I put a good chunk of money into Steem and currently have 619 Steem Power. I only earned about 90 of that from posting. I bought in knowing full well that crypto could crash more. Steem might even dip under a dollar during a "despair" phase. Does this bother me? No. I believe in the Steem platform. Every year this chain is up and running is going to look completely different than the previous one. This blockchain is evolving quickly along with many of the other ones out there. Last year Steem was worth $0.08 and barely a blip on anyone's radar. Today we have a grade B Weiss rating, one of the highest, and our new signup rates are solid.

Steem encourages HODLing

I find the concept of Steem highly addictive and satisfying. I don't interact with any other social media sites. I visit Facebook bi-monthly just to see if I got a message from anyone. I'm much more interested in Steem. It feels good when you gain SP and your voting weight goes up. Steem is the coin I buy when I want to HODL. Steem Power is very hard, if not impossible, to steal due to the 13 week vesting dynamic. Meanwhile with other coins all you need to do is lose one private key and you're cleaned out. Steem has zero competition so far and all of these attributes really line up for a solid coin. On the flip side there are a myriad of problems with Steem, but these problems are transparent and can be worked on.

Annual Cycles

I think that crypto in general may end up having two consistently volatile bi-yearly pump and dump sessions . One is the summer and one in the winter (end of Q2 and Q4). Economic cycles are a common occurrence and can happen for a number of reasons. Whatever the reason, I believe that June/July and December/January will end up being months that crypto gets pumped and becomes super volitile.

On the flip side I think that April/May and October/November will be the times when the market evens out and bit and it's safe to buy and HODL. Buying at other times may require swing trading to remain profitable in the short term. Maybe I'm way off base here, but I'd like to immortalize it on the blockchain just in case I'm onto something.

New Technology

Not only do I think there will be a natural pump during the end of Q2 2018, but also I think that all the new technologies coming out during that time is going to attract even more investors. Bitcoin's Lightning network, Ethereum's Casper protocol (switching from POW to POS), Litecoin's Litepay, Steem's SMTs, EOS, etc. All of these technologies could come out around the same time, during a natural pump in the market, and create a perfect storm of activity on The Blockchain. Even I am trying to create apps for Steem.

A crash in the market is an opportunity.

If crypto never corrected no one would ever have the opportunity to buy coins on the cheap. Every blockchain would be incredibly centralized and the same set of whales would never lose their power. Stop getting sucked in by the emotional roller coaster of price action. Money isn't as important as decentralization. Invest in the blockchain because you believe in the cause and in the community, not to get rich quick. Personally I'll be saving all I can to buy in right before my predicted "perfect storm".

Future Steem

If Steem evolves and proves itself it could easily have the same value as Facebook. A market cap that high would be $2000 per Steem coin. We only need to be 1/100th as valuable as Facebook to make $20 per coin. Just food for thought.