It all depends on the fundamentals. You can see that TA doesn't matter when the fundamentals are rushing in. This recent dump right after the ETF got delayed, even though the price was forming a bull flag on the charts serves as a proof. So whether we will go to ATH this year cannot be read from the charts. It would seem unlikely looking only at TA, because 8 months of bear market don't turn into an ATH right away, but a big news could change it. For instance if we got all ETFs approved and on top of that had a major retailer accept BTC directly 20k would break in a month.
ETF's might cause some money to come in, but not to the tune of several billion dollars. They're just not that appealing. And there's already been a major move by Starbucks and a few other giants, but nothing happened. Bitcoin is establishing itself in the market. It's carving out a comfortable resting area.
People don't need ETFs or Starbucks to do it all for them. Let's say we would need 10 billion to come into the market to reach a certain point, if that happens people will do the rest. They are only waiting for a signal to start buying. A signal that will prove that institutions are really interested, that governments approve BTC. We managed to reach 20k without ETFs, Starbucks, Microsoft annd all the rest, which means we can do it with them much easier and much faster.
Yes, I support that too. Frankly I'm getting sick and tired of all the questions about which ETF is going to shock the market into the skyline and when. I don't think that they are going to get involved very much anyway. They'll probably only jump in like you said when things are already in motion. That would be really good for us though because it will add momentum to the trend we'll already be riding.
We did reach those levels alone, but also because there was the novelty factor behind the trend. Now it's not so fascinating anymore so people are a bit more cautious.