Variant Fund Partner Says Crypto Market Likely Bottomed in July

Variant Fund partner Alana Levin said the crypto market likely reached a low at some point in July, while outlining which types of projects could benefit if a new bull market is beginning.

Levin had described a bottom as appearing near in early July, when Bitcoin (BTC) traded at $59,000, Ether (ETH) at $1,600 and ZEC at $420. She framed the next question as whether the market’s move marks a sustained bull run or a false start.

Levin expects marginal capital to flow toward two types of protocols: those viewed as monetary stores of value and those that generate revenue. She considers Bitcoin the leading digital store of value and expects competing assets to be assessed in part by their market capitalization relative to BTC and how that ratio changes.

For revenue-generating protocols, investors may consider whether income comes from crypto-native activity, such as Pump, or traditional-finance activity, such as Hyperliquid. They may also look at whether revenue persists during market downturns and at profit margins.

Projects with exposure to real-world assets and stablecoin growth may attract attention, as may those with potential to draw institutional users. Levin also sees founders remaining in charge after a bear market as a factor that could support higher valuation multiples.

A third category is onchain projects that can be compared with businesses outside crypto. Levin characterized most of these as narrative-driven trades rather than long-term investments. The themes include AI-related routing, inference, computing, data collection and interfaces.

She questioned whether most of those use cases need a blockchain. If AI-linked onchain projects strongly outperform, Levin said, she would view that as a possible signal that the market is nearing a top.