Ivan on Tech gives a bullish Bitcoin outlook and surveys the broader crypto market
Ivan on Tech presents a solo livestream covering Bitcoin's technical setup, macro rate expectations, and the current state of altcoins, meme coins, and NFTs.
Summary
Ivan on Tech delivers a bullish case for Bitcoin, arguing that the worst of the bear market is behind and that all dips should be treated as buying opportunities. He frames the key upcoming catalyst as Bitcoin's "bull flip" on the money line indicator, which he says will trigger a heavier allocation into both Bitcoin and altcoins. On the macro side, Ivan argues that a Fed rate hike is unlikely despite oil-driven inflation fears, and that a rate cut would be massively bullish for Bitcoin given its position at the start of a new four-year cycle.
A significant portion of the episode is devoted to Ivan's narrative-control thesis: that public figures including Bessent, Warsh, and Druckenmiller are deliberately performing hawkishness to maintain Fed credibility while privately positioning for cuts — a thesis Ivan supports by citing their shared history and Druckenmiller's reported purchase of a Hyperliquid ETF.
Ivan surveys the altcoin landscape, highlighting Solana, Hyperliquid, and Uniswap as the strongest positioned assets, while warning that meme coin trenches on Robinhood chain currently offer poor risk-reward due to dangerously thin liquidity. He also plays several AI-generated short films produced for the channel, using them to discuss consistency, rules-based investing, and his own experience losing $10 million by mistaking luck for skill — and closes with commentary that Hollywood actors will need to become influencers to remain relevant as AI video generation matures.
Key Takeaways
FULL TRANSCRIPT
Bitcoin's current setup and the bull flip strategy
Ivan on Tech opens the stream by noting that Bitcoin is still testing the money line breakout and has so far been rejected from it. He argues this is not a reason to turn bearish.
Ivan on Tech: Just like we spoke yesterday, all the dips are for buying. Right now, when we have touched the 200-week moving average and bounced from it, all the dips are for buying. But currently we just deploy a minor portion of the portfolio before the bull flip. The plan still remains — follow the plan.
People get so emotional when big candles happen. People told me, "Ivan, we missed the bull market. We missed it." Now people are saying, "Ivan, we're going to go to new lows." It's perfectly normal to be emotional, guys. It's perfectly normal. But if you follow the strategy, you follow the rules, it will be fantastically nice. Once we go above the bull flip right here, we go heavy, heavy, heavy Bitcoin, heavy altcoins, and we go Valhalla from there.
Solana is still in bull trend with a bit of a pullback together with Bitcoin. This all has to do with the temporary scare in the stock market. The stock market itself has been pulling back a bit — not that it went into bear trend. Stocks are still super bullish. You look at the trend, it's super bullish. The S&P, for example, is just 2% below all-time high.
Macro concerns: oil, Iran, and rate hike fears
There is a bit of concern around Iran oil fears — another hit on Iran, this and that. We've been having it for eight months now. Brent jumped, oil jumped, WTI jumped, all of the oil indexes jumped. People are worrying: is it going to mean that stocks cannot pump because oil is now expensive? We literally had all of this just a few months ago.
I think it's very unlikely that the Fed will hike rates, but this is what people are worried about — that they're going to hike because oil is inflationary. When oil is high, it is inflationary, and people are worried there's going to be a hike. The odds on Polymarket are now way above 50% for a hike in September. Personally, I don't think it's going to happen, but let's see.
For Bitcoin, this is all noise — all of this with Iran, oil, stocks, this and that. It's mainly noise. It doesn't matter whether they increase rates or don't, because we already had a big fat bear market. When you have a big fat bear market, the bad news simply stops mattering. Now is not the time to be too smart. We may see another pullback — maybe to, I mean, who knows? We're not predicting exact tick by tick what's going to happen in terms of price. But on the big picture, I can tell you that the worst is likely behind us for Bitcoin. And as soon as we go bull flip, it's going to be amazing.
What's driving Bitcoin: Strategy, ETFs, and rate expectations
Now, when you look at the different drivers for Bitcoin, if we organize our thoughts and look at what's driving the price, what's dumping it, and the balance between bulls and bears, it looks like this.
