Julio Moreno of CryptoQuant on what onchain data shows

Transcript

GM, good morning. Welcome to the Milk Road Show, the daily crypto show where the trend is your friend, unless you're still waiting on one more dip. I'm your host, Jay Hamilton. It's Wednesday, May the 21st. Today, we are joined once again by Julio Moreno, head of research over at CryptoQuant. This guy's the chart guy. Every time we get Julio on the show, he brings great charts and great analysis because that's all he spends his time doing all day, every day. He's deep onchain looking at the data to help us figure out where is the trend, what's happening with Bitcoin, what's happening with Ethereum. That's what we're going to talk about today.

We're going to look at whale trends. We're going to look at market liquidity trends. We're going to look at demand trends. We're going to look at some overheated trends or underheated trends. Which direction is the market headed right now? Everyone's asking that question. Are we getting too bullish too fast right now or is there still a lot of upside to come? Feeling pretty bullish right now, guys. So, you're going to you're going to be pumped on this one. Also, we're going to get Julio's Bitcoin price predictions for the next one to two months, as well as where he thinks the resistance is. Where is the bottom right now that we could if we were to have a correction? And we're also going to talk about Ethereum and why CryptoQuant and Julio believe that Ethereum is undervalued right now.

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Today's episode is brought to you by Letin. Get cash without selling your Bitcoin. It's also brought to you by Coin Shift, powering top crypto treasuries with their yield bearing stable coin. Without further ado, Julio, welcome back to the Milk Road Show. Thank you. Thank you for having me again, Jay. Always a pleasure, my man. Always a pleasure. Uh before we jump into your charts, how how you feeling right now? It's been uh it's been a wild ride. It's been a while since we've gotten you on the show, too. had you on the show uh I think it was um last fall. So since then, you know, we've gone we we we we got very excited going into the into the end of the year. We had a a bit of a peak and then we've we've dealt with so much macro stuff. What's what's

sort of your take on the current setup right now and how are you feeling about the market? Yeah, I was actually um I think in in early November uh or in November, right, or after the Trump election and we were talking about, you know, that the data was uh really uh looking bullish, you know, turning bullish in that time. So, and we got that, you know, that uh big uh rally to the 100,000 area for Bitcoin, right? And since then we picked and yeah was has been a really volatile year right with all the uh talk about tariffs about the trade war about um the economy the um

yeah um maybe contracting a little bit in the US right so so yeah we have a lot of volatility but I think that we clear that um we got a a better signal of what you know the tarists will be and so the market started to to react again and and the demand uh for for digital assets uh came back. So we that's what we're seeing right now the like the the market and the demand came back after after we get a better sense of what the targets were.

Base case uh and we're going to obviously we we'll we'll give your full case throughout this episode but I always like to give a little bit of teaser. base case, you bullish right now or do you think that we're a little bit overheated and we're due for a correction here? Uh yeah, overall bullish. Um and I I don't think that we are in that stage of overheating um right now. uh when when we got in I think it was um late in January you know we we got into that uh stage of overheating and then we got the correction because of the tariff t but right now right now uh the indicators doesn't doesn't show like we are in in

the in the overheated yet uh so but you know we need to be always be monitoring uh the indicators so so that we we know what what signals they're they're um giving us but right now no and we we're going to see this in in the in the charts uh uh that we're not at that stage at least for now. Mhm. Yeah. Great to hear it. It it the one thing I mean when it's so interesting when markets pump like they are right now it it brings so many people back in and I think that there's still a lot of people that are sitting in fear and uncertainty because there was such a strong market sentiment. You and I were talking about

it before we recorded. It was unbelievable the sentiment shift that happened as a result of tariffs and that that is still that overhang is still here. And so I think that it's there's a lot of there's a lot of cautious optimism right now which leads me to say, hey, we've got some room to run here. And I know we're already running uh right now. I mean, every day you wake up right now and it's like, oh my gosh, here we go. Here we go. Here we go. you're seeing green candles everywhere, particularly uh on on Bitcoin and ETH bouncing back. So, very exciting times.

