Destroying Bitcoin (Your Fault)

[famososMuertos]

First of all, trust is one of Bitcoin's pillars—yesterday, today, and presumably tomorrow as well.

Bitcoin's organic volatility has shifted; there are new players, though the traditional "whales" remain. I do not believe anyone will destroy Bitcoin; ultimately, it is a relatively non-deterministic situation.

[RGBTC]

Was that really the objective of financial sovereignty?

Haha. So, you want everyone to achieve this using Bitcoin?

No, not really. Bitcoin doesn't inherently make you rich.
Bitcoin only offers you sovereign control:

• no central bank can print BTC,
• no party can unilaterally freeze transactions (at the base protocol level),
• the supply rules cannot be easily changed.

the rest is up to you and everyone else involved in the speculative market. The fundamental modern monetary system was manipulated centuries ago, even back in your ancestors' time. That is why Satoshi excluded value control from Bitcoin's features and let it run on its own. Actually, believing in a currency's value is a choice left to each individual.

[goldkingcoiner]

Which markets are not manipulated by whales? Why is this something that surprises you with Bitcoin, but when Elon Musk sends his stocks flying all over the place because of a single tweet, suddenly nobody cares? Look at what is happening with prediction markets- corruption and manipulation abound. Basically a playground for billionaires to gamble with the market...

But I agree, what Bitcoin needs is adoption.

And the higher the adoption, the less Bitcoin can be manipulated by whales.

[Sanitough]

You forget that the whole bitcoin market is full of volatility, that makes it easier for whales to manipulate the prices. It's not destroying our bitcoin or the market itself, but its the poor mindset of the people that led them to be taken advantage by the whales. In a market where opportunities are free and unlimited, people will always want to be whales, unfortunately financial incapacity becomes a big barrier.

So don't blame the whales here. Blame yourself if your past choices in life are not making you successful and profitable with bitcoin.

[X-ray]

Manipulation happens everywhere OP, and whenever there is opportunity and profit to make, there are people who want to get more by squeezing the market.

Regardless, I wonder how the whales could crush the small investors? are these small investors investing in leverage? because if you're holding spot and planning to hold it for years regardless of the price of bitcoin, you will not be impacted by the manipulation.

You can keep manipulating the price.

You can keep triggering liquidations.

Don't confuse retailer traders who trade on leverage with real investor who buy bitcoin and forget. Traders aren't investors, they are trader and they're the one who got squeezed by price manipulation.

If you are truly investing in Bitcoin, buying spot and truly owning it, you wouldn't have liquidations, you wouldn't have to worry about price mark going to certain point neither.

[SeriouslyGiveaway]

Don't confuse retailer traders who trade on leverage with real investor who buy bitcoin and forget. Traders aren't investors, they are trader and they're the one who got squeezed by price manipulation.

If you are truly investing in Bitcoin, buying spot and truly owning it, you wouldn't have liquidations, you wouldn't have to worry about price mark going to certain point neither.

I understood your message but if possible, please don't use "forget" because it can mislead newbies to an unsafe direction.

People can decide that they will become Bitcoin investors with strategy of buying with spot, withdraw bitcoin to their non custodial wallets, and hold their coins in such wallets but they must do everything rightly.

Choosing a good wallet (open source, non custodial, enough bits of entropy for wallet seed).
Creating a wallet and backing up that wallet.
Testing wallet backup for recovery.
Store both original wallets and wallet backups securely.

Always remember where they store wallets and wallet backups.
Forget is not like a thing to do with your wallet.

Forget is recommended about trading in this volatile and unpredictable market, buy, hold, and ignore trading.

[drangos]

I'd like to discuss market size in this thread. While whales can certainly cause short term market movements. Particularly in markets with low liquidity and high leverage. It's not always a determining factor in market control. The more people get involved in Bitcoin. The more liquidity inflows make significant movements possible. And the more capital needed for such movements. But it could be too much leverage, not too many whales. A trader who trades with a high level of leverage can get liquidated by a relatively normal move, and feel like they are being manipulated. The reduction of volatility will likely be a more gradual process as Bitcoin becomes more liquid and more popular amongst investors. Rather than by the elimination of large investors.