The good thing now is that Strategy is a buyer. Strategy was a seller for the longest time — they sold the bottom. Now they're a buyer, buyer, buyer, buyer. The CEO of Strategy, Phong Lee, who works together with Michael Saylor, has come out and said they will continue to buy. They have no plans to sell. They're going to be buying and buying and buying.
Buying now feels normal. This is another thing in terms of perspective on Bitcoin, because you remember in 2020 when MicroStrategy bought its first Bitcoin, it was mega news. Now it's normal. They buy hundreds of millions — it's normal. So Bitcoin is now such a big asset that these constant buys feel normal. This is both bullish and bearish. It's bullish because Bitcoin has come this far. It's a bit bearish because the market is kind of used to it and expects Strategy to buy. But overall, Strategy going from net seller to net buyer is obviously very bullish. This Monday they bought Bitcoin for the first time in 10 weeks.
Next, you have the ETFs. ETFs are having fantastic inflows. When you look at Bitcoin ETF flows, 3.5 billion inflow in August, and since trading opened yesterday, we already had 200 million more on September 1st. Very important — another big catalyst.
So Strategy buying, ETFs bidding — next is where it's maybe a bit of a question mark in terms of the rate hike. People are worried they're going to hike rates. I'm not too worried. I don't think a rate hike is going to matter in any big way for Bitcoin. Maybe short-term volatility, but not in any big way, because we've had a bear market already. But if rates are cut, that's mega bullish. That's mega bullish for Bitcoin. So a rate hike does not matter, but a rate cut would be insane — that's mega bullish. And we're right at the start of the new bull. When you are at the start of a new bull, all of the bullishness pumps a lot.
The conclusion is that there is more upside than downside. No one knows what's going to happen. We're just positioning based on probabilities. When you look at the expected value of being bullish now versus bearish now, the expected value of bullishness is way better. If they cut, that's going to be such a signal — it also means that Trump has more or less control over Kevin Warsh. It means that Trump's wishes for lower rates, which he's been pushing for years, are going to come true. It's going to be such new information for the market that the market will have to price it in quite fast. Massive pump, especially for Bitcoin, because Bitcoin is at the beginning of its new cycle.
Let's say they hike for some reason — they're worried about an oil shock. For Bitcoin, I think it's going to be minor. Maybe we go back to 75. At the end of the day, we've had the worst behind us.
Bessent, Warsh, and the narrative control thesis
There is also a big question whether hiking makes sense when there is just a supply shock. Bessent said that Warsh and he are on the same page on bonds, and Bessent said traditionally you don't raise interest rates into a supply shock. The reason people are worried about a rate hike is because there is a supply shock with oil because of Iran. But that can be easily fixed. Normally it takes approximately 18 months for higher rates to propagate through the economy — to have impact on employment, on all of the KPIs they care about. So if there's just a temporary oil shock due to what's happening with Iran, this is not a reason to raise rates. And Bessent does not want high rates. Don't mess with Bessent — Elon Musk tried messing with Bessent and got a black eye. Bessent and Warsh are syncing.
If you're a macro investor, connect the dots. Markets are pricing in a September hike. Yields are surging and the consensus is completely taking the bait. Druckenmiller actually worked together with Kevin Warsh in the past — they wrote an article back in 2018. Druckenmiller, who literally trained both Warsh and Bessent, publicly takes a swing at Bessent's bond market intervention. Bessent plays along, firing right back. So basically all of the conflict with people critiquing Bessent is basically a charade, according to this analysis. Meanwhile, Warsh and Druckenmiller wrote a piece calling on the Fed to hold off on hikes in 2018. It's a masterclass in narrative control. Warsh gets styled as the uncompromised hawk to give the central bank maximum market credibility.
This is very important. If Warsh just says, "Hey, I'm just listening to what Trump says," he's going to lose credibility. Rates are going to spike even higher in the market because trust is lost. So they need to make it credible. He cannot just come out and say, "We're going to cut because Trump said so." They need to make everything credible. So even though everyone knows that the core motive from Trump is to cut, his guys are going to cut. I think — I don't know if they're going to cut, but it's going to be fantastic.
