Why Crypto Predictions Are Irrational

Written by FrederikBussler | Published 2019/11/13
Tech Story Tags: blockchain | crypto | cryptocurrency | crypto-trading | prediction-models | anthony-pompliano | cryptobros | cryptocurrency-prices | web-monetization

TLDR Bitcoin price predictions are the most beaten to death topic in the blockchain space. Anyone can make a crypto prediction, because these are usually backed by nothing, and wild claims will get you clicks. Bitcoin is mostly sentiment-driven, and accurate prediction evades even crypto fund managers and mathematics PhD's, let alone the #cryptobros. Following the market is perhaps the most sure-fire way for predicting the short-term future. If it's going up now, it'll probably keep going up, at least for a bit.via the TL;DR App

Crypto price predictions are the most beaten to death topic in the blockchain space, and that's for a simple reason: Anyone can make a crypto prediction, because these are usually backed by nothing, and wild claims will get you clicks. As a result, everyone and their grandma has an opinion about the future price of Bitcoin, forgetting that Bitcoin is mostly sentiment-driven, and accurate prediction evades even crypto fund managers and mathematics PhD's, let alone the #cryptobros.
If I filled this article with examples of predictions gone awry, then we'd be sitting here all day. Crypto predictions can be summed up with this idiom:
"If you throw enough shit against a wall, some of it has gotta stick."
Traditional value-capture in business is done with an intermediary. For example, a bank might hold onto your money when you're not using it and charge interest, or a social media platform might profit from your data, or a government might profit from your taxes. In essence, you have someone in the middle who has ownership of some or all of the value, which is useful if you want to make predictions.
You can make Facebook stock price predictions based on things like Facebook's profit and loss statements, or their quarterly returns, because these are fundamentals that reflect the success of the company. With Bitcoin, there are no fundamentals. There's no management, P&L statements, or quarterly returns.
Your best bet, without going deep into financial modeling, is asking is it in a bull run or not? Following the market is perhaps the most sure-fire way for predicting the short-term future. If it's going up now, it'll probably keep going up, at least for a bit, and if it's going down now, it'll probably keep going down, at least for a bit. Sure, you can get into the weeds of it, and build models that take into account things like news and Twitter sentiment, besides market price, but 99% of the public predictions aren't based on said models.
The problem is that all these crypto prophets are making predictions months, or even years down the line, forgetting that no matter what happens, crypto prices aren't based on forecast-able fundamentals.

Written by FrederikBussler | Published author and writer.
Published by HackerNoon on 2019/11/13