Okay, let's look at some some charts. Let's start with um let's start with Bitcoin and talk about talk to us about Bitcoin demand and how demand was affected by tariffs and then where you're seeing demand now. Yeah. So that this chart it's um for me is my my best estimate of um how demand for Bitcoin is growing or or contracting. Um so that's what it is um measuring right here and and you can see that you know the the big uh green areas on November after the election right we got that spike in demand. Everyone was really really

bullish. the prices were still under 70k and and and we you could see already like demand growing even as prices uh didn't move a lot and and we got uh because we had this this increase in demand we got into the 100,000 um area for Bitcoin but you can see after that after you know late January demand slowing down right this is growth uh so growth slowing down and and then we got you know in February the the tariff talks started you know Trump started to you know uh make announcements about about this then it came the um on April the the

announcement the official announcements on the tariffs right for every every country and that's why you see that um big red area there uh for demand so demand was actually contracting uh and so yeah when when you say like the market got really bearish. It's because of that and and you can see that in the data like the man contracting um sharply in in that in that uh in that in that period. Uh and so right now um we see demand growing again since um maybe late April when we got you know the the delays on tariffs, right? uh Trump announced the 90 day delay and

then the market I think that um is now seeing that maybe the tariffs aren't as bad as initially right uh in terms of the the you know how how high they were initially when they were announced and so maybe when they were ridiculous it made zero sense exactly so uh and now maybe we we do have the taries but it will be much much lower right so that's that causes a sentiment shift Right. And so since uh late April um early May, you see, you know, that uh demand for Bitcoin. So this is spot demand actually. And so you see that it started to grow again as people realize this and and you can see how they started to to

buy again. And of course uh prices uh prices um also uh increase it. So right now we are I think we touched a record high today, right? as demand continues continues to expand. So, so yeah, that's uh you know the first the first uh clue from the data uh that demand is growing. Um uh still not as much as in January, but you know it's a it's a really big uh shift from what we saw in March, April. It's so exciting. Have we hit all-time highs? I'm just checking right now. Uh are we at all-time highs? I think for a little bit we touch it, you know. We're just below 109 now. Yeah. Yeah, for a

little bit we touch it. Did we wick above 109? Yeah. Yeah. 109. We got to get you on the show more often, man. Look at this. You come on the show. Alltime highs. Let's go. Uh just while we're while we're mentioning tariffs, one thing that's very interesting to me is I fully agree with you that we're getting a lot more certainty around tariffs. Um, but we also have a lot of 90-day pauses. And I think that one thing that the market needs to keep an eye on is the the end of those 90-day pauses. So, I feel very good. We had a great episode live on X yesterday with Arthur Hayes and he talked a lot about how he is very bullish through end of

June, mid July, but then he gets quite bearish again into end of July and into August because a lot of these tariff pauses are especially the tariff pause the 90-day tariff pause with China are going to expire and when those expire is when you can expect to see uncertainty again because we'll be coming up to those dates. very good chance we might I mean unless we get a magical deal and like everyone's like let's go everyone's happy I just especially with US China I don't know if that's going to be the case and so I think really it it just shows how much you need to stay tuned in to the market to make sure and and to macro right now uh because you and I were saying ahead of the show as well like the the headline risk as a result

of Trump is so extreme and is not going to go away for the next four years. So, uh, sorry everybody listening in, but you're going to have to tune in to the show or some show every day for the next four years because there's just too much too much so much noise and so many things that could happen. Yeah, there could be um, you know, yeah, just adding to that there could be like volatility around those uh u, right? And and so but I what I like about you know looking at the hard data is, you know, you can see how it reacts to to the headlines, right? And so, okay, let's look at demand when that happens. Let's look at valuations and and all that. So, yeah, but definitely we do have to be

monitoring this because, you know, it's Trump um he just uh makes announcements and and so we we really don't know what he will announce next. Uh but I think that that's uh you know why the data is here and to you know to monitor that that those um how how it the market responds to those headlines. Mhm. Okay. Let's look at how the whales are responding right now. Yeah. So this one is um you know how how the big investors or whales um how the how their balances are changing. This is so um what you see here is the one-year growth or contraction in their balances right so

obviously uh you see price rallying when they are you know increasing their balances so they are are um uh buying bitcoin right uh so the these big big investors and it's it shows you more about the cycle right and so right now I mean since uh 2024 we have a positive you know a positive increase in their balances So whales are are buying but you see a little bit of a dip there uh around you know April March you know as a response to this uh and so that in in that period we uh had some some uh you know uncertainty about okay maybe this is a shift in the trend right um but as

we got more clarity to to the current situation we see that they're they are increasing again they're their their balances. So this is these whales are are buying Bitcoin, right? So and and and this is uh you know just to clarify when we see whales and we are excluding like the the we're following addresses, right? But we're excluding exchanges, we're excluding like mining pools just to you know uh take out all of the noise that that generates. But uh this is just like the the excluding those or investors. Um uh so yeah uh still you know we see a a clear upward trend there. Uh that uh resume after after

tariffs got we got more clarity on tariffs which to me just says anybody anybody who bought Bitcoin below 80K in the recent pullback like way to go celebrate that massively. you nailed that. Uh even if you bought below 85K, to be honest, you should be pleased with yourself right now because it seems like that was truly a short-term blip that we all our our sentiment and our fear made it feel like it was going to be something longterm, but it doesn't it's the chart is not showing that. Yeah. And and you know for for a moment really if if we if Trump was um you know getting um with the tariffs it it could be like

that. Uh it could have been like a you know a really a bare market in a in a way but you know we we started to see that he backed down from the from the targets and and lower them. So that's why that's why we we saw these uh investors and demand coming back, right? One thing that we talk a lot about on the show is liquidity and stable coins have been consistently growing. When you look at stable coin market cap, what does that tell you about liquidity in the market?

