Is it because when we have a bear market like now, people turn to bitcoin because it is more secure? I think the opposite happened with the bull market last december, people turned to fancy alts because they thought they could hit the next 10× or 100×.
Yep, exactly that. When things look grim people tend to switch to less risky assets. Just like when stock markets are in red investors try to move to government issued bonds that yield less but are sure to pay out