Disclaimer: This is not investment advice. Do your research before investing any money into crypto.

This article answers the most important retail question, “Should I invest in bitcoin now?” With bitcoin going only up, it might be difficult for new investors waiting for a pullback to invest. While waiting for a pullback to invest sounds reasonable, it isn’t practical, especially for new users.

So, how do you invest? Clearly, waiting for a pullback hasn’t worked since New Year’s eve as bitcoin has constantly surged an average of 4%.

Regardless of what type of investor you might be, here are some things to check before you buy bitcoin:

On-chain metrics are a specialty of the blockchain due to their transparent nature. Users can observe what’s happening on the blockchain without compromising the user’s pseudonymity.

Although on-chain metrics can sound intimidating, it isn’t. Handling on-chain data, on the other hand, can be a tough thing to do. However, lucky for us, there are multiple websites that give us on-chain metrics without having to worry about data handling. All one has to do is interpret them.

Think of on-chain metrics as a prophecy, but only more certain and reliable.

Here are some quick on-chain metrics that you can check before investing in bitcoin.

Stablecoin flow: Stablecoins are used to purchase crypto assets, be it Bitcoin, Ethereum, XRP, or Polkadot. Hence, if we see a large inflow of stablecoin to exchanges, we can interpret this as a bullish sign as investors are willing to buy and are entering the market.

Exchange reserves: If the exchange reserves go down, we can assume that investors are pulling their funds out of exchanges and this only happens in a bull run where investors let their assets gain profit and wait for the top. Hence, dropping exchange reserves is bullish.

Exchange flow: If investors deposit any assets other than stablecoins, it means investors want to sell that asset or perhaps exchange it for something else. Either way, it involves selling/converting an asset and is bearish. On the contrary, if we see large outflows of assets [like BTC, ETH] from an exchange we can assume it is either being stored away in cold storage or it was an OTC deal and investors are pulling it from the exchange in anticipation of a bull run. Hence, this is also bullish.

Refer to this article for an example.

Similarly, one can find more trends like these if acquainted with on-chain data or other blockchain/exchange data. For example, take a look at the funding rate chart overlaid with the price of bitcoin.

A simple takeaway here is that whenever the funding rate has dropped, it was a buy signal, as the price surged considering after this drop.