Yeah. So for total market cap, we actually have seen this this year, you know, a record height of of market cap for for all stable coins, you know, as as a whole. Uh and what we like to to look at and to follow is the how how the market cap of USD is growing like the growth rate. Um you know through all these um metrics um you will see that we mostly look at growth rates not not exactly like the level uh but how how fast uh is is the this metric growing or not right and so this is showing that that growth rate for USDT market cap USDT is the largest stable coin it's you know USDT is um used a lot for you know

trading and so it it it um it tells you how much liquidity there is in in crypto uh how is entering the market right if you follow this and so the same you you see the same like um in in that chart the trend also increasing again you know the um market cap of USDT in the last 30 days 60 days is what this is um uh measuring it's about seven seven billion you know it's adding seven billion in the last 60 days and and it's about trend that's growth and so you you see that being um correlated to the price increase also. So it's more liquidity into the market of course it it looks to where

where to to go right and so it's uh it's it's it's going to to the to these assets like Bitcoin and and also you know providing more more demand for for those assets. So in terms of liquidity we also you know seeing there like the increase again after after you know since May or you know the the trend is again to to to uh seeing more growth in liquidity. Let's talk about you and I I mentioned this before is um you know is the market overheated right now is a big question that I have uh because when everything gets so bullish so fast you know it's very easy to say okay wait a second are we getting are we are we overheating but

you're saying that we're not overheating what's let's look at the charts what are the number what are the charts telling us yeah so this is uh one of of the metrics that I really like to to to to to look at to assess this. So the purple area there is is what is measuring is um our estimate of um the traders, you know, the people that just trade Bitcoin, you know, from from one to three months, right? You know, what's their their unrealized profit margins? So they they buy and then the if the price increase, they have a profit, right? But they haven't it's a paper profit, right? They haven't realized that profit. So we tracked like that that unrealized profit

the level in terms of uh you know uh percentage so of of profit. And so what you see there is when when this unrealized profit margin gets really high you know one of the first uh per uh levels that we track is 40% around 40% profit is considered like it's high. So the so the price is is um really high respect um relative to to their purchase price, right? So um that's one indication of okay, maybe we are entering into overheating uh territory here. And and when it gets really high to 70 70% margin uh profit margin, it's

definitely like overheating, you know, way way overheated for for Bitcoin. So, and you can see there in the past uh local tops that we seen since 2023 how when it goes to 40% profit margin and then we should expect like correction in prices because they will start selling you know all these traders will start selling and realizing that profit right so in early this year in January we got to the $100,000 uh area that profit was you know above 50% right so it was really really high uh and so you can start you know say saying okay maybe we are like

overheating right um in that at that at that moment right so right now uh even when Bitcoin is above um 100,000 the profit margin is right now around 25% so uh in looking at this metric isolated metric you you can say that okay we're not still like overheating at this point right compared to when we were in the hundreds thousands in January we were already overheated right so yeah that's that's the the message from from this chart is okay yeah you know uh profit margins are higher right uh right now but um they're not at those

levels in which we uh start saying okay maybe we are overheated I I I want to ask the natural question that I know everyone listening and watching this is going to have, which is at what price could the market become overheated, but I'm not going to ask that yet because we're going to get to that uh in a few charts. Um let's talk first though about um the overall market conditions. Let's stick with this overheated theme. Uh when you look at the overall market conditions, are we in bullish territory still? Are we feeling bullish? Are we are we in bearish territory? where you see us. Yeah. So this chart uh it's all our bull score index. Uh so it it tracks 10 onchain metrics that uh we think that are um

really important metrics in order to track the you know the the cycles in the market um even the long-term or the more short-term cycles. Right? So it goes from zero to 100. uh and if it's 100 is the most bullish, right? Or that green area that you see there, it's when we say we are in uh bullish territory or below 40 is when we start um you know saying like okay we are in in in bearish territory. So right now you know we are at 80. So it's that the index is at 80.