You know the Trump guys — they love this kind of stuff. They position themselves. Look at Druckenmiller. What did he do? He bought a Hyperliquid ETF. You think you buy a Hyperliquid ETF if you think there's going to be bearishness? The Trump guys tell the public, "We're going to hike, be careful, oil up, be careful, be bearish" — then they position themselves for a cut. Would that be crazy? But anyway, I think there is just better expected value to be bullish — not recklessly bullish yet, because we have to go above the bull trend first. This rejection could mean we go back into the buy zone. It can easily mean that. But still, allocate a bit here, and then massively once we go bull trend.
Cycle timing, the MSTR clarity act, and the October anniversary
Don't panic. People are panicking now. The player brain from the mega grid is saying, "Ivan, we missed the bull market, why, why, why?" — and now they're so fearful. Take it easy. Follow the plan. We have a great plan.
Micro liquidity is the second thing. The CLARITY Act is also bullish if it passes — let's see if it passes. I don't have high hopes, but if it passes, very, very nice.
Cycle timing — this one is massive. The fact that we are now one year from the peak is going to be massive for Bitcoin. All of the four-year cyclers — by the way, we follow the money line, not the four-year cycle. It seems that the money line is going to flip basically right on the four-year cycle. We follow the money line. We don't follow the four-year cycle. But if the money line and four-year cycle agree, then good — we're also on the four-year cycle. But if they disagree, we're money line. We're not four-year cycle. That's another thing to keep in mind: the cycle is coming to an end, it's restarting. We have a new four-year cycle starting this October — literally in 30 to 40 days.
October 8th is a big day. We said time to be risk-off on October 8th, 2025. You guys remember — it's my pinned tweet. You can go to Twitter and check. Now it's a year since that call. Sometimes you have to take credit. Go check my pinned tweet. We saved probably hundreds of millions of dollars in our community because they did not get wrecked.
Tom Lee on September rate hike odds
Tom Lee is also saying the rate cut is more likely. Tom Lee and I are on the same page. Let's listen to this.
Tom Lee: I think the odds of a September hike might actually drop to zero. I know people are edging into September cautious because markets are down, oil's up, yields are up, and people are talking about the seasonality. I'm going to be contrarian. I think this is a setup for September to actually be a strong month for stocks.
"Well, I think one is that the inflation fears are likely to quell this month. We have the jobs report on Friday. Next week is August CPI, and then we have the FOMC rate decision in September. I think the sequence of those events is going to show inflation is weakening, and I think the odds of a September hike might actually drop to zero."
Ivan on Tech: I agree. I also think that at the end of the day, no one knows. I don't know. Tom doesn't know. It's more about the expected value here. What is the expected value of being bearish, worried about some hike, when Trump literally said he wants a cut and installed Warsh after making the mistake with Powell? I think we're actually going to cut. Let's see.
Based on the closeness to the bull flip — if we bull flip in Bitcoin, we're mega bullish anyway. And now we're accumulating a bit of Bitcoin with a smaller amount, especially in the buy zone. Don't worry about the rate hike or anything else. I think now it's time to be bullish. It's not time to be bearish. You had to be bearish in October. I told you to be bearish in October. Now it's another October — now it's time to be bullish.
Solana, Robinhood chain, and the meme coin trench problem
There are some reasons to be a bit bearish on Solana due to Robinhood chain taking trading volume. The problem is that there is nothing to invest in on Robinhood chain directly — you can buy the Robinhood stock, and you can participate in the trenches, but currently that's not smart. The expected value of the trench currently is more of a casino. It's for fun, but liquidity is super thin. Even if you make good money, for you to withdraw it is impossible from these meme coins. Liquidity is very thin. The biggest meme coin — Pawns — had like $3 million liquidity, and there were like five guys on Twitter saying they all have $3 million, $2 million, $5 million in this coin. But there's only $3 million liquidity. Their total bag is worth like $20 million, but there's only $3 million liquidity. So if anyone tries to withdraw, back to zero.
The risk-reward of actually trading the shitcoins in the trenches on Robinhood currently is bad. In bull market when we have alt season it's going to be different. But you can buy Robinhood stock. Otherwise, Solana is the asset — it's the platform where all trading is happening. So you have Robinhood chain, Hyperliquid is another one — we're mega bullish on Hyperliquid, it's bull trend, fantastic. For memes it's Solana where you can actually invest. Then it's Hyperliquid for leverage. Then Robinhood for current meme hype.
