Crypto Secrets Revealed: Why 75% Fail!

Even though mad gains are currently being posted, the stark fact is that most people won’t end up making money in this bull market. It may be hard to imagine at a time like this, when one of the first things you do every morning is check your portfolio and muse on how beautiful life is, but in order for a few to win, most must end up losing.

If you follow the Coinfessions X account, you’ll have frequently come up against some brutal reality checks that get posted there. Stories of people taking the most enormous Ls, shared with us so that we might not meet the same fate. If you don’t follow Coinfessions, then you should, because it reminds us all-too frequently just how catastrophically crypto can trip up the unwary.

In today’s video, we cover a recent report Coinfessions co-authored, which reveals some shocking facts and stats about the state of crypto market participants. It reveals who’s winning, who’s losing, who knows their stuff and who’s making it up as they go along. All of which gives us some valuable insights into how we can avoid becoming one of those folks who feel compelled to share their failure with the world.

You can watch that video here.

📈 Crypto Market Forecast 📈

Last week was sunny for the crypto market. This week though, you’re going to need sunglasses when looking at prices. Bitcoin hitting a key psychological level of $100k has put it back in the headlines not just in the US, but internationally. Tens, possibly hundreds of millions of people are going to hear about this and think ‘I’ve missed out on Bitcoin. What about the other cryptos?’

Case in point, we’re starting to see significant rotation into altcoins. This can be checked using the OTHERS chart, which measures the total market cap of all cryptos outside of the top 10. In other words, it measures the total market cap of most altcoins that everyone was saying would be replaced by memecoins. You don’t need to be a trader to see that altcoins are breaking out.

This is where things get interesting. As you might have heard, Microsoft will decide whether to allocate some of its massive treasury to Bitcoin this week, specifically on Tuesday. The consensus view seems to be that its board of directors have asked shareholders to vote against this proposal. This is good news, because it means a rejection is the base case and is therefore priced in. If there is a surprise approval to accumulate Bitcoin, then this would be very bullish, as it’s not priced in.

But, what if Microsoft’s shareholders decide to allocate to another crypto instead of, or in addition to, Bitcoin? Some of you might remember that KPMG, one of the big four auditing companies, added both Bitcoin and Ethereum to its balance sheet in the previous cycle. Other large tech companies like Reddit, and even OnlyFans, have held Ethereum too.

Put simply, the most underpriced scenario is the possibility that Microsoft will opt to buy Ethereum in lieu of or in addition to Bitcoin. This is in fact possible given that the tech giant is clearly interested in diversifying its treasury with crypto. Newsflash, but this would be an extremely bullish catalyst for Ethereum that would come completely out of left field. Consider that some asset managers have pitched Ethereum as the ‘Microsoft of Blockchains’.

There’s a big catalyst to watch on the macro front as well, and that’s the CPI print for November. It will be published this Wednesday, and could likewise be supportive of crypto and altcoins specifically. That’s just because a decline in CPI would increase the chances that the Fed will lower interest rates at its meeting later this month. For those who don’t know, crypto is inversely correlated to interest rates, particularly altcoins.

What’s fascinating is that crypto, including altcoins, has been doing very well given that interest rates have been elevated. This is fascinating because it underscores the fact that crypto-specific factors are the primary drivers of price action at this point in time. It’s also fascinating because it highlights the possibility that the altcoin rally will get even bigger if interest rates start falling - this macro headwind could become a tailwind.

More importantly, charts like the yield on the 10-year Treasury (which affects long-term interest rates) suggest that interest rates have started rolling over, and could continue to fall. In case it wasn’t clear enough, this foreshadows a very bullish macro backdrop for altcoins in the coming weeks. And we still have the Santa Rally to look forward to at the end of the month!

If you’ve been reading this newsletter since 2022, pat yourself on the back. You’ve made it.

🦖 Jurassic Rally 🦖

Over the past few weeks, most experienced crypto market participants were caught off-guard by an unexpected rally among a cohort of old altcoins collectively mocked as ‘dino coins.’

This included the likes of XRP, ADA, TRX, XLM and HBAR. The resurgence of these altcoins, whose price potential was deemed ‘extinct’ by many in the lead-up to a new bull market rally was impressive, to say the least.

Most of these coins hit local highs and a few even made new all-time highs. That said, at first glance, this rally seemingly came out of nowhere. This has left many scratching their heads when it comes to the questions: ‘why dino coins?’ and ‘why now?’

The answer to this question may not be as straightforward as you’d think. While some crypto analysts believe this rally is likely a result of institutional interest in older cryptos, others believe it’s a sign that retail investors from previous cycles are returning to the market.

For what it’s worth, they’re both right.

First, the rally for these dino coins appears to have started immediately after the results of the US election became clear. Trump’s victory was seen as a positive for the industry given his pro-crypto stance throughout his election campaign.

Once Trump’s victory was confirmed, the hopes of crypto holders everywhere were realised as we received news of SEC Chair Gary Gensler’s resignation from his post in January next year. The market priced this news as bullish considering that the SEC under Gensler’s leadership had ushered in a predominantly hostile environment for digital asset innovation and regulation in the US.

The bullish sentiment was further compounded as we began receiving news of pro-crypto candidates being considered to lead the country’s top regulatory agencies. Over the last couple of weeks, Trump followed through on his promises by appointing pro-crypto candidates Scott Bessent, Paul Atkins and Howard Lutnick as Treasury Secretary, SEC Chair and Secretary of Commerce respectively.

