Digital Asset News NFA Live panel discusses where the next bull market is hiding across crypto and traditional assets
Rob from Digital Asset News hosts a live panel with Guy from Coin Bureau and Ben, covering market cycles, investment strategy, and upcoming conference plans.
Summary
The panel identifies the memory and chip sector — with Guy pointing to Micron and SanDisk as standout performers — particularly Micron and SanDisk — as the standout performer driven by AI infrastructure spending. Ben argues that crypto is unlikely to see a bull run until closer to Q4, consistent with the historical four-year cycle pattern, and that international equities may offer near-term opportunities. The panel agrees that sitting entirely in cash is dangerous given persistent inflation, and that owning the right assets over the long term is the only reliable strategy for preserving purchasing power. The conversation also covers the upcoming ITC conference in Miami in November, the M2 money supply trend, stablecoin reserves at all-time highs, and the FIFA World Cup.
Key Takeaways
FULL TRANSCRIPT
Welcome and Where the Bull Market Is
Rob: Hello everybody. Welcome to NFA Live. I am joined as ever by my compatriots — Guy from Coin Bureau. Guy, how is the market treating you today?
Guy: It's treated me worse, Rob. That's as much as I can say, really.
Rob: Yeah, that sounds reasonable. And Ben, the most loved person on Twitter — Ben, how you doing?
Ben: Pretty good. How about you?
Rob: Not too bad. Got a lot of things to talk about. Let's jump into it. So first of all, if you're not subscribed to these two gentlemen, there is a plethora of different channels you can choose from over at Coin Bureau — I won't go through all 20. And then also Ben's got a great channel over there, and doing a great job on the thumbnails, my man. Great job. These are way better than the originals.
Ben: Now that I've hired ChatGPT, it makes it a lot easier.
Rob: So basically, Ben, you are saying that AI is going to replace jobs. I get it. That's okay. No — see, here's the thing, Rob, and I want to be clear. People say I'm a pessimist. I'm not. I'm an optimist.
Ben: I didn't have anyone creating thumbnails before. So I created — this is just a new thing that AI is providing. It's not a negative thing. It's just improving something that didn't exist before.
Rob: That is true. I think we all should take a look at the silver lining. So speaking of silver linings, let's talk about where the heck is the bull run. Now, Jim Cramer is not wrong every single time, just a lot of the time. But there's one thing that he did say that did make a lot of sense: there's always a bull market somewhere, you just have to find it. So as we go through the digital asset space and we see things going down — your cycle, which we get to in a bit, also midterm election year, which we're in right now — where the heck is the bull market? What are you looking at right now and into the future? Guy, I'd like to start with you on this one to tell us where to actually look. And this could be anything outside of crypto, particularly in crypto or outside of crypto.
Guy: Well, spoiler alert, Rob, Ben — it is not in crypto. I'm not anticipating a bull market there anytime soon. What I think has been really interesting over the last year or so particularly is just how fast these bull markets move. Do you remember not so long ago, gold and silver were absolutely ripping?
That's right — and gold now, I mean, I think gold has fallen back to around $4K. I'm not sure what silver's at off the top of my head. But it's fascinating because this is a dynamic that we've observed in crypto quite a lot over the last few years. You get these sort of localised little mini bull markets in specific sectors, and as soon as they start, they seem to end. And that also seems to be something I'm noticing in traditional markets as well.
However, having said that, for most of this year we've been talking about the AI trade, haven't we — the hyperscalers spending absolutely vast amounts of money on the AI buildout. And obviously there's been a lot of questions that come with that: are we in a bubble, is this sustainable, and so on. So what's been really interesting to see recently is where has that money been going — what have they actually been spending it on? And the answer, to some extent, is memory and chips.
What we're seeing now is a fascinating move away from some of the big names — the likes of Nvidia and Alphabet are both down recently — whilst on the other hand we've got things like Micron, the US-based chipmaker, and SanDisk, which is all about memory. These guys have been absolutely ripping. And the reason for it is that these guys are downstream — they're receiving all this money that the hyperscalers have been spending.