So it's it's inside bullish territory and so we can say that okay overall we think that we are in a you know bullish territory and so how it works if you see like the um early in the year when we were at 100,000 in February um the this index was already at um no when we were like in 90 95 something like that so we came down to 95 this index was already at 30. So already indicating you know the conditions are bearish even uh as prices were at 90 right. So if you look at this you would you know as a risk um tool you would say okay there's a risk

of correction right because we are still at 95 but the this index is already telling me that we are in a bearish bearish area uh bearish period and and after that you see how the prices uh you know we got that correction in April um so towards even as I think it we were as low as 74 at some point Right? But as we get, you know, a clearer view on the tariffs and and and all that and the demand came back, right? And so we see that we started to get into bullish territory again uh especially when prices were coming up again to the 90s.

And so that's that's that's uh where we are right now like uh in in bullish territory overall uh looking at this at this 10 um these 10 onchain metrics that we follow. Uh so yeah that's this is a really good tool as a summary of what's hap what's happening in the market because there's a lot of data there's a lot of um news there's a lot of noise and the the why I did this uh this um indicator is because you know let's strip all the noise and just focus on on on what the signals are telling us right so so yeah we are in in in overall bullish territory right now let's go very excited thing. Okay, next

we got to jump to before we get to your price predictions on BTC and where you think the range is over the next few months, uh we got to look at the um MRVR um sorry MVRV uh for for Bitcoin because this is one of our favorite charts we often look at on the show. Uh when you look at this chart, what are you seeing right now? So yeah, the the way I see this one, so this is, you know, comparing the price to the the market price to the average um cost, right, of the entire Bitcoin um supply, right? And so what this typically indicates is how how high the price is relative to that. So uh in in

previous market tops it goes to you know um really close to one in in this uh in this uh metric. It's the red area there. Right? So that's one way to see it. And so all these bull markets since we started in 2023 we haven't had that you know indicator go to the overall we haven't gone to euphoric stages yet. Yeah. Exactly. So that's one way to look at this and say okay we're not in that stage of when we think that the cycle has you know we had peak right for the cycle right so that's one way to to see it but uh what I learned in 2021 uh if you look at um yeah was late 2021

when we picked uh in the past cycle we we weren't in that area right like that that red area um but the indicator was already you know going on a downward trend. So that's why you see there you know the the the dotted line there is like the average the moving average of the indicator right so that's another way to to look at is okay the indicator is above or below its average right because what I've learned is that we don't necessarily uh need to go to those euphoric um um stages or by by um measuring this indicator but the indicator can go below a trend And that will tell you like uh there's a a shift

in in the price trend, right? So so for when we were in in April, March, April, the indicator actually went uh below its average, right? So that was an indication of we are in bearish territory and and you need to manage your risk there. So but right now it it it crossed above again. So um if we think that at least it has to go to the previous peak the indicator so we still have that that uh room to for the price to increase for the price of Bitcoin to increase but but I I always you know will tell you that um look for the indicator crossing below it's this is uh um really important uh for for for risk

management. Yeah, this would say to me I mean as you said we don't it you know getting up into the um where the M the MVRV is above 08 like you know touching up to one I don't know if we'll get there again right like I don't know like I'm with you I don't think we go so if you're if you're making your bets and you should never make your trades based on one chart but if you're making your bets based upon waiting for that there's a good chance you're just you're going to be waiting forever ever. We're not going to get there. Right now, we're sitting around 0.2 I think about 0.15.2.

Um, which is which is pretty reasonable. Like that's a that's a level where I'm like, "Yeah, I feel good buying. I feel good getting in." Uh, where where where do you think we could see this go to or peak within this cycle? like at what point would you be looking at this and saying now I think that this might be a signal that we're we're getting towards the peak. Yeah. So yeah, I agree. No, it it it doesn't need to go to the you know extreme area. So what I would look is to the previous um local tops for the indicator. You can see that in you know in March of this year then in in Yeah, those ones.

Exactly. and and you see those local tops compare that to you know 2021 November it was the same right like uh it's the same area so that will be for me if I'm looking just into this one you know look for that in that area how how we at the moment that we hit that area for the indicator what what are the what are the other variables doing like okay what's demand doing and what's the profit margins of you know traders and and all all other um how many how many bitcoins flowing to exchanges. So that will be for me you know to look at just looking at this indicator the previous local

tops seemed like a it had been a really a really important resistance. Yeah it's a great great point. Uh and that resistance is around 04. Yeah point4 exactly it's around point4. Uh, okay. The the thing that I know everybody wants to hear is price predictions. Um, but these aren't really price predictions. These are more um your the range that you could see us floating between. And I want to I want to talk about time frame here. This is within the next one to two months. This is a shortterm time range. Uh, which is great because everybody loves to talk cycle end. And cycle end is who the heck knows, right? what happens between now

and the end of this year or Q1 or Q2 2026 because lots of people are predicting that the cycle could extend longer. So within the next few months, what do you expect to see from Bitcoin? Yeah, so in this chart actually you know the the bands that you see there the the dotted lines um are derived from the traders uh profit margin that we saw in the previous chart. Right? So at the top like the dotted red line it's it's the price at which the trader's profit margin will be at se that 70% uh which is extremely overheated. Right?

