Every major dip reveals who is panicking and who is positioning.

Recently, my phone has been flooded with warnings: the stock market is about to repeat 2008, cryptocurrencies are going to crash, and mainstream coins will go to zero. My colleague Xiao Li couldn’t sit still and asked, "Should I sell everything now? This time feels different."

I've heard questions like this too many times. Over the past ten years, I’ve experienced five waves of such panic, and those who hurriedly cut their positions have all regretted it afterward.

The most vivid memory is March 12, 2020. Bitcoin was halved in a single day, and the whole network was filled with "zeroing theories." Xiao Li was so scared that he emptied all his holdings overnight. Six months later, the market surged to $60,000. Now he tells everyone, "I missed out on enough for a down payment on a house."

History repeats itself over and over. When traditional safe-haven assets like gold fall along with risky assets, it’s usually not the end for a particular asset but a sign of tightening global liquidity.

Look at early October this year. Bitcoin just broke a new all-time high of $126,000, and in less than a month, it retraced over 25%, even giving back its gains for the year. On the surface, it looks like a disaster in the crypto world, but in reality, it reflects macro-level changes—expectations of Federal Reserve policy shifts, cooling market hopes for rate cuts, and rising funding costs that directly depress the valuation of high-volatility assets.

The key issue is: panic itself often signals a local bottom. Research from the market sentiment analysis platform Santiment shows that when negative discussions on social media peak, it’s often the recent rebound period.