Yesterday, Micron came out with their earnings and they were insane. They reported fiscal third-quarter revenue of $41.5 billion. The expected number was $35.5 billion, so they exceeded expectations significantly. Earnings per share were $25, against an expectation of $20.50. And what's crazy is that for the next quarter they're forecasting $50 billion of revenue and $31 earnings per share.
What was also particularly interesting about that call was the discussion around the next generation of cars — particularly EVs, but cars in general — which obviously have more and more software built into them. Micron is saying that semi-autonomous cars use more than 5x the memory and storage of an average vehicle, and humanoid robots could use roughly 10x the memory of these more advanced cars.
So the immediate demand is coming from hyperscalers, data centres, and so on. But it is quite easy to see a long-term thesis for the memory and chip trade even without AI necessarily continuing to grow — even if AI spending were to dramatically slow down, that would obviously hurt the overall market and these companies in particular. But it's easy to see that the demand for memory and chips is probably only going to keep climbing.
So that seems to be where the current bull market is, and the question is how long it can be sustained. If the hyperscalers are forced to scale back their spending, that could bring it all to a juddering halt. But I think there is a very interesting long-term case for it as well. And I kind of like it because it's boring, isn't it? Memory and chips. It's not exactly going to set the world on fire, but I always feel drawn to sectors that are just boring but fundamental. So the memory and chip trade is where the bull market currently is. How long it remains there is another question entirely.
Rob: Holy smokes. Well said. I did not know about Micron — this is fantastic. SanDisk looks pretty good too. And of course it's one of those things where if I just would have known about this earlier. So everybody, if you're not following Guy over at Coin Bureau, give that a follow for sure. Ben, what do we got? Where is our bull market?
Ben: I mean, Guy's right — everything he said, I think I agree with. Going into the summer, I was talking about how we would likely see a small correction in June in the stock market, and we've kind of had that. So I wouldn't be surprised if equities in general went back up. A lot of times in midterm years, the stock market will get a correction in June — a shallow correction, like 5 to 10% — and then rally again kind of into the August–September timeframe before then getting a larger drop at the end of the midterm year.
So I guess that's where you could say the bull market is right now. International markets as well, like international funds. And then the argument becomes: once that gets a correction — because we know where the bull market currently is — where is it going to be next? If we do get a correction in the stock market in the back half of the year, you might actually see the bull market come back to Bitcoin. But that's probably a few months away. So that's what I'm planning for — to see it rotate back over to the cryptoverse, but probably not until closer to the fourth quarter of the year. That's my guess.
Rob: Sounds pretty good. I'll take that. It sounds very reasonable.
Four-Year Cycles and Bitcoin Patterns
Rob: So that takes care of the first question, which is interesting and definitely worth looking at. But the next part really comes down to four-year cycles, which I know some people believe and some people don't. It pretty much is what it is. But it comes back to what Tony Robbins said — let me see if you can hear this.
Tony Robbins: "There are three skills you want to give your kids, and you want these three skills if you want to succeed for the rest of your life. First is you have to be able to recognise patterns. It won't matter what the jobs are, won't matter what the business is. If you can recognise patterns, you have an edge."
Rob: Yeah, sounds pretty reasonable. If we can recognise these patterns, we have an edge. And one of those patterns is the four-year cycle. Now, unfortunately some of those things haven't really lived up to it — Trump and the idea that Bitcoin prices never dropped below election day, that's actually faltered. I thought 69K was going to be the bottom and it wasn't. However, if we take a look at timeframes — all-time high to all-time highs, 1,477 days between 2013 and 2017, then 1,424 days between 2017 and 2021. All-time low to all-time highs essentially the same thing. 68 days all-time high to all-time low, again 400 to 365 days.
So the question I have for both of you is: has the four-year cycle surprised you? It surprised me how it's actually kept going and come out to this point. Ben, I'll start with you. Are you surprised it's actually held? And are there any discrepancies you've seen?
