The 2018 cryptocurrency market thus far, I imagine, is one of the most observed cryptocurrency seasons to date. Not only is cryptocurrency significantly more notorious this year, as a result of the boom we witnessed at the end of 2017, going into 2018 but overall, more elements of cryptocurrency and blockchain technology are seeping into our real, mainstream lives. Therefore, cryptocurrency is far less anonymous and as a result, news of the markets is more accessible than ever. This is a good thing of course. 2018, does seem to be the year for cryptocurrency , despite how things may look at the moment. In a recent video, YouTuber Louis Thomas has uploaded a video in which he discusses the question, ‘Is this the 2013 bear market all over again for cryptocurrencies?’ You can see the video for yourself, here- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LClkx2DfMRA In the video, Thomas discusses that last the last few months trends could be seen as a reflection of what we saw back in 2013, after a ‘parabolic’ rise in Bitcoin value, similarly to the rise witnessed at the start of 2018. Both instances, in the wake of a rise, we have seen many common denominators between the two instances in terms of market trends. Thomas’ favourite take on this, derives from the twitter account for ‘Parabolic Trav’ which discusses why this market, is not the same as the 2013 bear market and that in fact, this is just the start of an incredible bull surge, which may very well make us all rich, or words to that effect at least. Thomas does remind us that it is important to stay headsmart when interpreting this sort of news as optimism can get the better of us, but he finds it hard to disagree with Parabolic Trav, because he agrees that surely at some point, we will see some huge price rises, perhaps not as optimistically as Parabolic Trav suggests, but overall, a rise is a rise regardless. Thomas believes that the 2013 bear market was a one off, simply because the cryptocurrency markets relied on few major entities, now, we are in a very different situation in that there are numerous exchanges and numerous currencies operating to the point we no longer have to rely on just a few. Thomas uses the example of Binance fading out, if this happened, there are still plenty of other ways in which exchanges can be made so, it wouldn’t have a huge effect, whereas back in 2013, that sort of situation would have been devastating. So, to answer the question, is the 2018 market just the same as the 2013 market? No. It can’t be, because things are so different now. Even if we see similar trends, the overall climate has changed, so big drops can make less of a difference, optimism may be less powerful than it was. There are a range of different factors at play now that did not exist in 2013. Whether you believe it or not, you cannot deny that the industry has grown since 2013 and thus, we can’t assume that the 2018 trend will follow exactly what we saw in 2013. Have a watch of Thomas’ video, it offers some great insight and a good coverage of the topic, if you don’t want to scroll up, here it is again- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LClkx2DfMRA Aren’t we good to you?