Today, we’re taking a break from the AI series to discuss the 30,000-foot view because we’re at a pivotal moment from a macro standpoint, and it is worth laying out my expected higher time frame direction for markets, so that we don’t get caught swimming with our pants down.

Before I get into it, if you missed any of the AI series or my latest market video, start here 👇🏽

Content you may have missed 🤔

Robotics Allocation Waiting Room

SPACE X - Allocation Strategy

AI ETF Allocation Strategy

Allocation Triggers - no moves are made until these triggers are hit.

The state of the market (video format) 👇🏽

Crypto:

I’ve covered my views on crypto extensively via the Community Chat.

I’ve even suggested what I need to see to confirm the bull run is in full swing 👇🏼

So, if you remain unallocated, I suggest you re-read the argument I made for “why you should have at least some level of exposure” when BTC was trading at $64K, and then come up with an allocation strategy 👇🏼

Better yet, if you prefer video format, here is a video I made on 29 June, making the argument that prices were attractive from a risk-reward standpoint when BTC was trading at $59K 👇🏼

For context, I have been allocating at key periods in 2026 (as discussed extensively in the newsletters) and I am:

• 100% allocated to crypto in my public eToro portfolio

• 95% allocated to crypto across my various entities

I plan to take a significant chunk of profit at key levels, much like when I moved ~60% of my portfolio to cash at what were then all time highs back in December 2024/January 2025.

I will be discussing those key levels for my holdings over the next few weeks.

That said, moving on to the more important and influential matter at hand… macro! 👇🏼

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Risk-On Risk-Off (RORO) Tool

👉 how do I use this tool? 👈

👉 performance stats for RORO👈

The RORO reading is 78% which is on par with May 2026 i.e. the highest value recorded this year.

The RORO tool is a great medium-term signal, and the outlook is currently positive.

Read more

Firstly, sorry about the length! It was required for this one, as it is possibly the biggest industry I’ll allocate to over the next decade….but I totally understand if you’re like 👇🏽

Moving on - this continues the multi-part AI investment series.

I spent weeks working through the robotics stack because I didn’t want to buy the next big humanoid robotics IPO to go public (I’m looking at you, Unitree).

Why?

Well, here is the Chinese humanoid industry at a glance - you tell me, which one is going to win the race?

That said, I landed on two plays for my robotics allocation: the ETF I shared here, and one public company that I think sits in one of the most valuable layers of the stack.

In case you missed them, here are the previous newsletter drops 👇🏽

SPACE X - An Investment Thesis

AI ETF Allocation Strategy

Allocation Triggers - no moves are made until these triggers are hit.

Next week I will cover:

• My allocation strategy for the ETF

• Why I chose this ETF rather than the private, closed-source robotics fund being hyped on social media.

Robotics is much bigger than humanoids 🤖

When people hear robotics, they think humanoids. That is one small futuristic part of the picture…at least today.

The bigger and more near-term trade is the buildout underneath them. Think industrial automation, semiconductor and electronics capacity, machine vision, sensors, controllers, precision measurement, and eventually the humanoid manufacturing and component boom.

That leaves me with two ways to allocate 👇🏽

Read more

I’ve narrowed down my long-term AI plays. Over the next several weeks, I’ll be dropping my allocation strategy for each of them along with entry prices, exit prices, circuit breakers.

This week - the play is Space X (SPCX).

I know what you’re thinking.

The question is not whether to allocate to SPCX. Every retail investor has already allocated or is planning to allocate. The question is what is the right price?

Because, let’s be honest. A -50% pullback looks very attractive…to some folks.

and I have no doubt that we’ll start seeing chart crime like this all over the timeline 👇🏽

from folks that probably look like this in real life…

But I digress.

I want to be clear that the plays I’m laying out will be either:

set and forget in my long-term portfolio (irrespective of volatility)

and/or

allocate to in my eToro portfolio for several years (taking into account macro conditions, price targets etc)

I haven’t allocated to any ETFs (yet), but I’ve already outlined my ETF picks here.

Despite the bullishness on the timeline, we are currently going through a deteriorating macro environment, that is all but confirmed with

1. a rising USD

2. a global rate hiking cycle

3. higher inflation OR higher unemployment

4. falling liquidity

On that basis, I’m not in a rush to allocate.

Please re-read that, because once you see the price targets, you’ll understand that I don’t expect price to come to my levels immediately.

Overview

Before Space X completed its initial public offering, I shared that the IPO price would mean that it was trading at a revenue multiple ~6x higher than TSLA. This was purposely meant to give us an idea of the premium we would be paying for a “shiny new Elon Musk play”.

Here is the updated comparison, some ~2 months post-IPO.

In relative terms, SPCX is still~7x more expensive than TSLA - let’s call this the “Moon boy premium”….because the mission is to colonise the moon… and also it’s priced like a memecoin.

Why I do not need to rush

First, let me preface this by highlighting that historically speaking, Mega IPOs do not do well 12 months out from their listing date 👇🏽

Those that have done well (see those that are green in the last column) are exceptions because they listed into supportive macro environments, such as:

• 2020 during unprecedented liquidity injections; and

• 2023 after markets had already endured record inflation, rapid rate hikes and equity drawdowns of 20-40%, and started to recover.

Second, we can gauge retail interest by reviewing the ETF inflows into SPCX. It has basically flatlined since 22 June 2026 👇🏽

…and price has been down only ever since 👇🏽

Now, let me reiterate a few things I believe profoundly:

I WILL BE A BUYER OF SPCX.

ELON MUSK IS THE MODERN DAY TONY STARK.

NEVER BET AGAINST ELON MUSK.

OVER A LONG ENOUGH TIME FRAME, AN INVESTMENT IN ELON WILL YIELD A POSITIVE RETURN.

However, with all that said:

SPCX and TSLA trade like high beta tech stocks and akin to BTC, ETH, and SOL.

and we know that Elon stocks can trade -50%, -60% or even -75% down, depending on the macro environment.

..and the current macro regime is not conducive to a high beta rally (more on this later)

Thirdly, only 5% of SPCX stock are available to purchase right now 👇🏽

This means 95% are locked.

This also means that 5x more shares (than are available today) will be unlocked and available for trading in early August.

By the end of October we will have 12x more shares on the market than we do today. We can fully expect to have a clear and sustained source of selling pressure until at least June 2027.

So, with those three points we can take a deep breath, rub our ear lobes..

..and recognise that we do not have to be in a rush to allocate.

Space X is at a $1.5T valuation with $19B in revenue over the last 4 quarters. This is not exactly “a steal”.

The Timeline “Crumb”

I recently watched The Economist’s interview with Elon Musk and he’s all but told us point blank that there is effectively no rush to allocate.

SpaceX is making investments today with a 10-15 year horizon, and actively committing capital to make a Moon and Mars base rather than prioritising short-term quarterly results.

In fact, they were explicit in the prospectus 👇🏽

Don’t get me wrong - this is admirable and why I want to invest in the first place, but that alone should tell us that we can bide our time with this trade.

Now, let’s move onto the macro and allocation strategy👇🏽

Read more

If you want to skip straight to the TLDR click here 👇🏽

TLDR

Part 3 of the AI trade series (the individual stocks) is coming next week.

Before I get there, I want to zoom out, because the question remains:

are these pullbacks in AI and crypto opportunities?

If you missed Parts 1 and 2 of the AI series or my latest market video, start here 👇🏽

Content you may have missed 🤔

The Trigger(s) I’m waiting for before deploying capital to the AI trade…again 👇🏽

The most attractive ETF plays 👇🏽

The state of the market (video format) 👇🏽

Crypto: cheap does not mean risk-free

I shared this view in the community chat 👇🏽

A lot of folks have now accepted that the 4-year cycle may, in fact, be real.

The response has been to wait until Q4 2026 before allocating again.

To be honest, that is a fair take. We have watched a version of the same cycle play out 3 times, and even with a tiny sample size, its reflexivity matters. If enough investors believe in the pattern, they can help create it. That is not to be underestimated (as I learned the hard way)

But the question remains:

What happens if the cycle repeats?

More importantly: what happens if it doesn’t?

Do you wait for BTC to reclaim the 200-day moving average (D1 200 MA)?

For RORO #11 - Megatrend to flip 🟢 (or blue in the case of the chart below)?

Or do you DCA through the uncertainty?

There is no universally correct answer. But there is a wrong one:

having no strategy and letting price choose for you.

For context, I am already 96% allocated to crypto. My two major allocations were:

• ➡️ February 2026, around $60K BTC

• ➡️ April 2026, around $70K BTC

That leaves me comfortable on both sides of the distribution.

I can absorb another 20% drawdown without being forced out, and I already have enough exposure if a new bull market starts.

That does not mean I think a sustained bull market can begin under today’s macro conditions. I do not (more on that shortly).

It means that at $60K BTC, $1,600 ETH and $75 SOL, the upside-to-downside asymmetry was attractive enough for me to do something about - especially given that my buy triggers fired.