Ben: No, I mean it seems like so far it's been the one thing that hasn't failed in terms of predicting what Bitcoin's going to do. So I think we defer to the four-year cycle until it proves wrong. It just keeps on working out. And it's one of those things — fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me. I don't understand why people fight it so much. I know the temptation to fight it is always there because we all want to find a reason why it can't be that simple, but then it just continues to be that simple.
So until something different happens, I would say the four-year cycle is probably one of the better indicators we have for navigating Bitcoin. I mean, if you think about it, there are like a thousand indicators, but all you really ever had to do was buy Bitcoin at the end of the midterm year and sell it in the fourth quarter of the post-halving year. If you just did that the last three cycles, you would have basically performed just as well, if not better, than any other indicator out there.
Rob: Yeah, I've got to agree. And then Guy, same thing — were you surprised by the four-year cycle, or were you like, "Yeah, that's pretty much par for the course"?
Guy: Well, what is it they say? The most fatal words in investing are "this time is different." So yeah, why should this time be any different? I mean, it plays out. It works until it doesn't. But it's hard to see why it would necessarily change. So I wouldn't say I'm surprised. I should have paid more attention to it if nothing else.
Rob: Yeah, that's for sure. We should have all paid a little more attention to it. It wasn't so much about the bottoms — it was about the tops. And like Ben just talked about, you can have a thousand indicators and guess what? All you had to do was go by the numbers for the four-year cycle and it would have worked out.
Now, can it continue? A lot of people will say no, at some point it will drop off. But as far as bottom indicators go, one of the things that lines up is the 200-week moving average. We can see that Bitcoin has actually dropped below it. The moving average is at 62 and today Bitcoin is around $61,000. The 250-week drops us to roughly $57K, and if we go to the bottom of the barrel, the 350-week, you're looking at $47K. So I think anywhere in that range is pretty good. And as a reminder, people will say, "Well, that's kind of scary, Rob." I don't think you should be scared. All you've got to do is look at these cycles — they've been lining up pretty well. Here's the tops, here's the bottom, here's the top, here's the bottom, here's the tops again, and then here's the bottom. Usually it's about a year, but just stick around. Not financial advice — that's where we're at.
M2 Money Supply, Macro Risks, and Whether to Deploy Now
Rob: Now let's move into the last topic, which is this: there is a fundamental shift, and we're at a crossroads right now. People will say it doesn't really matter because there's a bunch of liquidity out there and a super cycle is coming. This is the M2 money supply from 2018 — up and to the right. Sounds pretty good. These are the midterm years, these are the bad bear years. Then we take a look at 2022 — M2 money supply kept going down, so of course that's the reason for all the volatility and the bear markets. But then take a look at the M2 money supply for 2026 — we're going up and to the right and it keeps coming.
On top of that, we've got an issue with the Federal Reserve. Looks like we've got a split coming up on the next FOMC meeting on July 29th — looks like a 60/40 or 65/35 split to actually raise rates. And that's in July. September gets even more stringent. Then on top of that, we've got the geopolitical issues with the US and Iran, and I don't know who is telling me the truth — it seems like every single person is lying. On top of that, we've got stablecoins at all-time highs. According to DeFi Llama, $314 billion is sitting on the sidelines. And then we've also got Warren Buffett and Berkshire Hathaway — it says $347 billion here, but I think it's almost $400 billion — just sitting there waiting to be deployed. And then real disposable income just turned negative for the first time in at least the last two and a half years.
So we have all these bottlenecks coming in. The question for you guys is: is it best to just sit it out and wait to see where things go, or do you have to deploy right now? Guy, I'd like to start with you.
Guy: I think the danger here is in waiting for something that never comes. You only have to look at Berkshire Hathaway — those guys are sitting on an absolute mountain of cash, and you think, well, Buffett and Co. must know what they're doing, they must see a crash on the horizon. And then you look at the AI trade like we were talking about earlier and you think, well, that can't last. And there's definitely something to be said about holding cash. I think cash should always be a significant — if not necessarily a majority, then certainly a significant — chunk of your overall portfolio, to deploy at the right times.
