Contemporary scholars of the cryptocurrency market analysis often talk about the concept of these influential storylines which are congregations of ideas, thoughts, analytical pieces, technical analysis, and more. It is, as the name suggests, an imaginary story that has a tangible effect on a market, its sectors, or even separate assets that may feel it strongly.
While in the grand scheme of things, these storylines may sound insignificant, they do form the market sentiment and often proliferate throughout social media and news outlets with such virality that they start dictating the pace and vector of price action changes.
What are crypto narratives?
Any story that picks up traction in social media and may influence investment decisions is considered an influential story. There are larger, all-encompassing ideas based on several key talking points. Alongside them, smaller forecasts, promises, and hopes form other stories that may or may not align with the main overarching story about the industry as a whole.
The big picture: the overall cryptocurrency market sentiment
One of the reasons why prices have been bullish throughout the last decade is the strong message from the supporters of the blockchain enthusiasts who created the general storyline. We do not want to partake in the discussion and take sides. Instead, we want to give you a brief overview of meaningful talking points for and against the alternative to fiat money.
Here are positive elements of the current main story that keep the price action going:
- The ideation of decentralization. One of the main romanticized stories about decentralized money is that Bitcoin was born after and because of the 2008 financial crisis. In hindsight, it seems like something related, but it was just a coincidence. Early enthusiasts know that Satoshi Nakamoto was working on the concept much earlier than in 2008. Blockchain as a technology has been around since the 1990s. Nevertheless, the idea of a fully decentralized financial system built from the bottom is something that attracts many people.
- Equal access to the financial ecosystem. Among the agendas in blockchain technology, the idea of financial inclusion holds a special place. Many early adopters and current zealous supporters of Bitcoin, Litecoin, and Monero are people who believe that the banking system produces inequality and preys on the poorest. According to the World Bank, over 1.7 billion adults in developed countries are unbanked. This statistic makes this particular talking point quite believable.
- The disruptive nature of the technology. One of the biggest developing stories at the moment is that all these digital assets are disruptors of the fiat currency system and provide a useful alternative to traditional payment methods and unprecedented tools for self-custody. While the effectiveness and price competitiveness of transactions is still hotly debated topics, the disruptive potential of the industry is quite apparent.
- Storage of value. If you go to the subreddit dedicated to Bitcoin, you will read a new post about the underrated utility of BTC, ETH, or any other prominent financial instrument as a value storage. It is one of the most prominent talking points among enthusiasts and HODLers as it promises that the improvement of the infrastructure and wider adoption alongside deflationary mechanisms will inevitably drive prices up in the long run.
- Democratization and sovereignty. The anarchic monetary system managed by indifferent technology sounds like an environment perfectly suited for those who believe in borderless transactions, trading without regulations, and individual financial freedom. These are things promised by Bitcoin, its clones, and competitors.
You don’t have to compare long-term vs. short-term crypto narratives because the main stories are carved in stone and hard to argue against. Many stories that we will briefly touch later on often do not hold up against scrutiny and look like attempts at propping up a pump-and-dump scheme.
To be mindful of the risks associated with speculative investments, let’s also hear the opposition with their talking points derived from cautions from the skeptics:
- All digital assets are highly volatile. Making smart investments when crypto trends change every several months is quite hard. Prices can be affected by a funny tweet from a billionaire (like $DOGE skyrocketed thanks to Elon Musk) or drop after a single scandal involving just one company in the industry (like in the case of Terra Luna).
- The mist of regulatory uncertainty. Recent juridical battles between the SEC and Ripple as well as many other stories form different types of agendas. One that casts a shadow of doubt on the whole industry as it attracts the attention of governments around the world. While many countries in the EU seem to be welcoming cryptographic money, others remain very cautious.
- Security risks. CipherTrace published a report in 2019 and revealed that investors lost over $4.5 billion in all kinds of assets due to hacks, cyberattacks, fraud, and technological issues. For many individual investors risks are even higher since self-custody turned out to be a challenging endeavor that requires dedication, caution, and technical know-how. The lack of any meaningful consumer protection is another important point from the skeptics that affects the market sentiment.
- Let’s fight for the environment. When Ethereum switched to the PoS consensus mechanism, it was praised by many for the dramatic reduction of its impact on the environment. However, it also upset many enthusiasts who saw risks of centralization in the very model of the consensus mechanism. Bitcoin is still a humongous network that eats incredible amounts of electricity. Identifying one of the most impactful crypto narratives that the proof-of-work consensus is very bad for our planet’s future.
Staying informed about crypto trends is hugely important for many retail traders who want to run AI crypto bots and buy lots of tokens. However, some of the most talked about stories are covering the whole industry and will be unresolved for years to come. You should take them into consideration when making investment decisions.
How do narratives affect crypto prices?
