Bitcoin’s incredible growth — and the altcoins that followed — was mostly driven by retail investors. Half of them were Bitcoin enthusiasts, while the other half were just in it to make money. Both groups mostly just held their investments, cashing out occasionally.
Then speculators entered the crypto market, boosting the growth of crypto derivatives. Once the trading volume of crypto derivatives overtook spot trading, institutional investors started coming in seriously.
It’s easy to see why big players got interested. By then, Bitcoin and altcoins had gained major media and social media attention, built a large fan base, and attracted even more people thanks to FOMO. Speculators provided the liquidity and hedging tools that made it all possible.
But institutions don’t like high volatility. That means crypto enthusiasts should forget about Bitcoin doubling in price after every halving. Crypto is gradually turning into a more ordinary asset, much like stocks or forex.
No one has crushed
the dream of making it big in crypto. People have to look at Bitcoin's market cap and be realistic. When the market cap of the coin is 2 trillion US dollars, you can't expect the price of the coin to double because we have been collecting 2 trillion dollars since the day Bitcoin was created, so, it can't double every year, it's already too much. And I also want to say that institutional investors didn't crush the dream but they helped the dreamers. When the market cap of the coin is 1 trillion and institutional investors bring another trillion, the price of the coin doubles, so, where is the crush of the dream here? Now it's impossible to make big in crypto because old days when Bitcoin wasn't adopted is gone. Anyone could make their dream 10 years ago when the market cap of the coin was just a few million dollars, a money of an average millionaire person.