So that's that's the equivalent price that will get you to that uh 70% profit margin. And then the the line uh below that the next line below that uh which is the orange dotted line it's the price at which the pro the traders will uh be on sitting on a 40% unrealized profit margin right so and you can see that the price tends to go to those lines when when it stops right because at this at that point uh there's so much profit to be made by selling so that's why we get selling pressure that um from uh at those levels, right? Uh and so if you look at at those prices right now, you

know, the the max price that we should expect uh will be around uh 140,000, right? For that max uh which is, you know, it's it's we we actually got it in in 2024. We we got to that ban. It was lower of course, but we could get to that uh um as as the max price right now. And and the the other the other price is what we call the the upper band. It's around 118,000 uh for for for Bitcoin. So, so yeah, it's it's not a prediction but it's it helps you to really um you know really get some I would say like what will be

the plausible prices to expect right uh you know um I don't like like uh when people is just saying no we're going to 500,000 you know and I mean we could get there eventually but you know in the short term to medium term it's not it's not really plausible. And so that's why these bands are for like okay they tell you like okay what's the normal thing to spec uh for prices. So that that's it's between that um 118,000 140 if we get really uh and and then also these lines also um uh are good to to to look at for um for

price to um what's the lower price that we could get right uh so right now that is around uh 84 84,000 uh four. So that's the range that I would expect. Of course this um change every day because uh you know traders are selling and buying selling and buying and and we are tracking that you know at which price they are selling and buying right so so yeah that's uh that's uh you know the range but it it will it will definitely change uh but that's that's the normal I would say someone should expect in the next next few months. Yeah. And and and Okay. So just to range you're looking at is there's a

a pretty solid target of Bitcoin getting to 118K. There's a upper max you're seeing right now around 143,000. So Bitcoin's targeting somewhere between that range which to be honest from everything I'm hearing feels pretty good right now. Um, now that that being said, you pulled this chart yesterday, so it's not like this is very old data, but things are moving fast right now. We're seeing big green candles. So, you know, yesterday when you pulled this chart, we were at 106K, right? Now, we're Yeah, we're so Yeah, there is a need to really stay up to date on this. Um, it feels it feels like though that in the short

term, yeah, I also feel pretty good about this. I feel pretty good about this like 120 to 150 range within within the short term for Bitcoin. There's a lot of tailwinds right now. I don't really see any I don't see any negative catalyst in the short term. I think we've priced in tariffs. I don't think we're going to see much noise there in the short term other than some positive noise. Uh I think we've priced in Powell and the Fed not basically doing anything and sitting on their hands. Nobody's expecting them to do much at the next meeting in June.

So, it feels like just sort of smooth seas and we could sail here up to this, you know, 120, maybe we even get up to 140, 150 range in the next month or two, which uh let's go. That feels pretty pretty good, everybody. And you can see how, you know, last time we we we we hit all-time highs was also the same time we hit above 100K for the first time, which, as you said, a lot of people had a lot of profit. And so we couldn't sustain that because there's just too much sell pressure because so many people were like, "Hell yeah." Like I can't believe we're above 100K where probably a lot of people and let's go. I got some profit to take. So we couldn't sustain it. This time it's a different

setup. We're much more sustainable. So I don't think we should fear this all-time high the same way we we it was a different different state last time. So yeah, feeling feeling pretty good. Um, Julio, this is making me think we got to get you back on the show in a in a month to revisit this because uh things are gonna I think things are going to move fast over the next month. Uh, okay. Any final thoughts to share on Bitcoin before we chat quickly about ETH before we we let you go? Yeah, so again, I mean, this is something that uh I always want to remind people. It's something that you need to be monitoring, right? um or or you know seeing the data as it comes uh and and what you know what these movements and

what sentiment how is it you know reflected in in traders and investors actions and it's reflected on in onchain data. So always monitoring don't don't uh take this charts of okay that's what it is right now and it should go you know as as I expect no we we need to be monitoring this you know on a day-to-day basis and and this is uh why why we are here for fully agree okay let's take a look at ETH so ETH has just been I mean it's the that the the it's the asset that everybody likes to laugh about um but everybody's got big bags in it. I certainly do and I'm still bullish ETH.

