Decentral Block Post

Educating oneself about the crypto ecosystem is crucial for investors to pursue during a bear market while awaiting a bull cycle. That being said, having a good understanding of crypto investment entails keeping an eye out for fraudulent projects that threaten to drain assets overnight, a.k.a. pump-and-dump schemes.

Pump-and-dump in crypto is an orchestrated fraud that involves misleading investors into purchasing artificially inflated tokens — typically marketed and hyped by paying celebrities and social influencers. SafeMoon token is one of the most prominent examples of an alleged pump-and-dump scheme involving A-list celebrities, including Nick Carter, Soulja Boy, Lil Yachty and YouTubers Jake Paul and Ben Phillips.

Once the investors have purchased tokens at inflated prices, the people owning the biggest pile of tokens sell out, resulting in an immediate crash in the token’s prices. While fraudsters disguise pump-and-dump schemes under the pretext of creating the next batch of crypto millionaires, knowledgable investors have the upper hand in identifying and avoiding their involvement.

Pump-and-dump schemes are usually accompanied by false promises around three broad categories — solving real-world use cases, guaranteed exorbitant returns and unwithered backing from celebrities and influencers.

The long-term success of a cryptocurrency is heavily dependent on the use cases it serves. As a result, people supporting pump-and-dump projects often suffice their involvement by highlighting the use cases the token aims to serve. In addition, such schemes typically rope in celebrities by upfront payments in cash and the project’s in-house tokens. 

It’s weird to think that anyone could look forward to downturns in the crypto market, but that is precisely the position held by many developers and project creators who enjoy the low-pressure environment that exists during a bear market. 

As the saying goes, bear markets are for building, and now is one of the best times to survey the landscape to see which sectors of the market are most active in designing the platforms that will soar to new heights in the next bull cycle.

Here’s a look at five sectors of the blockchain ecosystem that may present some of the best opportunities for accumulation while prices are low and demand is non-existent.

Layer-1 protocols

Layer-1 (L1) protocols like Bitcoin and Ethereum form the foundation that much of the cryptocurrency ecosystem is built upon and enable most of the other sectors of the market to exist.

That being said, there are currently not many options available for launching other protocols on the Bitcoin network and Ethereum has well-known limitations in terms of scalability that can lead to high transaction costs and slow processing times.

There’s no rest for the weary during a bear market, and the Crypto Fear and Greed index shows that investor sentiment has been stuck in a state of "extreme fear" for a record 70 consecutive days.

As the market looks for a catalyst to reverse the trend, there is little on the horizon besides the Ethereum (ETH) Merge that seems capable of sparking a rally. If that is indeed the case, the market could continue to trend down or sideways until the tentative Merge date of September 19.

Data from Cointelegraph Markets Pro and TradingView shows that Ether price remains sandwiched in the trading zone it has been trading in since June 13 and it is currently running into the upper resistance near $1,240.

With the Merge still a couple of months away and little else on the roadmap for Ethereum in the near term, here’s what analysts are saying to watch out for.

Ether now trades above its moving averages

A short message of hope at this significant level of resistance was provided by futures trader Peter Brandt, who posted the following chart and simply stated “Maybe baby $ETH.”

The recovery in the cryptocurrency markets is being led by Bitcoin (BTC), which has risen above the $21,000 level. However, BlockTrends analyst Caue Oliveira said that on-chain data shows a decline in “whale activity” since the month of May, barring the flurry of activity during the Terra (LUNA) — since renamed Terra Classic (LUNC) — collapse.

A survey conducted in China shows that most participants believe that Bitcoin could fall much further. About 40% of the participants said they would buy Bitcoin if the price dropped to $10,000. Only 8% of the voters showed interest in buying Bitcoin if it drops to $18,000.

Millionaire investor Kevin O’Leary told Cointelegraph that crypto markets are likely to witness “massive volatility” and enter into a state of “total panic” before entering an accelerated growth phase. He said that companies run by “idiot managers” will face the heat, but that will result in the rise of stronger companies.

Could higher levels continue to witness aggressive selling by the bears? Let’s study the charts of the top-10 cryptocurrencies to find out.

BTC/USDT

Bitcoin slipped below the support line of the symmetrical triangle on July 13, but the bears could not sustain the lower levels. This suggests that the bulls purchased the dip and have pushed the price to the 20-day exponential moving average (EMA) ($20,842).