How long has the crypto market been tormenting retail investors?

Since entering 2026, the major market, led by Bitcoin, has basically been locked within a relatively narrow range
(roughly fluctuating between $60,000 and $79,000),
Throughout the first half of 2026, the market hardly showed any substantial directional choice.
Extending the timeline to 2025, aside from some localized trends (such as certain altcoins or specific meme narratives) and the sharp rise and fall in the second half,
the profit-making effect in 2025 was far below the market’s expectations at the start of the 2024 bull run, and due to a sharp correction at the end of 2025,
a large number of retail and institutional funds were trapped or exited.
The emergence of ETFs actually made it even more difficult for the crypto market to surge higher, because at high levels in 2025, a lot of institutional and corporate funds were trapped,
and whenever the market rebounded, these funds would sell to preserve their capital.
How long will this cycle of repeated fluctuations continue?
Currently, mainstream institutions believe that the volatile and stable trend will last until mid-2026 (around June or July),
and in the second half of the year, with the final implementation of some core regulatory laws (such as clear legislation on stablecoins and market structure in the U.S.),
as well as the macro liquidity improvement in Q3 and Q4 and the re-inflation expectations triggered by the maturity of Treasury debt,
funds may once again inject resilience into crypto assets.
Without a clear trend, major funds will also focus on boosting only a few highly controlled local sectors to maintain hype,
continuously creating the illusion of a bull run to attract impatient retail investors to chase high, then quickly harvesting their gains.
Until there are clear signals, retail investors’ main task remains to survive.