For starters, let’s talk about foundational components that form intense conversations driving price action changes. Here are some important driving factors you should keep in mind when identifying important ideas and concepts:
- The seed idea. A storymust have a beginning and an end. The middle part is often missing despite it being one of the most important. Take Cardano as an example. It was conceived as an Ethereum killer with an ambitious goal to grow bigger and become leaner. While none of these promises materialized by the time of writing, its story with the big finale already described in detail is heavily discussed on multiple subreddits, discord channels, and Telegram groups.
- Places of proliferation. Many discussions are strongly influenced and even created by enthusiasts who often create communities and spread the message. Often all possible media channels turn into places where a certain point of view can flourish. Take the recent NFT craze as an example. Everybody and their grandmother were talking about the utility, value, and potential of nun-fungible tokens. It was an incredibly bullish period for a short while. Unfortunately, not all massive crypto narratives have a good seed.
- People who talk and who listen. Audiences and their character are just as important as heralds. Some investors are more susceptible to certain types of messages. The aforementioned $DOGE example is the one that illustrates the point excellently. Elon Musk as the face of the hype train and millions of people who wanted to buy a meme coin just for fun caused an avalanche of events that brought us to the point in history where the cap for $DOGE is over $20 billion.
Understanding the origins of a story is quite important if you plan to rely on them when making investment decisions. Do not forget that you should never compare crypto narratives vs. fundamentals. Let them coexist. Listen to passionate messiahs and indulge in hopeful discussions within enthusiastic communities but continue doing due diligence. As the proverb goes: trust everybody, but always cut the cards.
Positively charged ideas propped by influential people can cause massive bull runs. However, a strong negative storyline that may form around a personality connected to the DeFi ecosystem or as a result of a catastrophic failure like the FTX collapse may produce an opposing effect and even kickstart a “crypto winter” that happened at the end of 2022.
How narratives affect the cryptocurrency market in 2024
In 2024, many discussions and conversations are shaping the general mood and forming visible price action trends in different financial landscapes. Experts are debating over the unique advantages of certain technologies that show promise and the whole world is listening closely.
Here are some interesting crypto market trends in 2024 that you should pay attention to:
- Web 3.0 gaming. Despite the questionable condition of the biggest DeFi play-to-earn game Axie Infinity, many are still quite hopeful about the future of web 3.0 gaming and the potential of NFTs in this particular industry. FLOKI, Notcoin, GALA, SAND, and AXIE are all performing well. They were not the biggest winners of this year, but the potential is here.
- AI tokenization. The advent of artificial intelligence technologies in all sectors is quite apparent. Multiple AI startups are switching their attention to the blockchain industry. Fetch AI, Render, SingularityNet, and, most recently, IO.net are good examples of platforms forming a strong storyline around a technology that looks like a game changer. The market cap for AI tokens has dropped by about 15% during the last month, but the long-term perspective looks strong.
- Real World Assets or RWA. This type of financial instruments has been discussed at every corner of the internet throughout the last year. Many institutional investors decided to dive into the concept, but it was especially popular among individuals who found the idea of fractional ownership intriguing enough to dish out hard-earned cash. Maker, Polymesh, and Ondo are the most prominent tokens with a combined evaluation close to $4.6 billion at the time of writing.
- Meme coins. $DOGE was the first but it sure won’t be the last. Alongside the biggest meme token of all time, you can find a plethora of other interesting coins. Identifying ideas that can have a big impact is especially important when dealing with assets that are covered in uncertainty. Shiba Inu, PEPE, and Dogwifhat are the three most important players in this sector of the larger industry. Together with DOGE, they make up a massive $45.4 billion evaluation.
Now, you know the potential of simple stories to dramatically affect the community of retail traders. However, it should be noted that many of these stories are inherently tied to larger talking points coming from other industries. For example, AI tokens were conceived thanks to the overwhelmingly strong storyline about AI taking over everything in the tech industry with all corporations racing to create something close to artificial general intelligence faster than others.
Some of the talking points are rediscovered concepts or natural developments of old ideas. For example, RWA tokens are very close to NFTs in spirit but present a completely different method of connecting digital and material assets into one.
Understanding these hotly debated conversation-starters and their strength based on origins, people behind them, and spread patterns can be incredibly useful to an active investor who wants to make informed decisions. While we do not support the idea of relying on stories and rumors when trading, they can provide valuable insights.
Should you use storylines in trading?
Some of the most prominent stories may have value for people making long to mid-term financial decisions. For example, the whole debate around staking is quite positive and makes a good case for investing some money in PoS networks like Ethereum. However, the very distant future of the concept is still unclear.
On the other hand, when it comes to high-frequency trading, liquidity provision, or running a crypto trading bot like GRID or DCA, relying on rumors and some stories from the internet is not the best of ideas. They form slowly and take time to start affecting the orices. Buying into them before you actually see their effect is possible, but automated trading systems rarely benefit from such late onset of effects.
A promising technique is to use DCA bots to purchase assets without selling them to lower the average acquisition price and sit on a long position until a story that picks up the pace results in a bullish price action trend. However, timing and understanding which conversations and topics affect how the community of traders react to them are two skills that should be present in a retail trader interested in executing such strategies.