Could BTC still follow the last two cycles?

• ➡️ Rally through the US summer

• ➡️ Chopsolidate through autumn

• ➡️ Then print one final leg lower during winter

  

Absolutely. The chart above shows how closely that would rhyme with 2018 and 2022.

But this is not my base case given that both prior cycles needed an exogenous catalyst to produce the final leg lower.

• In late 2022, FTX supplied the catalyst.

• In late 2018, regulatory pressure on ICOs collided with a broader equity sell-off driven by FED tightening, the US-China trade war and growth fears.

Some folks on social media are calling that “time capitulation” - really it’s just a bearish catalyst pushing price lower.

Could we get another shock? Absolutely. In fact, today’s macro backdrop leaves the door open.

But should we bank on an existential shock as our base case? Hell no.

We do not need to buy the final tick of a bear market to earn exceptional returns.

• ➡️ In 2018, buying BTC between ~$5.5K and $8K came before the move to $69K - about 9-12x.

• ➡️ In 2022, buying BTC between ~$18K and $25K came before the move to $128K - about 5-7x.

So, then the real question is:

would I accept a 2-3x from today’s levels, even if I am early?

Without a shadow of a doubt.

Back to Top

Would I be pissed if BTC spent a year at $60K and I didn’t allocate because I had waited for a perfectly scheduled Q4 bottom? Also yes.

The last thing I’ll say on the 4-year cycle for the remainder of this bear market is this.

If enough investors wait for the same 4-year-cycle entry, the entry itself can be front-run. Markets are reflexive. Once a playbook becomes consensus, the timing starts to move.

We have already seen evidence of that. The 2025 blow-off top arrived a year early, after only two green years rather than the three that preceded earlier cycle peaks 👇🏽

To add further, June 2026 delivered the most persistent run of ETF selling since the ETFs went live (on a 10 period moving average basis), yet BTC held ~$60K.

The prior burst of heavy selling, in February, found buyers around the same level.

This is not proof the low is in. It is evidence that supply has repeatedly been absorbed near $60K.

For BTC to break meaningfully lower from here, I suspect we need a broader risk-asset unwind - closer to what we saw in late 2018.

That is why I am comfortable with my crypto exposure - and why my fresh capital is now focused on AI.

AI: secular acceleration, cyclical pause

First, a caveat: my cautious view on AI is short-to-medium term.

Over the medium to long term, I expect the AI buildout to continue for years. The AGI Index below captures the slope of the acceleration in AI IQ (so to speak). The jump from GPT-5.5 to GPT-5.6 Sol is larger than the preceding increments. We are accelerating.

And the capability is no longer confined to benchmark charts. The example below shows GPT-5.6 completing a full day’s white-collar workflow from a single command 👇🏽

That said, a technology can accelerate while its stocks consolidate. The NASDAQ has spent 63 days moving sideways near the highs 👇🏽

The ETF basket tells the same story, but with interesting dispersion: SMH (chips) is -9% below its recent high; CIBR (cybersecurity) at all-time highs; SKYY (cloud computing) -10%; GRID (energy) -7%; BOTZ (robotics) -13% and NASDAQ (tech) -4%.

That is a consolidation.

And none of those drawdowns stand out as extraordinary inside a secular bull market. During the dot-com bubble, NASDAQ absorbed repeated -15-30% corrections before the final peak 👇🏽

So, the only question is whether today’s macro regime is strong enough to turn a normal consolidation into a deeper reset. Right now, one number in my RORO dashboard tells me whether this current pullback is an entry or a trap 👇🏽

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Read more

Today’s update is a little different.

Instead of a full written newsletter, I’ve recorded a video State of the Market update walking through where I think we are across crypto, macro and the AI trade.

I hope you enjoy! 👇🏽

Summary

Crypto, specifically BTC, ETH and SOL, is trading at levels that I think offer attractive risk-to-reward (R/R).

Like February 2026, we are at or near the lows, and several bottoming signals are flashing:

• BTC monthly RSI is near prior bear market low levels

• BTC is trading close to its 200 week moving average

• Crypto sentiment remains clustered around “extreme fear” and at major lows

• BTC, ETH and SOL are all showing weekly bullish divergences

None of this guarantees the low is in. It simply tells me that, if the crypto thesis is still valid, this is the type of zone where the risk-to-reward starts to skew favourably.

For the record, this is the thesis:

At the same time, the RORO tool remains risk-off. That is mainly due to rising inflation pressure, a stronger US dollar, the global hiking cycle across the developed world, and the broader “death knell” setup of higher oil, higher yields and a stronger USD.

That means that the macro backdrop is not supportive enough for a risk-on rally just yet. My base case is that TradFi trades flat to down, with a bias towards lower prices in the short to medium term.

Crypto is slightly different because I think the market is already pricing in a lot of bad news. You can see this in assets like MSTR and STRC, where the market is effectively pricing in one of the worst-case narratives around Strategy and its potentially unplanned selling of BTC to service future debt obligations - I think this risk is overstated, as highlighted in the Community Chat.

Could BTC trade another 10-20% lower? Of course. That is always possible.

But again, if the thesis is valid, this is attractive R/R.

The other thing worth noting is the four-year cycle narrative. I do not believe in the four-year cycle as a hard rule, but I do think it is reflexive. If enough people believe BTC should bottom in Q4 2026, then many will try to front-run that by buying earlier. So the bearish cycle narrative that has been hanging over crypto is also getting closer to exhaustion, which could become a tailwind rather than a headwind.

The AI trade remains my key focus for reallocation. I believe AI is one of the strongest multi-year opportunities, but I am waiting for a better entry as macro pressure and parabolic charts create the pullback I have been expecting.

The opportunity I am most focused on is not broad AI exposure, but rather specific parts of the AI stack where I think the next major 5-10x opportunities may emerge, as shared here 👇🏽

TLDR

Crypto looks like a high RR accumulation zone, but macro is not yet supportive enough for a rally in risk-on assets in crypto, AI or tech broadly.

My next major allocation/reallocation focus remains the AI trade once the setup improves.

Here is a PDF of the slides 👇🏽

2026 06 29 State Of The Market

3.26MB ∙ PDF file

Download

Download

That’s all for now.

Catch you next week ✌🏽

Filip Brnadic

DISCLAIMER:

PROJECT 10X (Filip Brnadic) does not provide individually tailored investment advice. Nor is PROJECT 10X registered to provide investment advice, is not a financial adviser, and is not a broker-dealer.

The material provided is FOR EDUCATIONAL PURPOSES ONLY. PROJECT 10X is not responsible for any gains or losses that result from your investments. Investing involves a high degree of risk and should be considered only by persons who can afford to sustain a COMPLETE LOSS OF FUNDS.

No statement or expression of opinion, or any other matter herein, directly or indirectly, is an offer or the solicitation of an offer to buy or sell the securities or financial instruments mentioned.

This newsletter is the second part of a multi-part series on how I intend to play the AI trade over the next decade.

• Part 1: The Trigger

• Part 2: The ETF Trade

• Part 3 will be the individual stock trade.

In Part 1, the key point was simple:

I do not want to chase the AI trade at any price.

But now that we have outlined the circumstances that could lead to the next pullback in AI, the next question is:

How do we actually allocate when that opportunity arrives?

The Roadmap

I think we can all agree that the AI trade is not going away anytime soon. Goldman Sachs estimates a $7.1T AI infrastructure buildout from 2026 to 2031.

Yes, trillion with a T.

The most significant part of the above graphic is not just the final number. It is the proportion dedicated to data centres and power (30-35%)

The AI trade is moving from software and chips into physical infrastructure.

From a load perspective a data centre is made up of:

• servers (GPUs/CPUs) which accounts for 60% of total electricity consumption

• storage and memory: 5%

• networking equipment (switches, routers): 5%

• cooling: ~30%

In power system simulation software, data centre load modelling is split between 60% data centre load and 40% HVAC (heating, ventilation and air conditioning).

This is why “power” is such a bottleneck. Before the AI buildout was a thing there were multi-year delays on some grid equipment. With the AI buildout, this absolutely blows out. The companies that win are the companies that are able to ramp production.

I also think we can agree that this will not move in a straight line.

We will get

• pullbacks

• narrative shocks

• macro scares

• periods where investors question whether the spending is too aggressive, whether the revenue is real, whether the power is available, and whether the market has already priced too much in

That is the point of this strategy.

I want a roadmap that lets us capture the bulk of the AI trade without constantly trading around it.

I want to enter at an appropriate time and stay allocated until a major trend-change occurs (more on this later).

The ETF Trade

I am splitting the ETF trade into three buckets:

• Core AI buildout exposure: the part of the portfolio that captures the obvious infrastructure winners without needing to pick the single stock.

• Second-order bottlenecks: the parts of the stack that become more valuable as the buildout runs into power, security, cloud and physical infrastructure constraints.

• Long-duration optionality: the part of the portfolio that captures robotics, autonomy and AI moving from software into the real world.

To be clear, these are not short-term trading instruments for me.