Uh but uh when you look at ETH um you put out a report last week basically stating that you believe that ETH is undervalued. Uh talk to us about what you're seeing when you look at ETH. Let me pull up a chart here as well for you. Yeah. Um yeah, exactly. So the way that um I mean you can analyze it on its own, right? But I think that is um more helpful to analyze it you know with respect to bitcoin with respect to what bitcoin is is doing and so that way you can compare like uh really what's happening on on it. So one way to we do it is to to uh estimate how overvalued or undervalued ETH would is relative to

Bitcoin, right? And so what we're seeing right now is uh if you look at those uh red circles there uh so this is the MBRB uh ratio but for the two coins at the same time, right? The relative price and the relative uh MBRB for these two two coins. And so the MBRB of for the price of Ethereum relative to Bitcoin um has has um reached really undervalued levels which are the um when when the indicator enters this green zone that we see there and this hn't happened since um I think was yeah 2019 around July 2019. So uh it hasn't happened in you

know almost six years right. So under this criteria you know the price of seed is just too low. It's really really low right. Um uh what will it do next? you know, it's it, you know, it's really difficult, right, to say, but it it definitely is at all-time lows relative to Bitcoin and and not just the price, but the relative value of of the two. Um, so it's really undervalued historically. The last time, as you said, this hasn't happened in uh almost six years. uh the last time and and previous the previous three times looking at this chart three times that the the the MRV VR ratio MVRV ratio has

has hit this level what is what has happened subsequently in in the past. Yeah. So exactly so the the price of it um or it outperformed Bitcoin in the next in the next months right uh after that. So after 2019, uh, Ethereum outperformed Bitcoin for the next, uh, almost three years, right? Uh, and so that's that's historically what h what has happened. So that's the message here is like uh, Ethereum is really undervalued and historically when this has happened um, then Ethereum starts to outperform Bitcoin. Um, and so we we saw a little bit of that. We have

seen a little bit of that since you know since last week actually um uh that Ethereum uh price has has rallied faster than Bitcoin. Um is this something that will continue? Um I really uh can't say but uh just from a valuation perspective if you are you know an Ethereum bull is something to consider right that right now it's it's it's it's maybe have it has bottom relative to Bitcoin. Yeah it certainly feels feels like it has bottomed relative to Bitcoin. I agree though in the short term I'm not sure. I'm just not sure. Uh, Bitcoin has

so much demand. It has a it is on a different path than it's been on in the past because of institutions and government uh approval um by you know governments putting it on their balance sheets by Trump making a strategic Bitcoin reserve. These things we didn't have in the past. And so it's difficult to know if I think Bitcoin I think you and I both agree Bitcoin runs from here, right? I think short-term Bitcoin is looking really good. It's strong case to get into that 120 140 150 maybe beyond it range. ETH does it follow in the short term here? I don't know what what's what's your short-term expectations on ETH? Yeah. So I agree their conditions are not the same right

like in the past um because of what you have seen say like for Bitcoin but also for Ethereum because uh in the past it was basically the only you know smart contract platform out there uh and so it was attracting a lot of the capital and development for those type of um blockchains right now it has more competition much more competition from other blockchains so so the conditions this I would say the structural conditions are not the same right so this is just an analysis from a pure you know price um price um pure a pure price perspective right uh it's just saying it's it's too too

low it can go I mean it wouldn't expect to go much much lower right so but yeah I I agree with that and also if you see like that chart the the the period in which it outperforms is is like it's not you know really fast after that right it's it's a long process uh so you shouldn't expect like right away oh yeah you know just buy Ethereum and it will go you know much much faster than Bitcoin it's a really slow process in which all that you know uh starts to to play Sorry, Julio. I don't know if you can

hear me. My My computer is struggling right now. All this Bitcoin madness. Everyone's as as Bitcoin pumps here, my computer breaks down. Uh the other thing I would say on ETH is the the the uh thanks the the one the one of the big things going against it as you said was all the other L L1 trade all the other smart contract trades that you could make and Solana really has dominated that that narrative uh basically uh since throughout this entire cycle right since the FTX crash when Salana hit below $10, which is insane to think

right now. Um, and and but the thing is that narrative has shifted away from Salana, right? Like Salana's really been affected by the memecoin narrative and all the negativity and the grifting around meme coins and it's lot a little bit it's lost a little bit of its shine. And then at the same time, the ETH narrative has shifted as a result of them addressing their leadership issues, of them getting out more in the public and speaking more and being less of this like academic research foundation. And so from the from an from more of a um not an onchain fundamental perspective, but more of a sentiment perspective, I

