The extreme escalation in transaction times is there to ensure the whales can cash out but that smaller investors cannot.
Whales can make large transactions, the fees do not mean as much to them.
True that whales can make large transfers but even those transfers are not getting confirmed nowadays due to the malleability glitches in segwit as well as miners trying to play games with the whole network by switching their hashes to other coins and wait for more fee increase in the network.
At the same time the small investors cannot cash out because their investment is quite small compared to the fees.
I don't think they can't, because even if they send their money with less fee/byte but which is better enough to be accepted in nearby time, then why should they wait for the whales to take the advantage of current prices? It's not just limited to whales cashing out on bitcoins, but as of now, matter has become more serious when sellers also got a chance to make money selling.
The result is the following:
- Whales are cashing out, converting to fiat
- Newbies are buying from the whales in the hope of continues increases
- Existing smaller investors do not want to sell now (despite possible large profits) because of the high fees is you only have a small investment (Today another bitcoiner on this forum has to pay a 20$ fee for a 50$ transaction).
When the whales have completed the sell-off, smaller bitcoin investors can finally begin to sell and that will be the trigger for a complete collapse in the price.
- Guess you are wrong on the whales point somewhat, as even if they are selling off, they might be doing it under the fear of getting price shot back low.
- Again, you are wrong here. Newbies aren't buying from the whales alone, but exchanges too. But if we consider exchanges also as whales, then I believe we will be left with no such options but to sell asap as they have the power to keep the price up or take it down at a stretch.
- No need to send a transaction with $20 as fee if hold is all you can do. If you're patient enough and can wait for confirmations, why to wait for sending your coins anywhere with lesser fee?