I am treating these like 5+ year thematic plays that we exit when the thesis breaks or CAPEX rolls over.

That is why we are tracking CAPEX. CAPEX is the North Star and as long as CAPEX spend is ongoing, so is the AI trade. 👇🏽

The strategy is therefore the following 5 ETFs 👇🏽

Read more

This newsletter is the first part of a multi-part series on how I intend to play the AI trade over the next decade.

• Part 1 is the trigger.

• Part 2 will be the ETF trade.

• Part 3 will be the individual stock trade.

I’ve been discussing the AI buildout quite regularly over the last few years, and I’ve already had exposure to names like IREN, TSLA and the SMH index..

They were great trades.

IREN and SMH would have been even better holds.

So the point of this series is not, “how do we get into the AI trade ASAP?”

The point is:

How do we participate in one of the biggest structural trades of the next decade without aping assets that have already gone parabolic?

That said, I happen to wholeheartedly agee with this take by in the community chat as it takes the Fear of Missing Out (FOMO) psychology out of the picture to a large degree.

So, what’s the play?

The AI CAPEX story is real. The buildout is real. The demand for compute is real, but the obvious chip trade has already gone parabolic.

From here, I’m not asking

“what do we buy?”

I’m asking:

“when do we buy it?”

and for that….

Where are we right now?

The first phase of the AI trade was straightforward: buy compute.

That meant GPUs. Semiconductors. Nvidia. TSMC. ASML. Broadcom. AMD. Micron. Equipment. Memory.

The next leg is broader. This time we need to:

buy the AI industrial buildout.

“Great anecdote Einstein, but what does that actually mean?”

It means

• ➡️ Better models require more compute.

• ➡️ More compute requires more chips.

• ➡️ More chips require more data centres (WE ARE HERE)

• ➡️ More data centres require more power.

• ➡️ More power requires grid upgrades, transformers, cooling, storage, transmission and generation.

• ➡️ More AI adoption requires more cloud, storage and cybersecurity.

• ➡️ More robotics adoption requires more sensors, batteries, actuators, factories, logistics, warehouses and physcial infrastructure.

Eventually, AI stops being a tech trade and starts becoming an economy-wide CAPEX cycle.

I think that’s what most folks are missing - the sheer amount of infrastructure and resources required to make LLMs the dominant “brain” or “workhorse” in our society.

The mistake I do not want to make

One of my core investment rules is:

avoid allocating in a trending market

Especially when assets are at all-time highs, have already put in multiples, and everyone is talking about them.

To me, there is a big difference between being right on the thesis and being right on the entry. I know my thesis is correct, now I have to wait for the right entry.

So, what are we waiting for?

Read more

Contents:

1. The AI Trade is Growing Up

2. NASDAQ has Already Started to Believe Again

3. Risk-On Risk-Off (RORO) Tool

4. The Most Important Chart

5. Capital Deployment Framework

6. What 5 February Actually Told Us

7. Current State Of The CDF Indicators

I’ve tried to keep this one as simple as possible, because I think the market is currently giving us three very clear signals:

1. AI demand is no longer theoretical

2. Risk assets are absorbing bad news better than they were earlier this year

3. My framework still says Risk-On, but that does not mean blindly chasing every green candle like an intoxicated degen at a casino on a Friday night

For context, this note builds on these major pieces:

• Latest deployment (14 April 2026)

• My base case (is a short-duration conflict, a temporary oil and gas spike, markets digest it, and we move on).

• The bottom is likely in for crypto (except if there is a major existential event)

• Why 5 Feb 2026 was THE buying opportunity (which we capitalised on)

• 2026 Macro Outlook

The simplest way I’d frame the regime we’re in is this:

The market is no longer just pricing AI hype. It is starting to price real AI revenue, real infrastructure demand, real energy constraints, and real capital flowing into the companies that can actually deliver it.

That matters for tech, energy, commodities and markets.

One investor sees “inflation”, while the other sees a “ deflationary boom” - which one is right?

And yes, it matters for crypto, because crypto tends to do very well when liquidity, risk appetite and technological speculation are all moving in the same direction (hint: they’re moving in the same direction!)

The AI Trade is Growing Up

Let me reiterate what I laid out last week.

THE trade for the next several years is the AI buildout.

Remember, at first (2023-2025) the market was hyped about AI.

Then it got scared that the hyperscalers (Google, Meta, Amazon, Microsoft etc) were lighting free cash flow on fire chasing something that may never generate a return.

Fair. It reminded the oldies of the dot com bubble where we got “dark fiber” (unused optical fiber cables that were laid but never “lit up” with equipment to carry data).

Today we see actual usage, actual revenue, actual customers and actual constraints.

First, we are seeing other income growth across hyperscalers 👇🏽

Second, we are seeing the annualised run-rate revenue of companies like Anthropic go vertical.

If AI was just another dot com or tulip bubble, revenue would disappoint, CAPEX wouldn’t yield “other income”, compute demand would soften, and the whole trade would start looking like the 2021 metaverse all over again.

Instead, you can’t rent a Blackwell Chip (B200) if your life depended on it.

Instead, we are seeing:

• AI labs need more compute

• hyperscalers need more data centres

• data centres need more power

• power needs more grid capacity

• grid capacity takes years, not quarters

That is the bottleneck.

And when the bottleneck is physical infrastructure, the trade does not end because someone on X says “bubble”.

It ends when capacity catches up with demand, or when demand disappoints.

Right now, neither of those things appear to be happening, so… all aboard the AI train!

Back to Top 👆🏽

NASDAQ has Already Started to Believe Again

We have now rallied off the lows, with NDX ripping to new highs after ~10 months of accumulation.

We have since had a small pullback. To be honest, after a move like that, I would not be shocked to see a -10% move.

and when we see those sorts of moves, we’ll get the skeptics saying

I won’t be paying any attention to these folks, because as an avid user of the frontier agentic models - and I mean proper agentic workflows through Claude, Codex, Replit or similar tools - you can clearly feel the direction of travel.

• I can one-shot CRM systems.

• I can one-shot indicators.

• I can one-shot web-apps.

• I can one-shot critical analysis.

and… this is the worst this technology will ever be.

So, what are our tools telling us? 👇🏽

Read more

I’ve tried to keep things as simple as possible and not overload readers with content. These are the areas I’ve focused on 👇🏽

• Latest deployment (14 April 2026)

• My base case (is a short-duration conflict, a temporary oil and gas spike, markets digest it, and we move on).

• The bottom is likely in for crypto (except if there is a major existential event)

• Why 5 Feb 2026 was THE buying opportunity (which we capitalised on)

• 2026 Macro Outlook

If you don’t have time to skim the newsletter, please go straight to the “Takeaway” section. Re-read it. Absorb it. Then re-read it again. That is the strategy for the next half decade. I’m sure of it.

Crypto Outlook

If you just want a TLDR of my views on the current state of the crypto market along with a forward outlook 👇🏽

• ➡️ 5 Feb 2026 = structural bottom. Formed under peak pessimism and drawdown. CDF triggered, I deployed.

• ➡️ We’ve been in accumulation since. Distribution looks largely complete. Positioning is still washed out.

• ➡️ Retest possible (not probable). ~$60K BTC or slightly lower can happen, but not my base case. DeFi hacks, war (US / Israel / Iran), and oil shocks failed to push price lower. Equities at ATHs. If price doesn’t go down on bad news, it usually goes up.

• ➡️ BTC showing relative strength. Outperforming gold, S&P 500, and Nasdaq since the War began. Not typical of a weak market.

• ➡️ 14 April = confirmed regime shift. RORO flipped Risk-On. I deployed cashflows into improving liquidity, stabilising financial conditions, and a resilient US economy.

• ➡️ Base case: higher through 2026. This looks like a sentiment/positioning reset, not a broken macro backdrop. AI + liquidity still supportive.

• ➡️ Narratives are building, not driving (yet). RWA, policy clarity, structural BTC demand, AI-driven deflation narrative - all potential accelerants.

• ➡️ Many expect a Q4 “perfect bottom”. More likely: sideways THEN Q3 move higher THEN forced chasing - this is our first round of exit liquidity.

We are all asking the wrong question

There is something I want to talk about. Something I’ve been alluding to for several months now.

The state of markets over the next 12-18 months.

In my 2026 macro outlook, I said the macro backdrop in January 2026 was bullish. When I deployed again on 14 April 2026, I showed that the macro backdrop had not changed.

But the question I’m asking now is not:

I think that question has largely been answered.

I believe the 5 Feb 2026 low was the cycle low for the reasons outlined here and here.

That low formed under peak pessimism and drawdown. Our Capital Deployment Framework triggered. I deployed.

Since then, crypto has been in accumulation. Distribution looks largely complete. Positioning is still washed out.

A retest is possible. Maybe BTC trades back towards ~$60K or slightly lower.

But that is not my base case. Why?

Because the market has had every excuse to break lower and it hasn’t.

So the better question is this:

How long does this bull run last?

Because right now, I do not see a slowdown.