But if you're waiting solely in cash, if you're just not investing at all, I think that's a recipe for disaster. Going back to what you were saying about the M2 money supply constantly going up — inflation is a constant thing. It may slow down, it may speed up, but we know that the value of fiat currencies is eroding every single day, which is why we have things like Bitcoin.
If you're just sitting solely in cash waiting for the big crash, waiting for it all to come crumbling down and for a generational entry point into whatever asset you're watching, there is a real risk that you end up waiting so long that inflation has eaten away at so many potential gains. So you need to hold assets to offset inflation, and as any seasoned investor will tell you, you need to keep your time horizon long. You need to trust that markets will go up in the long term, because if we look again at that chart of Bitcoin — that is what it's done. Okay, there have been some dips along the way, but essentially, like the M2 money supply, it is up and to the right. And the chart of the S&P and the chart of gold will tell a similar story.
It reminds me of the Chinese proverb that says the best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second best time to plant a tree is now. If you're not willing to take on risk, even at a time when you think the market looks frothy and asset prices are really inflated, then you won't get the reward. Short-term price action really is just noise at the end of the day. If you have a long enough time horizon and you're planning to beat inflation over the long term, then you need to own assets — and hold some cash by all means for that generational entry point. But investing is about taking the rough with the smooth. You never buy the bottom in the same way that you never sell the top. So it's really about time in the market rather than timing the market. If you're not in it, you ain't going to win it.
Rob: Very well said. If you're not in it, you ain't going to win it. Ben, same question for you — is this the time to sit out and let it percolate, then come back in? Or just put a little bit here, a little bit there?
Ben: With regards to crypto, the time to sit out was like eight months ago. Now I feel like the right strategy for crypto is just to ignore it from the end of the midterm year until about July, and then start looking for deals. That worked in 2018, it worked in 2022. Maybe it'll work again in 2026.
So I think having some cash makes sense, but you obviously don't ever want to be 100% cash without the ability to deploy anything, because then the purchasing power of the dollar is going asymptotically to zero. What Guy said is correct — you have to own assets over the long term, otherwise inflation will eat you alive. You just have to own the right assets. That's a mistake a lot of people make — they buy the wrong things, they buy garbage stuff and assume it's going to make them rich, and then it goes to zero.
As long as you're buying the right things, that's the way to outperform inflation. Especially if you buy total market index type stuff — it takes a lot less energy, it generally trends up over time, and you don't have to stock-pick if you don't want to. But yeah, you have to own assets over the long term, and normally the end of midterm years offers pretty good entry points to ride out for the next cycle.
Rob: Exactly. Well said. Let's be honest — if we don't own assets, inflation is going to eat us alive. But also, it's boring. Can you imagine how boring it is to just sit on mountains of cash and not do anything, not get to wake up and look at your portfolio and go, "Wow, it's up 30 or 40%"? Or on the flip side, "Wow, it's down 30 or 40%." I know people say that sounds crazy, but that's why we're in crypto and digital assets. That's just how it is.
ITC Conference Miami and Polymarket Bet
Rob: So speaking of risk, here is my new play. I didn't tell Guy and Ben this, but I like to gamble sometimes, and I think this bet I'm going to make is going to be pretty great over on Polymarket. The question on Polymarket is: will Guy from Coin Bureau attend the ITC conference in Miami on November 20th to 22nd? Now, I'm not going to sit here and say I don't have insider information, but I will just say that over time it was a pretty low probability. Right now we're at 50/50.
If you don't know what I'm talking about, there is a conference coming up in Miami, November 20th to 22nd. And if you are a family man or family woman and you want to take a little break, come out there for three, four, five days, visit Miami — it's going to be in November and the rest of the United States is going to be cold as hell. Come in and do the conference. I'll be there for sure. Ben will be there, David Lynn, Gareth Soloway, Evan Aldo, and Fe Kamichi — the CryptoKit. You get to see the actual team. It's going to be a good time.