see the shift in ETH happening right now. And I I see I see optimism for sure. uh shortterm I'm still not the one thing I'm not sure about and and would love to end with this question for you is um okay so we feel bit good about Bitcoin now uh when we look beyond Bitcoin and we talk about altcoin season one thing that everybody seems to agree on is we will we will get an altcoin season but it won't be the same as past there's too many assets now it's not going to be a every single token goes up like it was in past years so my question to you is uh do you think we will get an altcoin season? When do you think we will get it? Is this a it's going to

happen soon type of thing or is this more of a it comes later in this cycle? And and how do you see that playing out? Yeah. Yeah. So I think that what I've seen for altcoins is that in the past cycles altcoin season meant that basically every token rallied right like a really fast basically every token. So um and so what what we've seen I guess right in this cycle is that altcoin season is not for every token.

It's it's about you know the ones that are really you know delivering something or maybe it's new tokens you know like we've seen um AI tokens for example you know they they have probably but it's a it's like um like a niche right um so we could get or we have seen an alco season but it's it's not like a general alcoin season it's going to be more focused on which tokens are developing something new or really delivering what they promise uh you know as a product right so it's it's more I think I would say that's more about that uh about which altcoin is really um you

know doing something different or or really delivering the product or the application that they are supposed to be delivering and so yeah so to to answer the question like an alcoin season in general Maybe it's not like that, but it's more like a niche. So, you need to be aware of, okay, where are those niche uh and and and where are those um tokens that really, you know, have found a product that people use or or or that attract capital or development or, you know, Yeah. It's more more about that. Yeah.

And and the the things that I think about on that angle are I don't know what happened to my video here, folks. Looks like my video is just crapped out. My computer is just struggling right now. Uh the things I think about there are Okay, so if we're not going to get an altcoin season, but we are going to get uh um segment altcoin seasons, which I agree. We had an AI coin season. We had a long memecoin season already. And so it's very easy to sit here and say, "Oh, we didn't have an altcoin season because my L1's and my L2s didn't didn't have their season." Well, no, those didn't have the season. I think that that's exactly that same thing is likely to happen again here. I'm not saying that the L1's and L2s don't get it this time, though. The question is, who is it

this time? Is it memecoin season? I think pretty clearly I think we're going to get an AI season again just because AI is such a a massive narrative outside of crypto. And honestly, I I think we got to be pretty clear here. An AI season is very similar to a memecoin season. These are not fundamentally based projects. They are all hype right now. But then when you look at the fundamental side, which I really that's the side I'm more bullish on, I think about two sectors. I think about a DeFi season and I think about a DPIN season.

I think a DeFi season seems very likely. I don't know when, but it feels very likely ma ma mainly because there is so much demand coming for a lot of these DeFi projects from institutions who will look at fundamentals and will be able to value these projects, but also because these DeFi projects, there's only a handful of them that have real revenue and they have token buyback programs. And what do token buyback programs do? They create consistent demand for your token which enables it. It's why a lot of the DeFi projects, the leading DeFi projects, Maker, A, you go down the list, a lot of them have held up fairly well while the rest of the market really

struggled because they have these buyback programs that continue even if there's a macro scare or tariffs, it doesn't change that. So, is there a segment or a sector within altcoins that you are watching closely and you feel good about? Yeah. So there's uh the other sector that really has grown a lot. I mean this is the ones that you know it's stable coins, right? But there are some projects that you know there's tokens that um you know their their project is around the stable coins, right? So um like Athena or Maker like that. Exactly like those. Yeah. So that

sector if I just look at um what's coming in terms of there's a lot of also like traditional institutions that are coming to this sector right and so it's not it's not getting exposure of course to the stable coin right but to the projects that use stable coins to provide you know some service you know some some right now it's okay it's yield or but you know those those type of projects that that will use uh the growing stable coin ecosystem to to to make know right to build services. So I I think that uh yeah, stable coins definitely is is the the ones that have

um a pound product market in in in in crypto and and so as it grows more and more traditional institutions come into into the this sector, there will be you know projects that will build around you know the stable coin ecosystem. Yeah. Yeah. So maybe we get a stable coin season. I kind of loop stable coins in with DeFi often, but maybe we should segment those because they are different. Like you could have stable coins and DeFi as two categories. And I mean I think it makes a lot of sense that we going to get a stable coin season if you were to look at those projects for a few reasons.