Let's actually see the stats on DexScreener. Currently we see 2.4 billion volume. And the latest seems to be this Artificial Eno with 5.7 million liquidity. But even then, when you look at it, some of the guys on Robinhood — their bags are way bigger than the liquidity in this coin. So it's still a massive problem with liquidity in the memes.
And by the way, what happened to Pawns? It was the talk of the town yesterday. Now no one cares about it. Now it's down. Now it's Artificial Eno. See, this is the problem with being a normal person with a family. Because I know our audience — most of you guys are not Gen Z addicted to the screen. Most of you guys are 30 plus. For you, if you enter this — imagine you just bought Pawns yesterday because it was the talk of the town, and now no one cares. Now it's Artificial Eno. And you're asking me, "Ivan, what about Pawns?" This is the tragedy.
When we discuss the trenches in bull market, some boomer buys — and by the way, big shout to boomers, I'm a boomer myself in some ways — some boomer buys this trench and comes back to me five months later: "Hey Ivan, what about Pawns?" I'm like, "What?" You understand that since then like 30 memes have happened. That's the speed of these ponzis. You've got to be at the speed of the ponzi. There's the speed of light and there's the speed of the ponzi, which is even faster.
That's why I think for us currently it's better to speculate on the casino itself. For example, Robinhood stock, Solana. Soul still has more volume than Robinhood chain — Solana is leading, but there is a clear dent because many people now trade on Robinhood instead of Solana. Let's see if this is temporary or not.
Ways to invest in the crypto casino without being a trench gambler
What can we invest in? What are the ponzi platforms — the casino platforms — that we can buy?
Number one is Solana. Solana is bull trend, very nice. It can easily go back to $300. That's number one.
Number two, for trading leverage — stocks and everything — is Hyperliquid. This is the platform for going long and short with leverage on a DEX. Fantastic. Big buyback here. This is another way you can invest in the casino without being a degenerate gambler yourself, where you have to be at the speed of the ponzi. Hyperliquid is more or less like Bybit decentralized — trading stocks with leverage, crypto with leverage, on chain. That's valid. In bull market, people every day are making money with leverage trading bull trends. Instead of trying to catch the bottom, which is very bad expected value, you have a new bull trend start and you trade that with leverage. Fantastic, if you have risk management and mechanical rules.
Next, Pump.fun — I wouldn't touch the trench now. But Pump.fun as a coin with revenue share, owning the casino, is bull trend since August 10th. Fantastic. See the difference here: you don't have to be at the speed of the ponzi. You can buy, you can let it be for weeks. Of course you need to manage risk, stop-loss, yada yada. But here you can have an actual strategy. You execute, you see the trend, you set a stop-loss. With the trenches, there's no way to have a strategy. You just gamble.
Which is fine if there's alt season and you can just throw a dart and wherever it lands it's Valhalla. After being in the trench a lot in the last season, I can tell you that trench expected value even in bull market is not great. But now it's very bad. Very, very bad.
Some of the trench coins will level up into big ones. Let's say Dog With Hat — perfect example. Or Pepe — also a perfect example. When that shift happens, we're going to let you know. That's a very important shift.
Solana vs. Robinhood chain: the open system debate
Now let's look at what's happening with the different players. You have Solana, Robinhood chain, BNB chain. This guy from Solana is basically explaining their position:
"Solana is carrying the torch for an open system alone. There's no exchange with millions of existing traders to feed from, like with Robinhood. There's no listing mechanism or Vlad or CZ to wave a magic wand. There's no Jeff to add new features every week. It's just the Solana community — those people who chew glass for breakfast. If you build on Solana, you're a chad by default. You're not chasing trends or listings. You want to win as big as possible on your own terms. You're not waiting for approval."
It's true that Solana is the only open, decentralized system that can compete with the corporate chains. At the same time, I don't really like the cope. When ETH started to lose against Solana, they all said, "Oh, you know, it's centralized and we are better." Why? No one knows why. You're freaking slow. You have a million L2s. No one cares. Don't get into cope. If Solana guys are watching — don't cope. Get the revenue up. Get the volume up. No coping allowed.
