There's a mountain of greed manifesting itself in the market, according to Federated Investors portfolio manager Steve Chiavarone.

But he says you won't find it in stocks — it's in cryptocurrencies.

"It's the first sign of greed since the Great Recession," Chiavarone said this week on CNBC's "Trading Nation." "It's indicative of rising risk appetites which will drive equity markets higher almost regardless of what happens with bitcoin."

Bitcoin is such a contentious emerging asset, Chiavarone recently felt compelled to publish a market memo on it, because he was fielding so many questions from clients and advisors.

"Investors wanted to be on the roller coaster in the '90s. They wanted high returns. They didn't mind volatility," Chiavarone said.

"The Great Recession put the fear in a lot of folks and they wanted to go on the merry-go-round Folks really want to get on that risk trade," he added.

Chiavarone, who is a bull on the actual blockchain technology, believes there's a good chance bitcoin will suffer the same fate as Pets.com — one of the biggest dotcom bubble busts of the high-flying 90s, before tech stocks crashed.