Early last week, Vitalik Buterin tweeted in response to Tim Swanson, founder of Post Oak Labs, that he believes “We’re at the tail end of a crypto bubble.” Swanson had tweeted an image of SimilarWeb data indicating a rapid decline in traffic to Coinbase.com.

Google Trends Follows Suit

Google trends shows a similar pattern, with searches for Coinbase, Bitcoin, Cryptocurrency, and Ethereum all plummeting since their highs of December 2017. However, Buterin believes this is to be expected, and suggest the crypto markets are nearing the end of a bubble.

Is anyone surprised? We're at the tail end of a crypto bubble. — Vitalik Non-giver of Ether (@VitalikButerin) July 31, 2018

Google Trends is thought to be a lagging indicator by traders, suggesting that the volume of searches follows the price, rather than the other way around. It is, therefore, possible that the SimilarWeb data follows a similar pattern, with users visiting retail exchanges such as Coinbase far more during bullish price action.

Sea of Red

Markets are down significantly today, with the majority of cryptocurrencies in the top 50 down 10-20% as per CoinMarketCap. This downward volatility comes after the SEC delayed their decision on the CBOE ETF, which investors were hoping would be approved later this week.

Capitulation

Many traders believe that market capitulation is necessary before the market can turn bullish again, and many are waiting for this capitulation to confirm the bottom. The good news, however, is that there is some evidence that even ICOs which raised tens of millions of dollars worth of cryptocurrency are capitulating at this point, as pointed out in a tweet today from CNBC Cryptotrader host Ran NeuNer:

Spent the morning with an ICO (not to be named) they raised $30m usd with a solid roadmap, they raised when ETH was $1200. They panicked and sold their remaining ETH last night – they have $4m left. — Ran NeuNer (@cryptomanran) August 8, 2018

Retail traders appear to be behaving in a similar fashion, with many apparently in panic after the ETF decision was postponed yesterday.

If this really is capitulation, Buterin may be correct, and the crypto bear market could be coming to an end. That said, the crypto markets are notoriously volatile, and what comes next is anyone’s guess – there may be far more downwards price action to come.