Not an asset class, but I'd draw parallels to Texas Hold 'Em. In 2003, Chris Moneymaker wins $2.5 million at the WSOP as an amateur who qualified through the internet; within a year, everyone is talking about hold 'em, their bankroll strategy, having poker nights with their buddies, how they're playing 12 tables at once online, etc. Culminates in massive mainstream acceptance, ads for Pokerstars running on major networks, and a major plot arc in a James Bond movie. But it turns out that nearly everyone is a loser in online poker; after all, at a 6 person table, only 1 person wins (well, 2nd place usually gets their entry fee back, but still). Very few people become Chris Moneymakers; most just lose a bit of cash, some their life savings.

Look at where hold 'em is now. It still exists, of course, but you don't see poker tournaments broadcast live on ESPN anymore. It's not even a very popular livestreaming category. It definitely went through a boom, then huge bust, and then a slide into... not really irrelevancy, just kind of a continued existence.

IMO, crypto is headed for the same fate. It will still be fun for a subset of people to gamble on altcoins, to pump and dump and run schemes of dubious legality. And just like I wouldn't count out a poker resurgence sometime in the next decade, I wouldn't count out another crypto spike in the future. People never stop loving easy money.

Lets just hope the next craze doesn't use a bazillion kWh's of electricity

The main factor in the drop of online poker was the USA crackdown on poker sites. It remains wildly popular in jurisdictions where it is still legal and is making a comeback in some US states that have since re-opened it.

I'm in a region where online poker is legal (Canada) and can assure you it's not wildly popular, at least for my own definition of wildly. I've had a lot more conversations with people about crypto than poker in the past 2 years. Worldwide Google Trends matches the US trend of interest in Hold Em being down ~98% since 2004.

People may be underestimating how popular hold em was in the mid-2000s. As another comment in this thread said, it was even more popular than crypto is now, and that's without the extensive use of social media that we have today.

The flaw with your analogy is that poker continues to be hugely popular worldwide. Check WSOP.com any time this month

Poker is not even remotely as popular as it was in the mid-00s. Google Trends shows "texas hold em" currently at 1% of its peak in mid-2004, and the more general "poker" at about 14%. It definitely still exists, there are still tournaments, and it's still played by people around the world, but it's not a part of the cultural zeitgeist like it was ~20 years ago.

This is correct - in the '00s everyone was playing online, or playing after work, or knew someone who was playing. It was big - bigger than crypto is even now. It really was a fad that caught people's attention, combined with lax regulations enabling online play - it was a firestorm.

Which relatively quickly died off.

> struggling to find a good analogy to these crypto boom/bust cycles

Casinos. Seriously [1].

[1] https://pubs.aeaweb.org/doi/pdfplus/10.1257/jep.13.3.173

It’s like betting and gambling. The losers keep coming back thinking they can time it correctly this time around. The game is basically putting money in to get it higher, and timing the top. Crypto being largely meaningless in terms of value is a perfect medium for the game.

A fool is born every minute. there is an endless supply of those who need to learn the hard way. Keeps the Boom/Bust cycle going.