The New Normal of the Crypto Assets Market: Four Parallel Cycles

After recent discussions with industry veterans, I have come to an important conclusion: the traditional "four-year cycle" theory is outdated. If one continues to cling to old concepts and expects a bull market to bring opportunities for multiple returns, they are likely already lagging behind the market.

The current Crypto Assets market has evolved into four different cycles operating simultaneously, each with its unique rhythm, strategy, and profit logic.

Bitcoin's Super Cycle

Bitcoin has shifted from a speculative object to an institutional allocation asset. The scale of funds and allocation logic from Wall Street, publicly listed companies, and ETFs is completely different from the alternating bullish and bearish thinking of retail investors. The key change is the significant decline in the proportion of coins held by retail investors, while institutional funds, represented by certain technology companies, are entering the market in large quantities. This fundamental change in the holding structure is reshaping the price discovery mechanism and volatility characteristics of Bitcoin.

Retail investors face the dual pressure of time and opportunity costs. Institutions can endure a holding period of 3-5 years, while retail investors clearly find it difficult to possess such patience and financial strength.

We may witness a slow bull market for Bitcoin lasting over ten years. The annualized return may stabilize in the range of 20-30%, but the intraday volatility will significantly decrease, resembling a steadily growing tech stock.

MEME Attention Short Wave Cycle

The MEME bull theory still holds. When the technical narrative lacks expressiveness, the MEME narrative will fill the market's "boredom vacuum" by aligning with the rhythms of emotion, funds, and attention.

The essence of MEME is a speculative vehicle for "instant gratification". It doesn't require a white paper, technical validation, or a roadmap; all it needs is a symbol that resonates. From pet culture to political MEME, from AI concept packaging to community IP incubation, MEME has evolved into a complete "emotional monetization" industrial chain.

The "short, flat, and fast" characteristics of MEME make it a barometer of market sentiment and a reservoir of funds. When funds are abundant, MEME is the preferred testing ground for hot money; when funds are tight, MEME transforms into the last refuge for speculation.

However, the MEME market is evolving from "grassroots carnival" to "professional competition". The difficulty for ordinary retail investors to profit in this high-frequency rotation is sharply increasing. With the entry of professional teams and large investors, this once "grassroots paradise" is becoming highly competitive.

Leap-style Long Cycle of Technical Narrative

Innovations with real technical barriers, such as Layer 2 scaling, ZK technology, and AI infrastructure, require 2-3 years or even longer to see actual results. These types of projects follow the technology maturity curve rather than the emotional cycles of capital markets, and there is a fundamental time misalignment between the two.

The reason why the technical narrative is criticized by the market is entirely due to the fact that projects have been given overly high valuations while still in the concept stage, and instead, undervalued during the "valley of death" stage when the technology actually begins to materialize. This determines that the value release of technical projects exhibits a non-linear leap characteristic.

For patient investors with technical judgment, laying out valuable technology projects during the "death valley" phase may be the best strategy for achieving excess returns. However, this requires the ability to endure long waiting periods and market trials.

Short Cycle of Innovative Hotspots

Before the main technical narrative takes shape, various small narratives rotate rapidly, from RWA to DePIN, from AI Agent to AI infrastructure, with each small hotspot potentially having only a 1-3 month window.

This fragmented narrative and high-frequency rotation reflect the dual constraints of current market attention scarcity and capital rent-seeking efficiency.

A typical small narrative cycle follows a six-stage model: "Concept Validation → Funding Probe → Public Opinion Amplification → FOMO Entry → Valuation Overextension → Capital Withdrawal". To profit in this model, the key is to enter during the "Concept Validation" to "Funding Probe" stage and exit at the peak of "FOMO Entry".

The competition between narratives is essentially a zero-sum game of attention resources. However, there are technical correlations and conceptual progressions between narratives. If subsequent narratives can continue the previous hot spots, form a systemic upgrade linkage, and truly sediment sustainable value loops during the process, it is very likely that a super narrative at the level of a main upward wave will be born.

From the existing narrative pattern, the AI infrastructure layer is most likely to achieve breakthroughs first. If the underlying technologies can be organically integrated, there is indeed the potential to construct a super-narrative similar to "AI Summer."

In summary, understanding the essence of these four parallel gameplay cycles is essential to finding the right strategy within their respective rhythms. The singular "four-year cycle" mindset is no longer able to keep up with the complexity of the current market. Adapting to the new norm of "multiple gameplay cycles in parallel" may be the key to profiting in this bull market.