You know that moment when you're having a lovely Saturday morning—coffee's perfect, weather's decent, you're feeling rather pleased with yourself—and then you check your phone with your mouth wide open?

That was Friday for anyone holding crypto.

Bitcoin had just hit a new all-time high on Monday. Everything was ticking along nicely. "Uptober" was living up to its name. And then Donald Trump did what Donald Trump does best: he reached for his phone and decided to announce 100% tariffs on China. Because apparently that's how international trade policy works now.

Cue the sort of market carnage that makes you question your life choices. Let's talk about what actually happened, what it means, and why—despite the bloodbath—this might not be the disaster it looks like.

💣 The Tariff Tantrum That Broke the Market

In one social media post, Trump managed to liquidate $17 billion.

Here's what went down: Trump accused China of being "extraordinarily aggressive" on trade (pot, meet kettle) and announced 100% tariffs starting November 1st. Not just 100% tariffs, mind you—100% on top of existing tariffs. Plus export controls on critical software. It's the geopolitical equivalent of flipping the table during negotiations.

Crypto prices didn't just drop—they wicked down to levels that seemed almost fictional. Anyone who was leveraged long watched their weekend plans evaporate faster than British summer sunshine.

But here's the thing about Trump's tariff threats: they're a bit like those "FINAL WARNING" emails from your gym membership. Dramatic? Yes. Actually final? Rarely.

The pattern is always the same: Big announcement → Market panic → Negotiation happens → Everyone calms down → Markets recover. It's become so predictable that some traders apparently positioned for it.

🏛️ The Government Shutdown Nobody's Talking About

While everyone's focused on tariffs, the US government is still shut down—and it matters more than you think.

The longer the shutdown drags on, the bigger the backlog of economic data. No PPI readings. No CPI data. No clear picture of what's actually happening in the economy. Prediction markets reckon we're looking at a 7 days at the earliest before things restart.

For crypto, this creates a peculiar sort of purgatory:

• No macro catalysts to drive price action
• Delayed approvals for spot altcoin ETFs
• The CLARITY Act stuck in legislative limbo
• The DXY (dollar index) rising instead of falling, which is generally rubbish for risk assets

Every previous government shutdown has eventually caused the dollar to weaken. A weaker dollar typically means crypto goes up. But right now? The dollar's strengthening because of political chaos in Japan and France (the yen and euro make up most of the DXY). Politics in Europe and Asia are somehow affecting your Solana bags. Globalization is weird.

The crypto industry knows this, by the way. Coinbase just added DEX support on Base. MetaMask is integrating Hyperliquid and planning to add Polymarket. These aren't random moves—they're companies preparing for what they expect will be an absolute tsunami of new users once the macro conditions improve.

Everyone's just waiting for the starting gun.

📊 The Silver Lining in the Liquidation Apocalypse

Those $17 billion in liquidations might be the best thing that could've happened.

I know, I know—that sounds completely mental when you've just watched your portfolio get absolutely battered. But bear with me.

All that leverage? Gone. Wiped out. The market is now substantially cleaner than it was on Thursday. It's like a forest fire that clears out the deadwood—painful in the moment, but it creates space for new growth.

Here's what we know about crypto's four-year cycle:

• We're in Q4 of year four (the historically explosive bit)
• Previous cycle tops have come with clear bullish catalysts
• Once Bitcoin tops, altcoins typically rally for weeks afterward
• That means we're likely looking at a top somewhere between now and December

That's less than three months away. If you've been holding bags for three years (and let's be honest, many of you have), another three months is nothing. It's a queue at the Post Office. It's a British winter. You can manage.

The question isn't if we'll see the top—it's when exactly it'll arrive, and whether you'll have the bottle to actually take profits when it does.

What This All Actually Means

Right, let's tie this together with a nice British metaphor: The crypto market is currently like a car stuck in traffic on the M25 motorway. You know you'll eventually get moving. You can see your destination. But you're just sitting there, engine running, watching other vehicles (stocks, gold) zoom past in lanes that aren't gridlocked.

Trump's tariff announcement was basically someone cutting across three lanes without signaling—it caused a pile-up, but traffic will flow again once it's cleared.

The government shutdown is the roadworks that'll eventually finish. The crypto industry is already laying the groundwork for what comes next. And if history is any guide, Q4 of year four doesn't mess about.

So what should you do? Probably the same thing you do in any British traffic jam: have a cup of tea, listen to something pleasant, and resist the urge to make impulsive decisions based on temporary frustration.

The cycle's not over. It's just having a bit of a lie-down.