Just look at the NASDAQ. It spent 10 months accumulating before breaking out. Now look at the strength of the last 5 weekly candles - no wicks to the upside (maximum demand at close), very small wicks to the downside (meaningful pullbacks were few and far between).

Why?

Why in the F*** would we be seeing that sort of strength on the back of a war?

Final speculative blow-off top? Maybe, but I wouldn’t bet on that world view.

I think it’s much more plausible that this is simply not a weak backdrop, not a weak market, and certainly not a market willing to miss “The AI age”.

Let me explain.

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I deployed again on 14 April 2026 👇🏽

Which means I’m (investment capital) cash poor

The benefit of investing on a high time frame is that we only need to make a few big decisions each year.

On that basis, rather than discussing markets this week (because there’s nothing new worth adding beyond what’s already been covered in the community chat), I want to outline the PROJECT 10X Framework and its tools so that everyone can independently answer:

Should we be adding risk, reducing risk or doing nothing?

Contents

• 1 Overview

• 2 Tools

• 2.1 Risk-On Risk-Off (RORO)

• 2.2 Capital Deployment Framework (CDF)

• 2.3 Exposure Rule (ER)

• 2.4 Selling the Top Indicators (STTI)

• 2.5 Take Profit (TP) Strategy

• 2.6 Circuit Breaker (CB) Strategy

• 2.7 Buying the Bottom Indicators (BTBI)

• 2.8. Macro score

1. Overview

Let’s start with a 30,000-foot view of each tool 👇🏽

The TLDR:

• Risk-On Risk-Off (RORO) and Capital Deployment Framework (CDF) are the only valid tools for increasing exposure.

• Selling the Top Indicators (STTI), Take Profit (TP), and Circuit Breakers (CB) manage distribution and downside protection.

• Exposure Rule (ER) caps exposure depending on whether momentum is on our side.

• Buying the Bottom Indicators (BTBI) provides additional confluence to assess whether conditions resemble cycle lows.

When combined, the full process flow looks like this 👇🏽

We now have a decision path for every plausible scenario.

There is still discretion (and there should be) - for example, how much exposure to add - but more nuanced questions like “what defines a significant drawdown?” or “what do we do with sidelined capital?” are addressed below 👇🏽

What follows is a deeper dive into each tool. The goal is for this newsletter to serve as a one-stop reference whenever the question arises:

“What is the strategy from here?”

As an aside, I highly recommend building your own version of this process flow if you’re not using these tools.

Why? To internalise it and build confidence, especially in high pressure conditions where we’re asking questions like “when the f*** do I deploy” or “should I sell my bags now?”. But also because I have no doubt that along the way, you’ll tweak, improve and develop a process you can execute with confidence in real time.

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2. Tools

2.1 Risk-On Risk-Off (RORO)

This is the highest-level regime tool in the framework. It answers:

Is the market environment broadly supportive of risk?

• Risk-On → supportive backdrop

• Risk-Off → hostile backdrop, reduce exposure to 0%

RORO is not designed to catch every local top or bottom. Its role is to keep us aligned with the broader macro and crypto regime.

Here are the backtest results (Dec 2025).

2.1.1 How RORO fits into the framework

RORO does two things:

• Reduces exposure when the market flips Risk-Off

• Adds exposure when the market returns to Risk-On after a meaningful reset

This makes it one of the two valid exposure-increase triggers (alongside CDF).

2.1.2 How to interpret RORO flips

Not all flips are equal.

A flip back to Risk-On can justify re-risking, but the first signal is often noisy. Cleaner confirmation comes from:

• Two consecutive weekly Risk-On closes

• Momentum returning (RORO #12 - MegaTrend)

• A clear regime shift

More important is the first flip to Risk-Off after a prolonged Risk-On period.

Historically, this often marks the start of regime stress—even if RORO later flips back.

Example: February 2025

RORO flipped Risk-Off after 7 months of Risk-On. This led to reducing exposure to 0% at ~$99K before the pullback to ~$74K.

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2.2 Capital Deployment Framework (CDF)

CDF answers:

How aggressively should we deploy capital after a major drawdown?

CDF is the framework’s capital deployment tool. It identifies statistically significant drawdowns where allocating capital has historically produced strong high-timeframe results.

Across ~9 years, every trigger has aligned with a major high-timeframe opportunity.

A key point: CDF does not require RORO to be Risk-On. If CDF signals a major statistical drawdown, that alone is sufficient to allocate.

2.2.1 How it works

CDF can trigger when one core condition is met:

Price has fallen far enough.

In other words, the drawdown must be meaningful, not just a normal pullback.

The macro component of RORO is then used as confluence. When Macro Risk-On is active, or the macro component of RORO is ≥50%, the setup receives a higher score. But macro does not need to be ≥50% for CDF to trigger.

This is important because some of the strongest CDF setups can occur after macro has been weak for an extended period (see November 2018 and June 2022). By then, sellers have often been in control for long enough that a CDF trigger can mark the final flush of weak hands and a high-conviction bottoming setup.

CDF scores the setup from 0 to 100 and helps determine how aggressively capital can be deployed.

If no discount signal is active, CDF remains in Watching - no trigger mode.

Example: 13 March 2020 (COVID Crash)

• Score: 100/100 → Full capital deployment (100%)

• This was a “go all in” moment, and, in hindsight, a highly profitable one (see charts above).

Example: 21 November 2025 (first major crash following the BTC top in Oct 2025)

• Score: 48 → ~48% exposure

BTC was ~$80K when CDF triggered and later dropped to $60K before a second trigger in February 2026.

If deployed at the first trigger, the max total portfolio drawdown would be ~-12%

The second CDF trigger on 5 February 2026 would have led to an additional 32% deployed in what is increasingly looking like the 2026 cycle lows. This is an average purchase price of ~$72K.

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2.3. Exposure Rule (ER)

ER answers:

Is momentum deteriorating enough to reduce or cap exposure?

Crucially, ER is not applied symmetrically across the cycle.

2.3.1 Early-mid cycle use

In this phase, ER is not a hard de-risk trigger. Early-mid cycle refers to the post-bear recovery and expansion phase, typically the first ~24 months after a major bear market bottom. In this phase, price has moved materially off the lows, but is not yet near ATHs, materially extended, or showing STTI-defined cycle-top conditions.

Example: March 2020 (Black Swan event, COVID crash)

Despite ER triggering, price had already dropped -66%. This was a moment to add, not reduce, especially with CDF also triggering.

2.3.2 Late-cycle use

Late cycle is different.

When price is near ATHs and momentum deteriorates, ER becomes a powerful early warning signal.

This is what occurred in late 2025.

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2.4 Selling the Top Indicators (STTI)

STTI answers:

Are conditions approaching cycle-top / euphoric levels?

When triggered, the framework enters Distribution Mode:

• No new exposure via CDF or RORO

• Assets are trimmed according to TP and CB rules

• Trim size varies (0–100%) depending on the asset

STTI signals when to distribute. TP and CB determine how much.

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2.5 Take Profit (TP) Strategy

TP answers:

Has this asset reached a level to realise profits?

This is the execution layer for distribution.

It’s not about selling the pico top - it is absolutely about selling into strength.

Here are some examples:

• SOL (March 2024)

• META (February 2024)

• BTC (May 2025)

• SOL (May 2025)

The TP framework usually follows tranche structures i.e. 20% at TP1 / 40% at TP2 / 40% when STTI is at all-time-highs.

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2.6 Circuit Breaker (CB) Strategy

CB answers:

Has this asset triggered a protection rule?

CBs protect gains and limit reversals.

They are asset-specific:

• If SOL triggers → trim SOL

• Do not automatically sell BTC

Rule: If an asset hits its CB after a predefined level → trim according to TP/CB strategy.

Here is an example CB strategy 👇🏽

• SOL (April 2025)

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2.7 Buying the Bottom Indicators (BTBI)

BTBI answers:

Does this drawdown resemble a bottom?

Not that bottom…

This bottom!

BTBI is confluence only, not an action trigger. It is especially useful in bear markets.

👉🏽Here👈🏽 is a deep dive into the indicators along with an outline below 👇🏽

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2.8. Macro score

The macro score provides context for the broader environment and is used as a gate in the CDF.

Key threshold: Macro ≤ 50 in RORO

When macro is weak:

• Risk assets underperform

• Stronger confirmation is required before adding exposure

Macro is not a trade signal, but it is context. For example, a CDF trigger in strong macro conditions is different from one in a hostile environment.

That’s all for now.

Catch you next week!

✌🏽

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DISCLAIMER:

PROJECT 10X (Filip Brnadic) does not provide individually tailored investment advice. Nor is PROJECT 10X registered to provide investment advice, is not a financial adviser, and is not a broker-dealer.

The material provided is FOR EDUCATIONAL PURPOSES ONLY. PROJECT 10X is not responsible for any gains or losses that result from your investments. Investing involves a high degree of risk and should be considered only by persons who can afford to sustain a COMPLETE LOSS OF FUNDS.