So the question of course comes down to: will Guy make it to Miami? Guy, I don't want to give you any insider track, but what's your feel on this one for Polymarket?
Guy: It's something we're talking about, but I couldn't possibly confirm either way. Dubai to Miami — that's a long old trip. But we are considering it, that's for sure.
Rob: That's why you've got to come through Puerto Rico, stay at a reasonable place that maybe some of us could provide at a reasonable discount, and then come over to Florida.
Guy: Okay.
Rob: And then before we get to the Q&A, Ben, anything you want to say about the conference?
Ben: We're still adding speakers. We've reached out to a lot of people. By the way, this is my first conference — I'm throwing my first conference. So it's sort of a learning experience. But I think it'll be a lot of fun. We'll probably have one of our normal ITC parties, which I think Rob's been to a few of those, so it should be a good time.
Rob: Should be a good time. Well, everybody, congratulations to Ben on passing the 1 million subscriber mark — I forgot to say that in the show.
Ben: Almost a third of what Guy has.
Guy: Not too bad. Not too bad.
Rob: I'll tell you the secret to it, Ben — get all those subscribers in 2021 when crypto was going crazy.
Ben: That was my mistake. That was my mistake.
Guy: You just need to build that time machine. Go back. Maybe if my thumbnail game had been better back then.
Rob: Hey, that thumbnail game is getting strong, I will tell you.
Q&A: Conference Logistics, Quantum Computing, and World Cup
Rob: Let's see — Raven Eye says, "Come on, Guy, kick back and get a vodka cran in Miami." And yeah, if you guys come to the event, I will buy you a drink. Now, if it's a thousand people, it's going to be Keystone Light. But if it's just a couple hundred...
How have we not talked about the World Cup? That would be a good one for you guys to talk about.
Ben: I mean, Guy, I'm just going to say — England didn't have a great game the other day. I don't know if you saw it.
Guy: I didn't see it because it was on at an ungodly hour where I am, and I'm glad I didn't, because a nil-nil draw against Ghana is no one's idea of a good time. But I'm reliably informed that we're saving it for the bigger games. It was very sad to see Scotland go out, though. Well, I don't think technically Scotland are out — I think there's a chance they could still squeeze through, but it's not looking great. They lost 3-0 to Brazil, which wasn't exactly surprising seeing as Brazil are pretty good.
Rob: I don't think this will make you feel any better, but Ghana beat the United States in the World Cup in 2006 and 2010. And then we got our revenge in, I think, 2014. But not that that would make you feel any better, just because it's the US. I don't know — I'm a perma-bull right now on the US soccer team. Let's go.
Guy: I'm just so amazed, Ben, by how much you've gotten into the World Cup.
Ben: I've always been into soccer. Soccer was the main sport I played growing up. I played soccer, basketball, and baseball, but soccer was the one I liked most. And yeah, I've always been into it. I think the reason why this time is different is because there's just nothing else going on in the markets. So what else am I going to talk about?
It also adds a lot that the World Cup is in the States, you know — it makes it even more exciting. I got to go to one of the USA games a few weeks ago, one of the warm-up matches. Also, a couple of World Cups ago, the US didn't even make it, I don't think. They didn't even make it to the World Cup at some point in the last decade. I'm not as into it when they're not there.
But I mean, last World Cup, the finals — Argentina and France — that was one of the best games I've ever seen. One of the most exciting games.
Guy: That was a great game. Yeah, that was a great game. The US are very sort of hit and miss, but the US women's team — one of the best in the world, I think.
Ben: Guy, I also have a bone to pick with you. This has come up a lot and I'm going to ask you — why does everyone from the UK give Americans such a hard time for calling it soccer, when the term soccer originated from the UK?
Guy: Because for whatever reason the term soccer is no longer used in the UK. We call it football because you kick the ball with your foot.
Rob: Have you guys seen the SNL skit where they're talking about George Washington going to the new world, and he's like, "We're going to play football," and it's a sport where you throw a ball with your hands? And then they're like, "Wait, so there's no kicking?" And he's like, "There's a little kicking."