There are many people who successfully shift to Robinhood and their app becomes big. Just look at Pawns. Pawns could not be big on Solana because there is Pump.fun already. Pawns could become big on Robinhood because they were new. As a business founder, you should go wherever you can make the most money, not stay on Solana because you think you're holy.
But partially true — open systems will win because they're fundamentally better. They won't always be the sexiest new thing. Overall, I agree with this. Open systems long-term are going to win.
The only exception, guys, is in case Robinhood does a coin. If Robinhood chain does a coin, it's going to be crazy. Because now, if I'm bullish on Robinhood chain, what do I buy? I don't want to buy the ponzies. Robinhood stock? What do I buy? I don't buy ETH because Robinhood will not help ETH. But if they do a coin, that changes everything.
Hype bullish, Solana bullish, Robinhood stock bullish, Pump.fun bullish. Bull market coming in a big way. Super cycle coming in a big way.
Solana NFTs on OpenSea and the NFT season question
Solana NFTs are now on OpenSea. I think NFTs are going to have a comeback in one way or another.
I love NFTs when they are pictures. I like when they are pictures, but when they become these animated cartoons, I don't know. I don't like them as much. When it is a picture, it's more collectible. But when they animate them, it's like — what is it? Don't animate. Make them cards. They're collectible cards.
OpenSea made a bad product decision by mixing tokens and NFTs in the same interface. OpenSea for me is NFT. I will never buy a normal meme coin from OpenSea — for that there is DexScreener and proper apps. OpenSea is NFT. Now they dilute the experience. Whoever makes product decisions there should be fired, because now I have to ignore half the interface just to find the NFTs.
Looking at the actual NFT volume — Pudgy Penguins, Pawns, everything — the volume is negligible. 22K, 42K seven-day volume. There is no NFT season now. Don't worry too much about it. This is more for people who are really into this stuff. For us who make money in AI stocks and crypto, we have bigger waves to catch. It's not time for NFTs yet. Maybe there will be time in the future, but currently, no.
Q&A: Uniswap as a Robinhood chain play
Q&A segment
Someone raises the thesis that this cycle Robinhood becomes a massive on-chain retail platform and Uniswap is the liquidity engine — making Uniswap the cleanest way to express that trade.
Yeah, it could be. Let's see. Uniswap is up 50% since the bull flip on the money line, which was August 3rd. So that could be reasonable. See, but you have an idea. If Uniswap were bearish, I would say it's fugazi. Your idea is fugazi because there is no bull trend. But there is a bull trend. Good. Then your idea could make sense.
We need whatever ideas we have to be confirmed by bull trend. Otherwise, get out. Everyone has ideas. Cardano has so many ideas. Charles Hoskinson has so many ideas. Polkadot has so many ideas. But you need to deliver a pump. And here there is a bit of a pump, so that's good.
Let's actually check on DeFi Llama — is Uniswap the biggest DEX on Robinhood chain? Let's go to Robinhood on DeFi Llama. DEXes, fees paid. Uniswap. See — Uniswap is the biggest app on Robinhood chain. So that was actually quite smart. It's confirmed by the data, and most importantly confirmed by the bull flip. So yeah, up 50% since the flip. Thanks for the perspective. I think it makes sense.
Q&A: Gold, tokenized assets, and staying rich
Someone asks about safeguarding wealth by buying crypto gold — meaning tokenized gold.
Tokenized gold is not the best. The reason is: what happens if it goes bankrupt? No one knows. If you want to buy gold, the best thing is physical gold, but it may be impractical. And also the physical gold industry is a bit of a scam. If you go to a bullion dealer, they'll tell you ETFs are a scam. But actually these gold sellers are the biggest scam — they'll sell you gold at 40% more than it should be. It's hard to verify. You have to be very careful with physical gold propaganda.
Obviously, if you have a way to buy gold that's physical and close to the spot price, fantastic. But most people have no way to do that. If you go to your local shop — maybe in Dubai you can go to the gold market and buy — but then how do you know it's real? So all of this physical gold stuff, you have to be super careful. Most people are going to be sold fugazi coins. They tell you it's so rare, it's so rare — fugazi, fugazi, fugazi.
