Was Yesterday Crypto’s Jump The Shark Moment?

If you are my age, you remember the television show Happy Days.  It was wildly popular.  But, like all good things eventually they start to run out of ideas or they just aren’t as good as they used to be.  In the case of Happy Days there was a show where the lead character, Fonzie, jumped a shark. It was the beginning of the end for Happy Days.

Yesterday might have been that moment in cryptocurrency.

First, the most amazing news was that Long Island Ice Tea Company changed its name to Long Blockchain and the stock soared 500%. My friend Nicole Curcio Sherrod tweeted:

Radio Shackchain. Problem solved.

— Nicole Sherrod (@NicSherrod) December 21, 2017

Howard Lindzon changed his Twitter handle to Blockchain Lindzon.  Hilarious.

More news came out during the day. The creator of Litecoin sold all of his coins in order to be “more objective” when talking and thinking about it. That’s bullshit. It would be like the CEO of a company selling all their stock in order to be more objective. If anything, they need to hold stock in order to have the right economic incentives in play. The reality is the C suite in companies has the most impact on the future price of a stock. Employees below the C suite don’t. Litecoin’s founder was taking profit and making excuses.

We want startup founders to have skin in the game. This is the exact opposite.

All the signs are there.  I have heard stories of people taking out second mortgages and buying Bitcoin.  Low-level minimum wage employees buying cheaper crypto’s because they couldn’t afford Bitcoin.  My friends texting me why I never told them to buy Bitcoin years ago.  Yet, I am reminded that you can only see bubbles in the rearview mirror.  Bitcoin may rebound.  But, there is a unique physics to momentum markets. They tend to get an unstoppable head of steam.  You can’t buy them when they drop because it’s catching a falling knife.  Sell into their rallies and you get run over like a freight train.  If you bought low, you always feel deep regret when you sold even if you made a good profit because it just keeps flying in your face.

Of course, today Bitcoin is trading below $12,000.  Permabear Tim Knight is right.

Bitcoin collapse continues – -down 30% from its peak. It may mean nothing, and the lunatics calling for $350,000 (or higher) may be oh-so-right. But it sure is heading the wrong direction for now. Hold on for dear chapter 11. pic.twitter.com/iifJdNwEaH

— Tim Knight (@SlopeOfHope) December 22, 2017

Over the past several months, people that have been through bubbles before have advised people to cover, to risk only what they could lose 100%, to not buy if they weren’t in already.  It remains to be seen what happens but there are many days of reckoning to come.

Long term, a big drop in crypto is good for the sector.  In the short term, it’s going to be very painful.  I remain bullish on the sector but I certainly thought prices had gotten way ahead of themselves and was chastised for it by people who were HODL’ers.

This is what caused nuclear winter in Silicon Valley

QQQ data by YCharts