Guy: I've seen that sketch because you told me about it, Ben. You sent me the link when you were over here in Dubai.
Ben: Everyone should watch it if they haven't seen it.
Rob: That is a good one. Hey, here are some questions real quick and then we'll get going. What time on the registration day should we show up at the Marriott? To make this simple — if you go to the website, they actually have some recommendations for where to stay: Marriott Marquee Miami, Kimpton Epic Hotel, Intercontinental Miami. I am looking for the Hotel 6, but it's not listed here.
Ben: I think the first thing is at 5:00 p.m. — we're going to have welcome drinks, that kind of stuff at the hotel on Friday, and then the main conference is Saturday. We're going to fill in some more stuff on Friday and Sunday, we just haven't figured out exactly what. But I believe 5:00 p.m., and I'll let you guys know if that changes. We want to give people time to actually check into their hotel on Friday, and usually you can't check in until like 3:00 or 4:00.
Rob: Yeah, that's well — that's why we started drinking. Anyhow, that's up to you guys. And somebody says Richcom says Guy must come. I'm just putting it out there — this is what Polymarket is. Could have NFA Live live.
Guy: Let's not go overboard.
Ben: Does anyone know that Rob, me, and Guy have never been in the same place at the same time in the real world? I've met Rob and I've met Guy, and I think Rob has met Guy, but we've never actually all been together at the same time.
Rob: That's right. One day. Maybe soon.
Any chance of Lynn or Bob as speakers?
Ben: We've reached out. We're still working on that. A lot of people are just trying to figure out if they can make it work in November. But we're going to be adding more speakers. I think maybe Jason Kazino is interested in speaking — he talks a lot more about real estate. We're trying — I mean, the conference is more than just crypto. It kind of goes along with what Rob said earlier, right? There's always a bull market somewhere. So we'll reach out to as many people and try to get them there. And by the way, the goal is for it to be different from other crypto conferences. It's not just going to be treasury company talk after talk after talk.
Rob: Sounds a lot more fun. How about this one — Vanlife says, "I'm betting my money on quantum computing stocks for the next boom, like AI." I know the US government just gave a push to quantum computing, giving their agencies a timeline to I think 2031 or 2028. Any thoughts on this one?
Guy: We've been looking into it a bit. Some of them are fairly obvious — IBM I think are big into quantum, Google are obviously big into quantum. So often you just consider it in terms of what it'll do to Bitcoin and indeed everything else. But yeah, it will be a thing at some point, I think. And it's coming sooner than later.
Rob: And then lastly, let's finish up with some soccer talk. Someone says Ben isn't American — I'm guessing that's because he's talked so much about soccer.
Ben: I mean, think about it — the US has what, three to four hundred million people in it, give or take. Most people care about basketball, baseball, and American football. I'm just calling it American football for the benefit of our international host here, Guy. But even if only 10% of the people in the United States cared about soccer, that's still like 30 to 40 million people, which is probably around the same audience size as a lot of the European countries that care about soccer. It's just that in the United States there's an astronomically larger number of people that care about other sports. So it seems like soccer isn't popular at all, but it is popular. I've been to soccer games and there are a lot of people there. I actually went to the national championship game in soccer this past year. It's more popular than people think — it just pales in comparison to the NBA or the NFL.
Guy: I remember reading a while back that one of the reasons football was becoming more popular in the US was because of a lot of immigration from Latin America, where football culture is a lot more ingrained. So a larger proportion of the US population comes from a football culture. And I think that's kind of what you need in order to get popularity — it needs to be quite strongly a part of the culture. In the UK, it's like a cultural cornerstone. But as you say, Ben, there's so much competition. When you think of American sports, you think of baseball, basketball, and American football. When you think of British sports, football is near the top. Maybe in a few more generations it will keep getting more and more popular in the US because that football culture will build.
Rob: I feel like you're going to soon start telling us we should be using the metric system.
Guy: One day — I'm not going to die on that hill today.