[Somegory]

OP is too focused on price action and that's the major problem that many newbies and beginners are facing, it's why you are talking about whales performance in the market, well if you don't know, whales are going to keep doing whales things.

You can just buy Bitcoin and go back to your normal life, until maybe few years later and see for yourself, I always pity people who reacted to what's happening in the market presently, that's too much energy draining.

Whales have always been here and guess what? We have hit new ATH many times already, stop focusing on the short term market behaviour for your own sanity sake..

[ElPicaroTrader]

Of course all financial markets are manipulated. I never said otherwise.

Politicians, executives, funds and whales influence markets everywhere. That is not my point.

My point is that in crypto it has reached an embarrassing level.

Sometimes you look at the candles, volume and technical structure and it feels almost meaningless, because the market is so heavily influenced by large players that technical analysis often becomes secondary.

And I will repeat this clearly:

If you defend this level of manipulation in crypto, whether you are a whale or not, then in my opinion you do not love crypto. You love your profits.

What many of you still fail to understand is that you would benefit far more from genuine mass adoption: a deeper market, more participants, more trust, smaller corrections and long-term growth.

If, after all these years in Bitcoin, you still believe extreme manipulation is somehow good for the ecosystem, then I do not think you understand what digital assets could actually mean for the world.

No ordinary person who knows little about crypto is going to put serious money into an asset that reaches an all-time high and then loses more than 50% within weeks or a few months.

That is not how you build trust.

That is how you destroy it.

[aoluain]

I do not believe that a market where a relatively small number of players control absurd amounts of capital can constantly be presented as a free, clean market driven simply by supply and demand.

Market manipulation exists in all markets but it is a lot more complicated than you think. It is not like they "control" the market. There have been so many cases where whales tried to manipulate the market by going against the trend and got crushed by the actual "supply and demand" driven movement.

And in fairness its probably more pronounced in the Bitcoin ^{and crypto} market anyway because of the
"open access" of it to literally everyone.

We consistently see threads created for example "4000 Bitcoin have just moved from x to y - so I will use
the preverbial "we" are guilty of being extremely focussed on every whale movement which doesnt actually
matter at all.

It needs people willing to put their savings into it because they believe they are participating in something with a future, not entering a casino where four giants can move the table whenever it suits them.

Exactly.
We need people who are seeking financial sovereignty not people who think they can make profit from bitcoin and complain when the price doesn't move in their desired direction!!!

We need an absolute explosion in minnows who are willing to ignore what the Whales are doing and
focus on a long term strategy and to realise what Bitcoin has become over and above being just a
digital payment system. As has been quoted many times in the past in terms of watching the markets,
ZOOM OUT

[Achalugo BTC]

You forget that the whole bitcoin market is full of volatility, that makes it easier for whales to manipulate the prices. It's not destroying our bitcoin or the market itself, but its the poor mindset of the people that led them to be taken advantage by the whales. In a market where opportunities are free and unlimited, people will always want to be whales, unfortunately financial incapacity becomes a big barrier.

So don't blame the whales here. Blame yourself if your past choices in life are not making you successful and profitable with bitcoin.

Some people are the reason they are being taken advantage of. Instead of having the knowledge of how Bitcoin works and how to go about it, which would help prevent them from being manipulated. That mindset that the market is stable leads them to make decisions that will disrupt their plans. Without a proper understanding of the market, they may invest with the expectation of making quick profits, etc. But by understanding that nothing can completely eliminate Bitcoin's volatility, they will find it easier to exercise patience in their decisions and take accountability for their actions.

[Findingnemo]

I stopped reading at the sixth or 7th line because all I see just a rant from someone who lost their money by selling at the wrong time and expressing regret all around the place.

Bitcoin/crypto prices are manipulated which is true but whales are not controlling the prices they also take risk by moving huge amount of bitcoin or even selling them at low price with the hope of crashing the price but it doesn't mean the price will always go down after their deal.