No statement or expression of opinion, or any other matter herein, directly or indirectly, is an offer or the solicitation of an offer to buy or sell the securities or financial instruments mentioned.

I’ve tried to keep things as simple as possible and not overload readers with content. These are the areas I’ve focused on 👇🏽

• How to position based on the War and our view of the world, 6 to 18 months out

• My base case (is a short-duration conflict, a temporary oil and gas spike, markets digest it, and we move on).

• The bottom is likely in for crypto (except if there is a major existential event)

• 2026 Macro Outlook

This week, I want to focus on the strongest signal of “we are so back” that we’ve had in months.

Read more

I’ve tried to keep things as simple as possible and not overload readers with content. These are the areas I’ve focused on 👇🏽

• How to position based on the War and our view of the world, 6 to 18 months out

• My base case (is a short-duration conflict, a temporary oil and gas spike, markets digest it, and we move on).

• The bottom is likely in for crypto (except if there is a major existential event)

• 2026 Macro Outlook

From where I stand, there are only a few things worth noting.

• Trump’s latest direction

• Where we are vs where we’re going

• Allocation strategy

• What RORO is signalling

• What BTB and CDF are signalling

So, let’s go one by one

Read more

I’m going to keep it short and sweet this week (for once).

I was almost done writing the newsletter when we got this banger from POTUS.

If it looks like an off-ramp and smells like an off-ramp, it’s probably an off-ramp for both the US and Iran.

That said, much of what I have written about is still relevant because…well, we just don’t know with POTUS.

I mean, some ‘semi-official’ Iranian media (according to Bloomberg) is already claiming that they never held talks with the Adminstration - let’s wait and see.

So, let’s simplify our decision-making

Firstly, I think we can all agree that this geopolitical climate is adversely impacting our bags.

Secondly, over the past few weeks, I’ve consistently highlighted the importance of de-risking assets sitting at or near all-time highs, and I expanded on this when our Risk-On Risk-Off (RORO) tool flipped to Risk-Off 🔴

Since then:

• Gold is down 21%, back to levels last seen in December 2025

• The S&P 500 is down 6%

My stance hasn’t changed.

• De-risk assets at or near all-time highs.

• Hold assets that have already experienced a meaningful drawdown

including those we accumulated on 5 February when the Capital Deployment Framework last triggered

This view is based on the expectation that the War ends in the short-to-medium term. I’ve covered the full reasoning in prior newsletters, but it is worth reinforcing one key point:

As investors, we should not be allocating based on today’s headlines. We should be positioning based on what the world is likely to look like 6 to 18 months from now.

From that lens, the problem becomes much simpler. There are three scenarios on the table. Effectively, we have a multiple-choice question that we can assign probabilities to and position accordingly.

Here are the three scenarios as I see them 👇🏽

Based on these scenarios, here is how I expect BTC to behave, and how I plan to position 👇🏽

Read more

What a week….

Basically everyone with a strong view on oil got caught leaning the wrong way.

Oil panic was loud. BTC reaction was louder.

We went from mainstream media (MSM) and macro accounts pushing full-blown global supply shock panic, to the Trump administration and US officials effectively having to talk the market down. That is after oil had already ripped ~90% in a matter of weeks, only to then collapse ~30% in a single day as the rhetoric shifted.

We went from posts like this 👇🏽

To market maintenance mode like this 👇🏽

and this 👇🏽

and this 👇🏽

To be frank, I was not concerned about oil for the reason I laid out in the last newsletter:

My base case is that we have a short-duration conflict, a temporary oil and gas spike, markets digest it, and we move on.

What I found far more interesting was not oil, but how crypto reacted to the conflict.

Last week, I showed that sentiment in crypto had already reached some of the worst levels we’ve ever seen - and how historically, these are fantastic buying opportunities for crypto - especially when the crowd is fully committed to the idea that a 12-month bear market is inevitable.

To be crystal clear, in the last few weeks I have said:

• Yes, now that we’ve broken down further than a typical ~-30% BTC correction (which would have put us at ~$85K), it’s hard to argue that crypto is not following the standard 4-year cycle

• The real question is whether -53% in BTC, -65% in ETH and -77% in SOL represent a good HTF entry. For me, the answer is pretty clear - absolutely.

Those two views are not contradictory.

You can believe the broader cycle structure is still in play, while also believing that deeply oversold conditions offer strong long-term entries - they are not mutually exclusive.

Too many people think in binaries i.e. either we are in a bull market and everything is fine, or we are in a bear market and nothing is worth touching. Markets do not work that way and I have a strong feeling that those that are “adopting the easy narrative” that we bottom in 8-9 months at $40K are probably going to get caught swimming naked when the tide goes out, as Warren Buffett likes to say

That is also why I find the market’s reaction to the conflict so important.

BTC bottomed on 5 February, which is when our capital deployment last triggered.

The BTC/GOLD chart then bottomed on 23 February. Since the US-Israel-Iran conflict began, BTC has shown relative strength. Despite oil and LNG gas supply shock fears, social media panic, and endless doomsday takes, BTC did not make a new low in USD terms and actually outperformed the S&P 500, the NASDAQ, and gold on a relative basis.

No, that alone is not enough to call a full market turn, especially when:

• all those charts have been down and to the right (the other assets have been outperforming BTC) for the entirety of 2026.

• the RORO tool is still in the condition it is in, which I’ll get to shortly.

But it does tell us something important:

Buyers are becoming increasingly price-insensitive.

It is getting harder to push BTC, ETH, and SOL materially lower because there are fewer willing sellers left at these levels.

That does not mean price cannot go lower from here.

It means that pushing price lower now likely requires a much bigger exogenous shock than the market needed a few months ago.

Think BCH hard fork in 2018. Think FTX collapse in 2022.

A short Middle East conflict, a violent oil spike, and social media screaming about the end of the world was not enough to do it in 2026….

There is signal in that..

When bad news stops doing as much damage as it should, it is often one of the earliest signs that positioning, sentiment, and supply have already been heavily cleaned out.

This brings me to the RORO tool, because its current state is telling…to say the least.

Read more

Every cycle, the same questions resurface:

• Where are we in the bear market?

• Is this a bounce or the cycle bottom?

• Should I be allocating now, or waiting?

In mid-February, I floated a simple idea:

If crypto continues to follow the traditional four-year cycle structure, we may bottom in Q3 instead of Q4 as participants attempt to front-run the cycle low.

Not groundbreaking. But structurally important.

Because if bottoms are being pulled forward each cycle, that changes how we deploy capital.

Front-Running the Cycle Bottom

BTB #4 - Semaphore illustrates the structural shift clearly.

Across the last three cycles:

• First cycle: bottom in Q1 of the sideways year

• Second cycle: bottom in Q4 of the down year, one quarter earlier

• Third cycle: bottom in Q2 of the down year, followed by the FTX contagion sweep

Each cycle low arrived earlier than the previous one.

Now, I know at least one person reading this is thinking to themselves that there are only three cycle data points - hardly a statistically significant sample size.

That is not lost on me, but ultimately, markets are reflexive systems. Participants learn….capital adapts….we work with what we’ve got….

Front-running becomes self-reinforcing.

This is also why BTC finished down in an up-year after printing new all-time highs in early October 2025. Profit-taking itself was front-run.

If we apply that logic forward, and assume no existential macro shock, my base case becomes:

Cycle lows occur in Q1 or Q2 of the down year (2026).

I’ve already laid out why I believe this recent flush is at least a local bottom and a great HTF entry.

Read more

As markets trend down, the hardest part is not finding indicators, it’s knowing what to do with them. The point of Buying the Bottom (BTB) indicators is to identify the regime where long-term risk-reward flips back in favour of buyers.

Not the exact day of the low, not a signal to go all-in, just the zone where it starts to make sense to build positions.

These are deliberately high time frame (HTF) tools. Think cycle indicators, not trading signals. They help you stay patient through chop, avoid emotional buys, and size into weakness when everyone else is tapping out

How to use the BTB stack

My core strategy is to use the Capital Deployment Framework (CDF) to allocate the majority of my capital.

The CDF is designed for allocating during local and cycle bottoms, but it’s more tuned to local bottoms. Practically, the CDF is driven by BTB #6 (Z-Score Bottom Finder) and BTB #7 (Trend Sigma Bands), which act as my “Discount Window” triggers.

Most of the other BTB indicators are primarily cycle-bottom tools, especially BTB #1 through #5. They help identify when we’re in a broader regime where buying makes sense, even if the exact low takes time to form.

How I deploy capital:

• I allocate when the CDF triggers.

• I allocate an additional amount when one or more of the cycle-bottom BTB indicators trigger (for example 5% or 10% of total capital, depending on the setup).

• If multiple indicators are triggering, that’s additional confluence and increases confidence that the market is in a bottoming process.

These indicators are designed to work standalone, but they are most powerful when they work together, and when they are used alongside the CDF.

