitcoin.

[Coyster]

It's the same cycle playing out, a new all time high was reached and now we are in a bear market. You don't expect the scenarios to be exactly the same, but it follows the same pattern, and for this cycle we don't know if we have reached the bottom, yet. The events in each cycle would different, but ultimately history does repeat itself in one way or another.

[Biodom]

Well, there is a slight difference today; the theory has changed from 70-80% now looks like we dump only around 50% to 60% compared to previous years, but remember why BTC prices dropped so hard at the time? We are in a pandemic when Bitcoin and altcoins fall that low.

I believe the cycle still the same but with slight differences; it's not totally the exact same scenario, but still the price movement is still the same as before. There are just many things added in this new era, including the ETFs so I believe the pervious cycle will still repeat but with slight differences.

There is no "theory" that says that it changed from an "obligated" 70-80 to 50-60%.
That's not a theory, but simply describes both past and current observations.

Pretty much all parameters were violated during the current cycle: Pi cycle top, MVRV Z-Score, Puell multiple, Stock to flow, even powerlaw (albeit briefly).
In addition, ATH occurred before the halving.
All what remains is a silly adherence to an exact timing (which is also shifting a bit), which I am 90% sure would be front run this time, even if the cycles continue in some form, which is 50:50 in my opinion.

To conclude: Bitcoin has been not an exciting to own asset since about 2021 and being exciting to own is what matters to at least 90% of its owners.

Imho, bitcoin would be better without the cycles, but I am not sure if could follow gold's graph (with it's long basing and sharp moves) since it is on the predictable halving trajectory.

[Findingnemo]

The four-year cycle is actually used to represent the mining reward havling but that also aligned with the bear-bull cycle but in different time period but it is't always the perfect 4 year cycle, it could be different but looking at the overall chart we had bearish and bullish trends in that period so nothing changed even now, just be pateince and if you don't have any then better exit while you can.

[OgNasty]

It's the same cycle playing out, a new all time high was reached and now we are in a bear market. You don't expect the scenarios to be exactly the same, but it follows the same pattern, and for this cycle we don't know if we have reached the bottom, yet. The events in each cycle would different, but ultimately history does repeat itself in one way or another.

It looks pretty much exactly the same to me. People saying it isn’t because it fell a few percentage points from where they deemed the four year cycle to be is nothing more than cope. Not to mention it isn’t over yet. Come October when things reverse exactly as expected, the narrative will change to some other explanation why it happened because it just couldn’t be the four year cycle. 

[Zaguru12]

It's the same cycle playing out, a new all time high was reached and now we are in a bear market. You don't expect the scenarios to be exactly the same, but it follows the same pattern, and for this cycle we don't know if we have reached the bottom, yet. The events in each cycle would different, but ultimately history does repeat itself in one way or another.

People actually look at the four year cycle base on the market conditions but guiding factor for the four cycle is strictly the bitcoin halving period and which happens every four years and just as you have rightly said between this cycle there will always be a long period of bullish market this can come either after Hal him or even before halving and a long bearish market trend and this will follow when a bullish trend is done. This is the right cycle of the market will it be happening like it does in the past years? That’s subjective because the market cannot be following itself always or history cannot be relegating it self perfectly but as long as we have the halving of bitcoin rewards it is definitely going to be the case.

[alastantiger]

I don't think the four year cycle is dead, but it has become dominated and more orderly, more institutionalized by wall street and almost more monitored and regulated by governments, because it is now a part of the hybrid macroeconomics of most countries of the world.
It's the price Bitcoin has to pay for massive adoption, but the maths remains same even if it has become more difficult to attain an ATH like previous years after a halving.

The four year cycle theory is not dead but instead we are too greedy that we want a particular percentage every 4 years instead of we celebrating Bitcoin achieving a new all-time high. Bitcoin pump to a price of $120,000 and this price has not been achieved before because the last all-time high was around $69,000, if you compare these two price then you realise that Bitcoin still achieve a big price in regards to previous all-time high although the percentage increase is not as much as before and that is why people were still expecting Bitcoin to do more but because of the massive investors that Bitcoin currently has it becomes very difficult for Bitcoin price to increase as it used to increase before. 