[stompix]

200 lines of ranting from someone who has forgotten the principle of Bitcoin

Not your keys not your coins!
Not your coins, none of your f* business what I do with my money!

Seriously, we need to stop thinking that a hive-mind society is the best for Bitcoin where everyone just holds and buys and the price magically goes up and everyone is rich!
Things don't work like this and will never work like this, no matter how many times you try to shove it down people's throats!

Sometimes you look at the candles, volume and technical structure

It's people like you who are always glued to their screen watching candles that ruin Bitcoin!
See how easily it is to blame something for something you don't like?

[Muskanrani]

First of all, trust is one of Bitcoin's pillars—yesterday, today, and presumably tomorrow as well.

Bitcoin's organic volatility has shifted; there are new players, though the traditional "whales" remain. I do not believe anyone will destroy Bitcoin; ultimately, it is a relatively non-deterministic situation.

Basically traditional whales still play a major role in driving the order book depths and market sentiments  Trust and Decentralization are the basic pillars of Bitcoin .

 According to the Game theory it is completely impossible to destroy the Bitcoin  because its network is non-deterministic as long as the network decentralized there is no single point of failure it means that no single whale can destroy its fundamental protocol .

Don't you think destroying Bitcoin economically is a very big disadvantage?
 
According to your views is the entry of institutional players suppressed Bitcoin's organic price ?or it is giving whales oppertunities for market manipulation? 

[ElPicaroTrader]

Then do not expect mass adoption.

If people eventually get tired of this, the whales may end up trading Bitcoin among themselves. And after reading some of these replies, I am starting to think that may be exactly what happens.

It is honestly depressing to see people justify crypto manipulation by attacking others as “bad investors.” Nobody is blaming anyone else for their good or bad investment decisions.

That is not the point.

The point is the manipulation itself.

And please, spare me the endless “crypto cycles” argument. We have heard it for years.

Do you really believe Bitcoin is going to behave like this forever and still achieve mass adoption?

[OsaiEmma]

Do you really believe Bitcoin is going to behave like this forever and still achieve mass adoption?

Well, the data says otherwise. There is a mass adoption of Bitcoin right now. Below is an article on the growth rate of Bitcoin in Coingeko:

Despite suffering a 68% drop in active users during the crypto bear market of 2018, the average daily users on Bitcoin has recovered steadily by 41.7% from 666,000 in 2018 to 944,000 as of August 2025. ​

​Uptrends in Bitcoin network activity tend to precede major price movements. The network recorded its all-time high of 1.36 million active users in April 2021 as BTC broke past the $64,000 level and remained elevated at ~1.0 million daily users before BTC’s -35% price plunge in May.​

​However, that dynamic has somewhat shifted since 2023 with the introduction of Bitcoin Ordinals and BRC-20 in early 2023. As these projects gained more hype and traction, active Bitcoin users rose from an average of 900,000 in 2023 January to 1.10 million daily users in 2023 May and has continued to ebb and flow with Ordinals trading activity.​

source



And the growth is not slowing down, all thanks to institutionalization and all.

Then do not expect mass adoption.

If people eventually get tired of this, the whales may end up trading Bitcoin among themselves. And after reading some of these replies, I am starting to think that may be exactly what happens.

It is honestly depressing to see people justify crypto manipulation by attacking others as “bad investors.” Nobody is blaming anyone else for their good or bad investment decisions.

That is not the point.

The point is the manipulation itself.

In as much as Bitcoin's market is an open market, you must see these manipulations. It is left for you to either follow the direction the whales are going, or you quit trading and hodl across different trends.

But then, i will love to ask you a question: what do you propose in solving whale's manipulation in an open trading market in Bitcoin? Because this is the root cause of your complaint about whale's manipulation—open market trading.

[Smartprofit]

Then do not expect mass adoption.

If people eventually get tired of this, the whales may end up trading Bitcoin among themselves. And after reading some of these replies, I am starting to think that may be exactly what happens.