Signal key used throughout:

• 🟢 BUY REGIME - in the historical bottom band

• 🔵 NO SIGNAL - not in band, stay patient

• 🟠 WATCH - approaching the band

Here is a summary of the indicators:

Contents Page

• BTB #1 - Monthly RSI

• BTB #2 - Puell Multiple

• BTB #3 - Fibonacci Retracements

• BTB #4 - Semaphore

• BTB #5 - Net Unrealised Profit/Loss (NUPL)

• BTB #6 - Z-Score Bottom Finder

• BTB #7 - Trend Sigma Bands (Trend σ)

BTB #1 - Monthly RSI

Category: Momentum/ cycle exhaustion

Summary

• RSI on monthly ( M1) candles is a cycle gauge, not a trading trigger.

• Historically, compression into the ~45 band has aligned with macro accumulation zones.

• Best used as a “buying the bottom regime” flag, not a “bottom is in” call.

What it is

The Relative Strength Index (RSI) is a momentum oscillator. On a monthly chart, it filters out noise and shows whether the market is structurally overheated or exhausted. When monthly RSI compresses into the mid-40s, it has historically coincided with periods of maximum pessimism, and downside momentum being largely spent.

When it’s applicable

• Best on BTC due to long history and deep liquidity.

• Use on monthly (M1) timeframe.

• Most valuable during sustained drawdowns and post-bubble unwind phases.

How to use it

• If monthly RSI is in the ~45 band, treat it as 🟢 BUY REGIME.

• Expect it to stay in-range for a while, so you could plan buys across time, not a single entry.

• Pair with at least one stress or capitulation tool (Puell, NUPL, Sigma bands, Z-score bottom finder) to avoid being “early but not wrong”.

Common pitfalls

• RSI can remain depressed for months, patience is part of the edge.

• Not a precision bottom picker. Don’t try to snipe the low because RSI tagged 45.

• Regime shifts can make historical levels less “clean”, treat 45 as a band, not a magical number.

Current state (example)

RSI has tagged the historical buy zone, signalling that it is at least a local bottom and perhaps a cycle low. In both cases, it’s a great long-term accumulation zone.

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BTB #2 - Puell Multiple

Category: Miner stress/ systemic sell pressure

Summary

• Tracks miner revenue versus its own 365D average.

• ≤ 0.5 has historically aligned with miner capitulation and deep accumulation zones.

• Structural changes (ETFs, treasuries, maturity) may make the “0.5” line rarer over time.

What it is

The Puell Multiple compares daily BTC issuance (in USD terms) to a 365-day moving average of that value. Miners are natural sellers, so when miner revenue gets squeezed, it often coincides with systemic stress and forced selling in the ecosystem.

When it’s applicable

• Most relevant in bear markets and sharp post-euphoria drawdowns.

• Works best as a confirmation tool when other indicators are already “warming up”.

• Use for BTC cycle analysis, not intraday decision-making.

How to use it

• If Puell drops to ≤ 0.5, mark 🟢 BUY REGIME and consider adding a tranche.

• If it is falling but still above 0.5, mark 🟠 WATCH and prepare.

• Use context: if drawdowns are structurally shallower, the “capitulation” threshold may drift.

Common pitfalls

• It’s not 1:1 with price, Puell can move due to issuance, fees, and miner behaviour changes.

• Thresholds may evolve as miners become a smaller share of marginal sell pressure.

• Don’t use it alone as an “all-clear”, it tells you about miner stress, not overall demand.

Current state (example)

Puell is still above 0.5, so there is 🔵 NO SIGNAL (watching, not buying).

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BTB #3 - Fibonacci Retracements

Category: Behavioural support zones / cycle retracements

Summary

• Measures how deep BTC corrects after a major impulsive cycle move.

• Across cycles, deep bear corrections have often found support in 0.702 - 0.786 retracement.

• Use as a “deep value zone”, not a certainty that price must go there.

What it is

High time frame (HTF) Fibonacci (Fib) retracements map common retrace depths of a major impulse move. When drawn from the cycle swing low to the cycle swing high, the fib levels become behavioural zones where long-term buyers have historically stepped in.

When it’s applicable

• Best used after a major cycle peak has formed, and price is unwinding.

• Helps with planning limit orders and expectation setting, not with predicting a short-term bounce.

How to use it

• Mark the 0.702 - 0.786 band as your “deep value” support zone.

• If price enters the band, treat as a high-probability accumulation area.

• If price never reaches the band, that can still be bullish, it may reflect a structurally shallower drawdown. My base case (March 2026) is that we don’t see this level of drawdown given the bullish macro-backdrop.

Common pitfalls

• Anchor point selection is subjective. Different anchors = different Fib levels.

• Markets can front-run deep zones in mature regimes, so don’t “wait forever” for a perfect Fib tag.

• Fib is not a catalyst, it’s a map. You still need a reason for sellers to exhaust.

Current state (example)

The buy zone is $40-$50K, so there is 🔵 NO SIGNAL. That said, anything close to those levels in this regime i.e. the golden pocket (0.618 -0.702 Fib, $50-$60K) is a BUY from my perspective.

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BTB #4 - Semaphore

Category: Time-based cycle model

Summary

• A time-based interpretation of the 4-year BTC cycle rhythm.

• Splits a cycle into down year🔴, sideways year 🟡, and two up years 🟢🟢.

• Useful for patience and expectation setting, not for low-time-frame (LTF) timing.

What it is

The Semaphore is a time-based indicator built around the 4-year cycle theory. It’s a simple framing device: cycles tend to repeat a rhythm of contraction, re-accumulation, breakout, then expansion.

When it’s applicable

• Best as a regime guide when you’re prone to overreacting to bear-market rallies.

• Useful for aligning your expectations (how long bottoms can take).

• Should be used alongside capitulation indicators.

How to use it

• Use it to set your default expectation for when the market is more likely to bottom.

• In “down year”, treat big rallies as rallies first, trend reversals second.

• As you approach the end of the down year, get ready to deploy more aggressively, especially when other indicators confirm.

Common pitfalls

• Cycles can be front-run (or delayed) by liquidity conditions, policy shifts, and new market structure.

• If you treat it as a prediction tool, it will annoy you. Why? Because the “4-year cycle” is a meme. A reflexive loop. If you treat it as a patience tool, it becomes useful.

• Time-only models don’t capture capitulation intensity.

Current state (example)

We are early in the bear market, and while there will be large rallies, we can expect a HTF trend lower into Q3 2026, where we bottom.

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BTB #5 - Net Unrealised Profit/Loss (NUPL)

Category: Holder P/L + capitulation temperature check

Summary

• Measures how much of the market is sitting in unrealised profit vs loss.

• Historically, bottoms form as profit cools to negative values (with a rising floor), and sellers get flushed.

• A rising floor signals diminishing downside across cycles.

What it is

NUPL approximates the proportion of market cap that is sitting in unrealised profit or loss. When NUPL is high, most holders are in profit. When it is low or negative, losses are widespread, investor sentiment and psychology is distressed, which is often where long-term opportunity shows up.

When it’s applicable

• Most useful during full-cycle drawdowns and late-stage capitulation phases.

• Works best as a temperature gauge alongside price structure and liquidity context.

How to use it

• Treat the 0% region as the BTB focus area; below this is typically the final capitulation zone.

• Watch for an “ascending accumulation floor” across cycles, meaning each bottom can occur at a less-negative level than the prior one. This is how the green dashed floor line has been modelled.

• Use it to manage urgency: if NUPL is still meaningfully positive, there is usually no rush to buy.

Common pitfalls

• It’s slow and can stay depressed for a while, that’s normal in bear markets.

• On-chain metrics can be affected by market structure changes (ETFs, DATs, off-chain activity).

• Don’t try to bottom tick with this indicator; recognise the regime and value zone (below zero).

Current state (example)

NUPL is pointing to an accumulation zone, buying-the-bottom levels around the 0% region. We have a while to go before we get there. There is no rush to buy anything right now according to this indicator.

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BTB #6 - Z-Score Bottom Finder

Category: Statistical dislocation (oscillator)

Summary

• This isn’t a pure cycle-bottom indicator. It’s a local and cycle-bottom tool, and we use it directly inside our Capital Deployment Framework (CDF).

• This is an “extremes” detector, it tells you when price is unusually stretched to the downside versus its own normal behaviour.

• The trigger is a 3-sigma downside event, that is rare, and it’s meant to open the Discount Window, not call the exact bottom.

What it is

The Z-Score Bottom Finder measures how far price has deviated from its typical range, expressed in standard deviations. In plain English, it answers: “Is this move abnormally extreme for this market?”

When it’s applicable

• Best on HTF.

• Most useful during sharp sell-offs, early to mid-cycle, or late bear market.

How to use it

• 🟢 BUY REGIME: when the indicator prints a 3-sigma downside event, treat that as “Discount Window open”.

• Stack it: it’s most powerful when it lines up with our cycle regime tools (Monthly RSI, NUPL, Puell). That’s when we have both “cheap” and “capitulation”.