If you want to diversify a portfolio, which makes sense if you have a big portfolio, we discuss this in Bulmania — we have a whole section on staying rich, because people get rich and then lose money. You get rich by taking risk, by being in crypto. Gold is not going to make you rich. It's a stay-rich mechanism. When you're rich, you want to diversify. You don't want to risk. Your money can print 5% per year just in treasuries. The US is the best creditor for this debt. Is it risk-free? No — that's why you diversify. You have stocks, bonds, you know. Once you become rich, you have to ensure you don't lose it.
Q&A: Kaspa, bear trend coins, and the importance of following the trend
Someone asks about Kaspa — as they apparently do every stream.
It's bear trend. There's nothing to say. If it's bull trend, we're going to speak. If it's bear trend, don't ask about it every stream. Whatever tech you have, Kaspa chat — no one cares about tech. It needs to pump. In bear trend, you need the money more. You're in bear trend trying to pump your coin on our live stream day after day. From the peak, Kaspa is down 86%. Now you're forced to shill it and beg: "Ivan, please mention, please mention." Why don't I mention? Because it's bear trend. Go bull trend, we talk. If you don't go bull trend, keep the money. You need it.
For you to get back to zero from down 85%, you need more than 7x. This could make your whole bull market. Some people make life-changing gains by just compounding bull market after bull market with five to seven x, because if you compound and keep the gains, you don't need 100x every time. 100x is very possible in bull market. But if you're able to compound, you don't need crazy returns each and every cycle. You can have seven, eight x — fantastic. Then you keep it and next cycle you do another. Two cycles, you have your 100x, just by using the brain a bit.
But no — you know better. And then you beg and beg and beg. Crazy, man.
AI-generated video content and Hollywood's future
The stream features several AI-generated short films produced for the channel. One depicts Ivan meeting Satoshi Nakamoto, with Satoshi delivering the following lines:
"I gave them Bitcoin. Scarce, decentralized, simple. But simple was boring. So they bought JXC rocks, chased impossible yield, trusting an unstable stablecoin, went 100x long on a dog coin. Everything vanished. And somehow they blamed Bitcoin."
"I know, son. They need rules, not another prophet."
"Bull Mania. This will show them the way."
Many people do all kinds of dumb stuff. If you have the rules — like now, for example, you see how the rules protect us. They protect us from FOMO, they protect us from greed, and also they protect us from fear. The roller coaster people had during the last days and weeks has been crazy. Crypto is emotional.
Another AI clip delivers the following message:
"One perfect batch is luck. Bitcoin didn't prove itself with one block. It earned trust block after block, roughly every 10 minutes since 2009. Consistency isn't luck, it's a system. Bull Mania — clear strategies, clear rules."
That's also a very important thing, because sometimes people get wrecked. Sometimes people make some money and there's no consistency. They don't understand why they made money. And the worst case that can happen is when you make money and you were lucky and you repeat the same dumb strategy — because sometimes even the dumb strategy can make you rich. Sometimes it's like using your car without a seatbelt going 400 kilometers an hour on the Autobahn — and bam, suddenly it doesn't work. You understand? So it's a problem sometimes in crypto: people luckily do some dumb stuff with no risk management, they make money, and then they think they're Nostradamus. They're a genius. So they keep using the same thing. Sooner or later you lose everything. The round-trip is insane. There's no shame in that — I have a whole book on how I did exactly this. I made money, then I thought I was smart because I'm a developer and I know how tech works. That's how I made money. No, that was not how I made money. I was lucky. Then I lost $10 million.
The Bit Boy AI film and the super cycle
The stream also features an AI-generated cinematic clip depicting Bit Boy being released for the super cycle:
"Bit Boy, get up. The super cycle needs its OGs. I'm rebuilding the timeline. Try to stay out this time."
This is cinema. I mean, I don't know about releasing all of the dark forces, so to speak, but I can see the cinematic value in this. Everyone is getting released here. SBF has some kind of joker role — releasing the mayhem. Somewhere there behind is the Bitconnect guy. We release him also. It's a new super cycle.
And this is AI. That's crazy. Now that we've seen what AI can do, I think Hollywood is cooked. If you're an actor and you just do movies — you're not needed. People will need connection in the future, connection to a human, not AI. But most actors — what connection do you have to them? You just see them on a TV screen. There's no connection. So all actors will have to be influencers in some way to be relevant. Otherwise there's no relevancy.