It is honestly depressing to see people justify crypto manipulation by attacking others as “bad investors.” Nobody is blaming anyone else for their good or bad investment decisions.

That is not the point.

The point is the manipulation itself.

And please, spare me the endless “crypto cycles” argument. We have heard it for years.

Do you really believe Bitcoin is going to behave like this forever and still achieve mass adoption?

I don't think Bitcoin will achieve mass adoption... Due to technological limitations, the number of daily transactions is severely limited. Once quantum computer protection is implemented, the number of daily transactions will likely decrease even further. 🙋

8 billion people won't be able to use Bitcoin at the same time. And why would they? Most people are happy to use a central bank digital currency (CBDC).

You see, to start using Bitcoin, you must be unable to fully utilize the modern financial system and/or have strategic long-term financial plans. If these conditions aren't met, then you don't need Bitcoin. For example, if a war breaks out in your country and you urgently flee the country, then you will need Bitcoin. If your country is experiencing hyperinflation, then you will need Bitcoin. If you want to build family wealth and pass it on to your children and grandchildren, then you will need Bitcoin. In other life scenarios, you may not need Bitcoin at all.  It's slow and its price is very volatile, why do you need it anyway? 😉

[MainIbem]

Can you think of anything that had gotten the approval of many to be accepted as Mass adoption, does such asset has manipulated attitude price manipulation?

Yes, I have said many times that Bitcoin can't be used for mass adoption because of it's price movement, either manipulative or not,

What can be used widely accepted for large usage is stablecoin, every investor will certainly stay safe and comfortable investment in stablecoin because Price fluctuations wouldn't caused trust issues and much mental damage.

Like d500 said, many investors are practicing DCA because of the nature of Bitcoin, that's it.

Since people are understanding the nature of Bitcoin, they either adapt or don't invest at all than complaining, whales manipulation has been in existence long before Bitcoin even got to $100k so it's not something new. Bitcoin hasn't changed from increasing in value as time goes, whether whales manipulate it or not we'll definitely or likely see another ATH so why can't people keep buying and holding instead of bothering about whales manipulation?

[d5000]

Do you really believe Bitcoin is going to behave like this forever and still achieve mass adoption?

It seems you have ignored my post on the previous page about falling volatility. It's not anymore like it was in 2017 or 2021.

Your point is that long term adoption should happen in detriment of short term speculation. DCA and similar strategies are now more popular than ever.

That's the search trend for the keyword dca bitcoin:


Source: Google Trends

This shows that in 2025 there was not only the ATH of Bitcoin price, but also the ATH of DCA searches at Google. And even if since then it has fallen a bit (due to the bear market, I suppose), it's still more popular than before mid-2025.

And this 5-year timeframe (2021-26) has a 650% growth of the term's popularity in comparison to 2016-21. It was barely a thing before 2018 if you look at the longer timeframes ...

[ElPicaroTrader]

So what is the point of all these excuses about cycles and adoption?

If adoption is supposedly growing, why does it also seem that there are more whales, more people getting trapped, and more players trying to profit from manipulation?

Honestly, this forum sometimes feels less like a place where people question manipulation and more like a place where many people simply accept it because they benefit from it.

And regarding the idea that “Bitcoin tells you where it wants to go”: Bitcoin does not “know” where it wants to go.

A lot of the time the charts look chaotic precisely because too many powerful players are pulling in different directions.

It is like putting one piece of candy in front of a hundred children. Everyone wants their piece, but nobody seems to realize they may destroy the candy in the process.

When Bitcoin was tiny and there were “four whales and seven monkeys,” extreme volatility was understandable.

But if Bitcoin is supposedly maturing, how can we keep normalizing an asset reaching an all-time high and then losing 50% a few months later?

Yet every time someone criticizes this, the answer is the same:

“Cycles.”
“Learn to invest.”
“Look at this chart.”
“Read this link.”

But at the same time, many of you openly admit that manipulation exists — and you support it.

That contradiction is exactly what I do not understand.