Murad Mahmudov, a prominent crypto analyst and widely followed market commentator on social media, recently pointed out that the number of tweets about bitcoin (BTC), the flagship cryptocurrency, have dropped to “the same level as 2014.”

Mahmudov added that it seems “like nothing has changed” as bitcoin-related tweets are even lower than “at any point in 2016.” In his lengthy Twitter thread, he noted that “all the people, particularly in the Western world, obsessed with Bitcoin” such as Pierre Rochard (the founder of Bitcoin Advisory), have already been involved with crypto for quite some time.

Historically, “bull markets bring fewer new obsessed” crypto industry participants and “there are [even] fewer of them overall than I thought”, Mahmudov wrote. Moreover, the crypto analyst claims that there are significantly “fewer people” who are interested in “decentralized sovereign”, deflationary currencies “for its own sake than you’d like to think.”

People “Dont’ Care” About “Sound Money”

According to Mahmudov,

Cryptocurrency's biggest use case is speculation. That is a fact. For better or worse, speculation and human greed are your biggest hope.

He continued:

[More than 99%] of people, be they poor or rich, don't care about decentralization, don't care about self-sovereignty, don't care about privacy, don't care about sound money, don't care about Austrian [Economics], don't care about uncensorable payments or libertarian/[anti-capitalism]/cypherpunk ideals.

Notably, Mahmudov believes “people care [most] about making money and getting rich in a short amount of time.” Commenting on the current cryptocurrency bear market, the monetary economist argued that “more people will sell when they realize” that the downward price movements will continue. He thinks that the traders who may be selling their cryptoassets right now might be planning to “potentially buy back in later and [even] lower.”

Digital Asset Prices To Drop Further Before People Buy Back

Interestingly, Mahmudov tweeted that it would be “healthy” for cryptocurrency prices to “collapse” so that the coins are transferred “from the weak hands to strong hands who don’t sell no matter what.” Going on to elaborate on how he expects crypto traders to respond to market trends, Mahmudov mentioned that digital asset prices would have to drop further before they “once again [become] attractive for speculative ‘value investors.’”

Due to “overall weakness” in the world’s macroeconomy, it’s quite likely that bitcoin is still “perceived” as a “risky asset”, Mahmudov claims. Expressing views similar to Eric Larchevêque, the CEO of Ledger (a leading manufacturer of crypto hardware wallets), Mahmudov believes the current bear market “will last for much longer” than what most people think.

He also noted that “those who are building, learning, studying right now of course will be handsomely rewarded in 2023/2024.”