And remember too how the industry also secured a massive win on the regulatory side in a landmark court dispute involving the Tornado Cash protocol. So, considering all these factors, it shouldn’t be too surprising that institutional investors are considering listing spot ETFs for assets like HBAR and XRP.

Second, the relatively dull change in trading volumes on altcoin-BTC pairs, while we see a massive spike in trading volumes on altcoin-fiat pairs, shows that new liquidity is entering the market. For what it’s worth, it makes sense that this new liquidity is likely coming from returning retail investors. After all, these dino altcoins were incredibly popular during previous cycles.

The fact that BTC has been hitting new all-time highs recently is likely pulling those retail crypto investors who left during the bear phase back into the market. These returning retail investors, who are likely unfamiliar with most newer projects, could be adding to their old crypto bags of XRP, ADA and others in an attempt to secure a better overall entry price.

That said though, a third category of crypto analysts believe this rally is nothing more than a variation of what made memecoins popular as an investment among a certain category of crypto-native traders in recent months.

While not everyone agrees with that point of view, it is true that ‘attention’ is what moves the markets at any given time.

Regardless, XRP, ADA and TRX (the three most notable dino coins to see massive rallies) all had a bit of speculation and/or rumour helping to fuel their pumps.

In the case of XRP, the pump seems to be largely driven by speculation surrounding bullish developments in its long legal battle against the SEC. Not to mention the number of asset managers filing to list a spot XRP ETF, and the NYDFS’s speculated approval of Ripple’s RLUSD stablecoin. Note that the delay in official confirmation of RLUSD’s approval has since resulted in the price of XRP falling.

Regardless, this spike in attention even saw traders attempt to launch memecoins on the XRP Ledger (XRPL). Irrespective of how profitable XRPL memecoin traders are, the new wave of attention seems to have prompted XRPL developers to lower the base reserve for accounts by 90% from 10 XRP to 1 XRP. Could this be the start of a new memecoin meta on XRPL? Who knows.

As for ADA, most of its price action was driven by speculation that Cardano founder Charles Hoskinson could be part of the Trump administration in 2025. For context, the rumours originate from a recent video in which Hoskinson claimed he was setting up a policy office within his company to support cryptocurrency policy development in the United States. This brought attention back to Cardano, even though there was no mention of Hoskinson receiving any formal invitation from the incoming Trump administration to join a crypto policy department.

ADA also experienced a second-hand pump on rumours that recent interactions between Charles and Ripple CTO David Schwartz suggest a potential partnership between their two projects.

Finally, TRX’s recent spike seems to come from founder Justin Sun being named as an advisor to Trump’s World Liberty Financial DeFi project. Not to mention the various other publicity stunts pulled by Sun in recent weeks, including consuming a multi-million-dollar art piece and bull-posting TRX with comparisons to other dino coins.

That said, the most notable pump for TRX appeared to come from the political instability in South Korea. For context, South Koreans are calling for the impeachment of President Yoon Suk Yeol after he announced the brief imposition of martial law in the country. In that context, crypto traders in South Korea seem to be taking capital out of local crypto exchanges using TRX and the Tron network. The role of South Korean degens in the pumps for XRP and others should also not be underestimated.

However, it’s unclear how much longer optimism and attention will remain focused on these dino altcoins. If you ask us, barring any further catalysts, returning investors will likely begin rotating their capital to newer projects once they re-familiarise themselves with the current state of the market and discover all the brand-new goodies on offer.

But, at this point, it’s anyone’s game. After all, as John Maynard Keynes famously said: “Markets can remain irrational longer than you can remain solvent.” Take heed.

🔥 New Partnership 🔥

Coin Bureau was founded with a simple mission ‘to help pave the road towards cryptocurrency mass adoption through education: one person at a time.’

And, through that mission, we were able to grow the YouTube channel to be the largest source of crypto education in the English speaking market.

However, the non-English speaking market is so much bigger. For example, around 1.2 billion people speak Mandarin - that’s a lot of people to share our love of crypto with.

As none of our team speak Mandarin, the challenge was not only to find native speakers, but also like minded people that shared our vision for crypto education. Thankfully, we found our ideal partners with the team over at Future Trends. As such, we are very pleased to announce that we will be working on a Mandarin YouTube channel together called Coin Bureau 华语.

Please give the Future Trends guys a warm welcome to the Coin Bureau family. Hop over to the new channel and give them a sub!

🔮 Video Pipeline 🔮

* Aptos Update: More growth potential?
* Last Bitcoin Mined: What actually happens?
* Memecoins Are Dead: The rise, fall and controversies of memecoins
* Coin Bureau Portfolio: What cryptos do we hold?

🏆 What's New at CoinBureau.com This Week? 🏆

* Top DeFi Crypto Wallets In 2025
* Top Low-Fee Crypto Exchanges In 2025
* CoinCatch Review 2025: Complete Exchange Overview
* The Top Fiat-to-Crypto Exchange Platforms for 2025

📖 Quote of the Week 📖

We made it. $100,000. It’s been a long journey but never did we doubt that we would arrive here eventually.

"Rivers know this: there is no hurry. We shall get there some day" - AA Milne

Team Coin Bureau

Disclosure: Authors may own cryptoassets named in this newsletter. These are unqualified opinions, and a Coin Bureau newsletter, is meant for informational purposes only. It is not meant to serve as investment advice. Please consult with your investment, tax, or legal advisor.