One, I mean the Genius Act just took, which is the stable coin bill in the US, just passed a big vote in the Senate on Monday, which it's not the final vote. The legislation is not done, but it's the biggest vote in the process. There's a few more votes to go, but basically everyone's now saying it's a done deal. We've passed the hard vote. We got the we got the bipartisan support we needed to get it through the Senate. So, that's huge. And when you think about that, like what are the tailwinds of that? Like I can't even imagine the number of tradi companies that are waiting on the sidelines that want to use stable coins or already are using stable coins. Uh or even the tech companies like Google uses

stable coins a ton internally like internally they use it to pay their team members around the world. They use it for a lot of internal uses. Well, I'll guarantee you they're they're limiting their use of it because they are worried about regulation. They don't want to go too far. They want to test it. They want to be prepared so if the regulation does pass, they can jump in. And that's a lot of people. There's a lot of capital waiting on the sidelines. I don't know if you have a stable coin prediction. But I'm everyone I'm talking to is thinking stable coins somewhere between could easily could pass 500 billion. You know, we're well on our way uh you know that would be a massive all-time high.

Obviously almost double from where we are right now. But lots of people thinking we could get to one trillion in stable coins in this cycle. And even more importantly that stable coins are going way beyond that in the long term. Right? So even beyond this cycle it is it is an upward trend. I mean if you look at the stable coin chart it basically never goes down. It only goes sideways in bare markets. It does not go down. So I think yeah it feels like a no-brainer there. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Definitely agree. and and this all um especially as you say like this um tech companies also are you know coming again into the into the into the industry right so also like meta is also thinking you know they tried before yeah

I guess wasn't there right and so now we have they have a more you know clear um regulation in place or it will be um a clear regulation in the US so Yeah, definitely. Uh these are massive massive companies, right? Uh global companies. So, yeah, we could easily get there for stable coin. One of one of one of and I didn't even mentioned Stripe. Actually, Stripe just launched their stable coin stable coin accounts, I think it's called. I can't exactly remember the name of it, but basically what it allows you to do is anybody who has a business on Stripe can now offramp into stable coins. So, you could like skip a bank, right? Like usually if you have a business on Stripe, you need to take

your money out of Stripe. You take it into your bank account and then you you do whatever you want within your business. But now what you could do is you could just go straight from your Stripe account straight into a wallet into a stable coin. That's huge, right? That is huge. And we just they just launched that a few weeks ago. Like the Yeah. The the the the tailwinds on stable coins and what's coming here, it's just going to be mass. As you said, there is rumors that Facebook Meta is either going to build their own stable coin, which feels like such an obvious thing for them to do, or they I could see them buying. One of the big takes that uh that Kyle um my coowner at Milro has is that he thinks that Meta will buy a massive stable coin company like a

Circle or something like that. And we've heard recently that Circle is preipo exploring maybe selling, right? And Coinbase and Ripple are very interested. So there's there's a lot of things happening here that I think we we need to move beyond the tariff world. We need to get excited about get excited about the future again and we need to notice it's almost like we need to reposition our mind to where we were coming into 2025 and feeling so incredibly bullish. That is I think we're we're back in that place because none of those things that were happening in in 2024 have gone away. like none, none of the growth, none of the legislation, none of all those things that we needed to in order

to mature the space that are going to allow more capital to come in. All that stuff still exists. We just had a tariff scare. So, yeah, game on. Let's go. Yeah. Yeah. Agree completely. Okay, Julio, fantastic. Thank you so much for having on the show. It was a long one. We went long, but you know, the charts are so good, my man. Uh huge vow to you and the team over at CryptoQuant, everybody listening in. Uh we will link to the reports that we discussed today. If you guys want to see any of these charts, if you want to see the deck that we discussed, we'll link to that in the show notes. You can check it out. As always, just go ahead. Can I just make a really quick announcement? Of course. Uh yep. So, uh pizza day is coming, right?

And so we cry have a some u some um you know discounts um for for the pizza day starting tomorrow. I think it's for a week. So, if you go to Cryptocoin, there's going to be um discounts up to 30% if you uh subscribe to to our our plans. So, just uh check it out starting tomorrow. And uh again, thank you. Thank you for this cryptoquant.com. And so, thank you. Thank you for the invite. No doubt. Always great to get you on the show, Julio. Let us know in the comments if you want us to get Julio back on the show. Uh celebrate Pizza Day. Go check out CryptoQuant. Great service. Really big fans of them. Uh, and I got to remember you guys, oh, before we let you

go, none of this is financial advice. Do your own research. This is the show is for entertainment andformational purposes only. Julio and I are not your financial advisor. You should know that investing is risky and you should only invest what you're prepared to lose. And I got to remind you one more time, Milk Road Swap, 1 million in volume, which is huge for us. We're very excited about it. So, if you're swapping, go check out Milk Road Swap. Have a wicked awesome day, y'all. We'll see you back again tomorrow.