Common pitfalls

• It can stay extreme for longer than we want. Bottoms are processes, not single candles.

• It’s not a precision tool. Don’t wait for the perfect print, then try to go all-in on one entry.

Current state (example)

Last triggered on 5th Feb 2026 - that is the local bottom as at the time of writing (March 2026)

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BTB #7 - Trend Sigma Bands (Trend σ)

Category: Trend-relative dislocation (bands on chart)

Summary

• This isn’t a pure cycle-bottom indicator. It’s a local and cycle-bottom tool, and we use it directly inside our Capital Deployment Framework.

• This maps price versus a long-term trend baseline, then builds sigma bands based on how volatile that trend-deviation normally is.

• It’s designed to be scale-aware, so “stretch” is comparable across different price regimes.

• Use it as a visual framework for deep-discount zones, with the lower 3σ region as the main BTB focus area.

What it is

Trend Sigma Bands answer a slightly different question to the Z-Score. Z-Score measures how extreme price is versus its own average, Trend Sigma measures how stretched price is versus the long-term trend (band-style), so they can trigger at different times and they complement each other when stacked.

The output is a set of bands that visually show when price is stretched 1, 2, and 3σ in either direction.

• Green = ±1σ

• Blue = ±2σ

• Purple = ±3σ

When it’s applicable

• Best on HTF where we care about structural dislocation, not day-to-day noise.

• Particularly useful across long BTC history where the price level changes dramatically, because it keeps the concept of “stretch” consistent.

• Most valuable when markets are trending down and we’re looking for zones to plan tranche deployment (per the Capital Deployment framework).

How to use it

• 🟠 WATCH: price tags the lower 2σ area, start preparing tranches, set expectations for volatility, don’t rush.

• 🟢 BUY REGIME: price pushes into deeper lower-band territory (the 3σ style “panic” zone), treat that as Discount Window open, scale in per the CDF rather than trying to nail a single entry.

• Stack it: if Trend Sigma is 3σ while the BTB indicators are also flashing, that’s when the signal is strongest.

Common pitfalls

• Band signals can cluster during heavy downtrends. That’s not “broken”, it’s the market telling you the regime is stressed.

• Don’t treat a single tag as “the bottom”. Use tranches and time as your edge. This is what the CDF is all about.

• Keep this as a system. If you constantly change the baseline or the framework, you lose comparability.

Current state (example)

Last triggered on 5th Feb 2026 - that is the local bottom as at the time of writing (March 2026)

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DISCLAIMER:

PROJECT 10X (Filip Brnadic) does not provide individually tailored investment advice. Nor is PROJECT 10X registered to provide investment advice, is not a financial adviser, and is not a broker-dealer.

The material provided is FOR EDUCATIONAL PURPOSES ONLY. PROJECT 10X is not responsible for any gains or losses that result from your investments. Investing involves a high degree of risk and should be considered only by persons who can afford to sustain a COMPLETE LOSS OF FUNDS.

No statement or expression of opinion, or any other matter herein, directly or indirectly, is an offer or the solicitation of an offer to buy or sell the securities or financial instruments mentioned.

This week I’m trying something a little different.

Instead of the usual written breakdown, I’ve recorded a short video update where I walk through everything in real time - charts, context, and what I’m watching.

I’d genuinely love your feedback on this format, so please vote in the poll or leave a comment!

What I would like to know:

• Do you prefer video or written? Or a mix of both?

• Shorter or longer?

• Keep this as a monthly update?

Here is what we cover in the video:

• Jane Street lawsuit – Why this could be a BTC catalyst

• The Clarity Act – Why regulatory clarity could unlock institutional DeFi participation and become a structural tailwind

• The macro backdrop

• RORO tool update

• Buying-the-Bottom indicators

• Capital Deployment Framework – checklist:

  • Macro must be risk-on

  • Discount window must trigger (Z-Score Bottom Finder / Trend Sigma Bands)

• Are 50–80% drawdowns buyable?

• Quantum / AI fear narrative

Read more

Last week, I said the 5 February shenanigans were, at the very least, a local bottom.

From those levels:

• BTC +14%

• ETH +12%

• SOL +27%

The question I’m thinking is: did I buy the dip, or is this one of those...?

Even more importantly,

Is this just a relief rally inside a bearish high time frame trend? Or are we in the bottoming phase of a micro bear market?

As I said last week, I believe we have effectively speed-run a bear market. So I’ll go out on a limb and say we are now in the bottoming phase of a micro bear market. That means we should be preparing to allocate more capital once a few additional Buying the Bottom indicators begin to trigger.

Let me explain 👇🏽

I’ve already walked through the magnitude of the pullback and the reasoning behind it.

But let’s zoom out and quantify what we’ve just experienced.

To give proper context to this drawdown, I built a log-linear regression model anchored to the 200D trend. Around that trend, I’ve mapped standard deviation bands:

• Green = ±1σ

• Blue = ±2σ

• Purple = ±3σ

When BTC tags -3σ, it is statistically extreme. The reason it is extreme is that it shows how many standard deviations the price is from its exponential trend path.

For context, that is the equivalent of BTC rallying to $188K in September 2025…from $125K (adding another 50% to its market cap).

Here is the 2018–2026 chart, with vertical lines marking -3σ tags.

Here is 2013 to 2017.

What do you see?

I see:

• Cycle bottoms

• Violent local bottoms

• Generational buying opportunities

But also important context.

Read more

Here is what you may have missed over the last few weeks:

1. A brutal drawdown inside a bullish regime exposed two structural gaps in my system - here’s how I patched them and why I’m still firmly Risk-On.

2. Crypto looks cooked while equities print ATHs, but history says these disconnects are temporary - and contrarian allocations here are where the asymmetric upside lives.

3. Trump tweets, Greenland drama and bond yield breakouts feel huge - but when you start from the assumption it’s all noise, you see the macro hasn’t changed and the dip is likely buyable.

4. Wealth rarely dies because of markets; it dies because there was no structure - here’s the family office mindset you need long before you think you’re “rich enough”.

5. My 2026 base case - liquidity is expanding, policy is pro-growth, institutions are already positioned, so drawdowns are noise, and the risk-reward is still skewed violently higher for crypto.

Dislocation vs Regime Break

I’m not going to regurgitate what I said last week.

“I have a hard time believing that crypto will simply continue trending lower against a bullish macro and global liquidity regime. But we’d be kidding ourselves if we pretended that scenario isn’t on the table.”

Why?

Because price does not detach from liquidity indefinitely.

Crypto is a high-beta expression of global liquidity. When liquidity expands, it eventually finds its way into the most reflexive assets. That has been true across every cycle. The only time crypto has trended structurally lower for extended periods has been when liquidity has been contracting aggressively.

Today, liquidity is expanding.

That does not mean price cannot overshoot to the downside. It does not mean forced deleveraging cannot occur. It does not mean narratives cannot temporarily dominate.

It means that sustained structural downside requires sustained structural liquidity withdrawal.

We do not have that.

So what we are likely seeing is dislocation, not regime change, IMO.

Allocation Logic

Look - I preface this by saying that there is a good chance that I may just be retarded.

I shared this in the Community Chat in real-time on Friday morning, Perth time.

That wasn’t the reason I allocated.

I allocated because if I step back, remove every other variable and ask myself if this is a good risk-reward trade, the answer is clear 👇🏽

I provide more validation in this message 👇🏽

But if I could distil it into a few words, it is because “my framework told me to”.

• If global liquidity is expanding,

• If macro is pro-cyclical,

• If the regime is still structurally Risk-On,

• Then horrific sell-offs are opportunities.

The only time I should hesitate during a -50% sell-off is if the regime itself has broken.

It hasn’t.

Capital Deployment Framework

The icing on top is the signal from the Capital Deployment Framework 👇🏽

You can check the criteria out in your own time, but from a charting perspective (criteria #3 and #5), and using BTC as a crypto proxy:

✅ Momentum stabilisation - RSI, MACD and Z-Score

✅ Extreme statistical dislocation - nearly 4 standard deviations oversold on a 100-day lookback

When price moves 4 standard deviations away from its mean, it is not “bearish” (I mean, it technically is), but even more so, it is statistically stretched.

The histogram printed the largest negative-to-positive swing ever recorded. That means forced sellers exhausted themselves, and aggressive buyers stepped in immediately to a degree never seen before in almost 15 years of price data.

That is at the very least a local bottom.

Why?

Read more

TLDR

• I was wrong on timing, not on framework.

• The mistake was structural, not emotional.

• Two gaps have been patched.

• I am holding, allocating lower, and operating within the same HTF thesis.

Last week, we discussed how a -42% drawdown in BTC would be consistent with a growth scare, implying roughly $73K BTC.

We didn’t have to wait long.

Around 15 hours before the official announcement, it became clear that Kevin Warsh had been nominated as the next FED Chair. Thanks, Polymarket.

Markets reacted violently. Crypto, equities, and commodities all sold off hard.