[STT]

We got to 100k and people didnt think thats high enough any more so you could call that impatience or inflation of aspirations I suppose.    Also the block reward going down naturally puts us into the hands of the markets rather then the miners cycle, the home brew mining seems to be well gone which makes me sad personally.  I'd prefer a good crypto setup to stay with the vast range of people not become big business so things definitely changed in that way and it has a feedback effect on large moves in price also.

 Final obvious point is 60k or wherever is still high as hell, we'll never just continually rise so yea be patient some, chill your jets

[Dave1]

I don't think the four year cycle is dead, but it has become dominated and more orderly, more institutionalized by wall street and almost more monitored and regulated by governments, because it is now a part of the hybrid macroeconomics of most countries of the world.
It's the price Bitcoin has to pay for massive adoption, but the maths remains same even if it has become more difficult to attain an ATH like previous years after a halving.

The four year cycle theory is not dead but instead we are too greedy that we want a particular percentage every 4 years instead of we celebrating Bitcoin achieving a new all-time high. Bitcoin pump to a price of $120,000 and this price has not been achieved before because the last all-time high was around $69,000, if you compare these two price then you realise that Bitcoin still achieve a big price in regards to previous all-time high although the percentage increase is not as much as before and that is why people were still expecting Bitcoin to do more but because of the massive investors that Bitcoin currently has it becomes very difficult for Bitcoin price to increase as it used to increase before. 

I wouldn't say that we are greedy. It's because there are some so called experts that pushes the narrative that we might see a new cycle, which they called super-cycle and thought that after reaching a new all time high, we will continue to go up this year.

But majority could have known that it's not going to be case, as this market also operates and holds true that 4 year cycle. So just like know, we are in the bear market and so the price is going to dump and that's what really is happening right now.

[Oshio-man]

Nothing is permanent in this forum op, your plan may fail but it doesn't mean there is no other way to make it from bitcoin holding because no matter how long the bullish season stay in the market, there will surely going to be bearish season that will make investors to use the opportunity to invest, I don't think the theory is dead just that the season is changing gradually to allow holders to enjoy their holding to earn what they have never earned from bitcoin.

[coinrifft]

Nothing is permanent in this forum op, your plan may fail but it doesn't mean there is no other way to make it from bitcoin holding because no matter how long the bullish season stay in the market, there will surely going to be bearish season that will make investors to use the opportunity to invest, I don't think the theory is dead just that the season is changing gradually to allow holders to enjoy their holding to earn what they have never earned from bitcoin.

And this kind of market conditions separates Bitcoin to the rest of world class assets. It's because we have this kind of cycle, it might be unpredictable though, but every 4 years or after the block halving there will be a massive bull run.

But after reaching new all time high, the market will subside and then accept it or not, the bear market will appear. And so far we are in the cycle, so no one can stop the market from nosediving and then hitting a record lowest low.

[Swordsoffreedom]

I don't think the four year cycle is dead, but it has become dominated and more orderly, more institutionalized by wall street and almost more monitored and regulated by governments, because it is now a part of the hybrid macroeconomics of most countries of the world.
It's the price Bitcoin has to pay for massive adoption, but the maths remains same even if it has become more difficult to attain an ATH like previous years after a halving.

The four year cycle theory is not dead but instead we are too greedy that we want a particular percentage every 4 years instead of we celebrating Bitcoin achieving a new all-time high. Bitcoin pump to a price of $120,000 and this price has not been achieved before because the last all-time high was around $69,000, if you compare these two price then you realise that Bitcoin still achieve a big price in regards to previous all-time high although the percentage increase is not as much as before and that is why people were still expecting Bitcoin to do more but because of the massive investors that Bitcoin currently has it becomes very difficult for Bitcoin price to increase as it used to increase before. 

I wouldn't say that we are greedy. It's because there are some so called experts that pushes the narrative that we might see a new cycle, which they called super-cycle and thought that after reaching a new all time high, we will continue to go up this year.

But majority could have known that it's not going to be case, as this market also operates and holds true that 4 year cycle. So just like know, we are in the bear market and so the price is going to dump and that's what really is happening right now.

Blaming the expert while denying our own greed is not right and comes across as avoiding responsibility. Because at the end of the day, the final decision is still ours. No one forced us to believe the supercycle narrative or any predictions whatsoever.

The truth is, a lot of us wanted it to play out that way too. Unfortunately, it did not turn out the way we had hoped

The cycle is still repeating itself, and we should have trusted it. But no, most of us got greedy and convinced ourselves that this time would be different.