My view, which I outlined in the Emergency War Room session on Monday, is that this was an overreaction. But when markets reach a point where bad news is bad news and good news is also bad news, price tends to move in one direction until positioning and sentiment reset.

“Bear market vibes” - addressing the elephant in the room

My base case and something I have been talking about for weeks was that crypto would continue trending higher following the bottom on 21 November 2025.

The next most likely scenario (given that was the base case) was a sweep of the lows for the reasons discussed below 👇🏽

That could still be the case, and it would be exhibiting behaviour much like we saw in early 2025…

or mid 2024…

or mid 2021….

The next most likely scenario was a continuing downtrend. It is absolutely plausible that we have entered a bear market and that price chops around or bleeds lower for the next 6–9 months.

I have a hard time believing that crypto will simply continue trending lower against a bullish macro and global liquidity regime, but alas, we would be kidding ourselves if we pretended that scenario isn’t on the table.

That said:

• My core thesis remains unchanged i.e. crypto is driven by liquidity first, macro second, and crypto-specific catalysts third, in that order

• On that framework, the 12-month outlook remains bullish, and RORO remains firmly Risk-On

• I actively monitor existential risks - the type that would force me to materially reduce exposure

• None of those conditions is present today

• I hold major assets I am confident will trade meaningfully higher than current levels at some point in the future, whether that is in 2, 6, or 12 months

On that basis, there is little rationale for capital preservation or defensive positioning at levels where I would normally be allocating.

At these levels, I see entries, not exits.

The gap that was exposed

During the War Room session, we discussed something important.

Macro and global liquidity can be bullish, while crypto still experiences sharp drawdowns driven by sentiment and technicals.

RORO incorporates technicals (RORO #10–#14), but those signals alone do not flip the system Risk-Off. Historically, that has been the correct design choice because we have never seen a sustained crypto bear market during a macro bull regime over the past decade.

But that leaves a gap.

Normally, circuit breakers would handle this. However, after cutting positions earlier, I did not re-add a circuit breaker in early November 2025. I held the view that we were in a bull market experiencing a standard correction (per RORO).

That view was wrong.

This matters because the error was not emotional - it was structural…and structural issues can be fixed.

The Exposure Rule - what changed

In November 2025, I introduced the Exposure Rule.

The Exposure Rule automatically caps portfolio exposure at ~25% when crypto momentum (RORO #10 to #14) turns bearish while macro and geopolitical conditions remain stable.

Its purpose is simple:

• Protect capital during sharp, sentiment-driven sell-offs

• Contain drawdowns, especially in alt-heavy portfolios

If momentum rolls over, exposure is reduced. Full stop.

Some of you might be thinking: is it possible that prices start trending lower while these indicators stay 🟢?

No - these are momentum indicators.

In practice, the first Exposure Rule trigger occurred around ~$110K BTC. Had this rule existed earlier, my drawdown would have been materially smaller.

Re-deployment - fixing the second mistake

After cutting exposure in early November and then reallocating too early, I introduced the Capital Deployment Framework (CDF) in December.

The CDF is a rules-based system that governs how and when capital is deployed. It forces staged buying during statistically extreme sell-offs rather than standard corrections.

In simple terms:

• We wait for a 3-sigma sell-off AND we look for a thrust, showing buyers stepping in

  

• We confirm that momentum is stabilising and beginning to turn

  

The goal is not perfection - that’s a pipe dream. The goal is getting close to the lows consistently.

Using this framework, entries would have occurred around:

• ~$86K BTC

• ~$135 SOL

• ~$2,800 ETH

Even at current price levels, this drawdown is perfectly reasonable.

For context, CheckonChain (prominent on-chain analyst) has been scaling in since ~$95K BTC.

Looking back historically to a bear market, in May 2022, this framework triggered at ~$25K BTC…

..but because RORO remained Risk-Off until mid-December 2022, it would have kept us out until ~$17K.

The takeaway for me, is that I am comfortable with making mistakes. I am not comfortable repeating mistakes.

These two additions - the Exposure Rule and the Capital Deployment Framework help close gaps that only emerge in rare regime combinations.

Where things stand today

Do these tools help my current positions?

No. They help future positioning, not past decisions.

Right now, I (along with everyone else) have two options:

• cut positions

• hold positions

I have chosen to hold.

In my view, the optimal window to sell has passed. I went 100% to cash in September - perfectly executed.

I then reallocated in late October, based on the view that tariff-driven US-China sentiment would fade as soon as Trump made a deal with China (he did), and that macro and liquidity would remain supportive.

When that proved wrong, positions should have been cut immediately. That is on me.

So why hold now?

• Could price go lower? Yes

• Is it highly likely price trades higher than here at some point? Yes

• Do I need this capital short term? No

• Were these short-term trades? No

• Am I being paid to hold? Yes, via staking (~5–7% p.a.)

• Do I benefit from sideways or lower prices? Yes - staking rewards and the ability to deploy more cash at low levels.

• Will I deploy additional cash flow at these levels or lower? Yes

• Do I incur opportunity cost by not selling now? Yes

• Am I comfortable with that? Yes

If this doesn’t resonate with you, that’s completely fair. Drawdowns feel very different depending on where you’re coming from financially and emotionally, and there is no “correct” response.

One important clarification, because this is where a lot of people get stuck psychologically.

For me, I operate within a framework (RORO) that remains bullish on a high-timeframe basis. I will not stray from that. Some holes related to momentum have been identified and patched, but the core structure is intact.

The portfolio does not need BTC, ETH, or SOL to make new all-time highs for the portfolio itself to make new all-time highs.

What drives portfolio ATHs is not price alone, it is where and how capital is allocated.

If I continue allocating at materially lower prices than my initial entries, the portfolio’s average cost basis improves. Well before any asset revisits my initial entry price or its previous ATH, the portfolio will make new highs.

So, what I a actually need is patience, time, disciplined allocation, and a regime that eventually resolves higher.

So the question is not, “Will BTC, ETH, and SOL make new ATHs tomorrow?”

The real question is:

Has anything fundamentally changed since October 2025, aside from sentiment?

For me, the answer is no.

Liquidity dynamics remain supportive, macro remains constructive, and none of the existential risks I monitor are present.

On that basis, the portfolio makes new ATHs again - well before price does.

Risk-On Risk-Off (RORO) Tool

👉 how do I use this tool? 👈

👉 performance stats for RORO👈

The RORO tool remains Risk-On.

The Exposure Rule has triggered, but this is now the third such trigger. The rule is designed to be applied the first time macro is bullish and crypto momentum rolls over, not the second or third time after exposure has already been reduced.

On the “hawkish Fed” narrative

My view is that:

• the FED has a dual mandate - price stability and full employment

• it has two levers - rates and the balance sheet

• any new FED Chair must operate within those constraints

Warsh is not an inflation ideologue. He believes deregulation and innovation can be deflationary forces. If inflation spikes, rates rise. If unemployment rises, rates fall. There is no optionality here.

Trump wants growth. The policy direction since April 2025 is to grow their way out of the debt burden. Everything we have seen for the last 12 months supports that bias.

With Scott Bessent at Treasury and Warsh at the Fed, both influenced by Stan Druckenmiller’s framework (as former Duquesne Capital employees), this is far more continuity ‘with a twist’ than rupture in my view.

Warsh believes that a combination of bank deregulation and tech innovation are deflationary forces, enabling interest rates can be lowered (excatly what Trump admin wants).

ISM PMI

The ISM Manufacturing PMI ripped from 48.5 to 52.6 - surprising to the upside.

I actually laughed out loud at this great take from Benjamin Cowen 👇🏽

I know Raoul Pal has been going on about the ISM Manufacturing PMI not being above 50 in his most recent podcasts, and how a break above 50 would signal ‘banana zone’.

A PMI above 50 indicates expansion, which generally supports risk assets. But the direction and rate of change matter more than the level itself - how do I know? Because I’ve backtested it, and simply being above 50 is not a valid signal.

RORO #9.6 captures exactly that. It evaluates:

• Absolute level

• Direction

• Momentum

This indicator alone outperforms a BTC HODL strategy.

Yesterday’s PMI print is constructive, but not sufficient on its own to reverse the crypto trend.

In my view, we would need a combination of

• a hot PMI; and

• regulatory clarity through the acceptance of the CLARITY Act by the Senate

• continued strength in GDP

• dovish comments by Warsh

That’s all for now. Catch you next week!

✌🏽

Filip Brnadic

DISCLAIMER:

PROJECT 10X (Filip Brnadic) does not provide individually tailored investment advice. Nor is PROJECT 10X registered to provide investment advice, is not a financial adviser, and is not a broker-dealer.

The material provided is FOR EDUCATIONAL PURPOSES ONLY. PROJECT 10X is not responsible for any gains or losses that result from your investments. Investing involves a high degree of risk and should be considered only by persons who can afford to sustain a COMPLETE LOSS OF FUNDS.

No statement or expression of opinion, or any other matter herein, directly or indirectly, is an offer or the solicitation of an offer to buy or sell the securities or financial instruments mentioned.