Cory Klippsten’s warning for ‘shitcoin traders’ in the bull market: X Hall of Flame

Swan Bitcoin founder and proud Bitcoin maximalist Cory Klippsten has a word of caution for crypto bros: steer clear of the altcoin season hype. According to him, you might as well bet your life savings on the slot machines in Las Vegas.

“Just keep in mind that out of the 20 to 30,000 altcoins, only three have ever had a new all-time high, three or more years after their first all-time high,” he says.

Klippsten cites XRP, which saw its 2017 all-time high beat its 2013 all-time high.

XRP, the crypto that has probably caused the most hair loss for United States Securities and Exchange Commission officials in recent years, hit $0.06 in 2013 and skyrocketed to $2.85 in 2017.

As for the other two altcoin phoenixes? Klippsten isn’t too keen on praising them for returning to record highs.

“I don’t count Dogecoin because Elon [Musk] pumped it personally in 2021, but it was higher than its 2017 pump,” he says.

Klippsten notes that the BNB token is technically the other candidate but only awards it half a point.

Why? Because BNB wasn’t in the game for the entire bull market back in 2017.

“So it’s really two and a half because Binance only got half a pump in the bull market of 2017 because the coin came out in the summer of 2017,” he explains.

Klippsten founded the Bitcoin savings platform Swan Bitcoin back in 2019. He’s a hardcore Bitcoin maxi with an impressive 219,000 followers.

Unsurprisingly the platform doesn’t offer memecoins, altcoins or shitcoins — just Bitcoin.

“Unless you’re an active shitcoin trader, you better be good because it’s a casino,” he declares, adding that in Las Vegas casinos, the “rake” is three to five percent depending on the game. However, he argues that in altcoin trading you’ll be facing odds stacked even higher in favor of the house.

“In shitcoins, the rake could be 80% taken right off the top by the insiders. And so you’re in the hole. On average these punters that are trying to trade crypto are deep in the hole on all of these gambles.”

How did he get popular on Twitter?

Klippsten noticed his follower numbers began to rise during the last bull market in 2021, along with the rise of Swan Bitcoin, which now gets shoutouts from industry heavyweights such as Lyn Alden.

But Klippsten admits he’s gained a bunch of new followers in 2022 because he’s been spot-on in predicting which companies in the crypto industry are going to take a tumble.

“It really took off and exploded, probably went from a 100,000 to 200,000 or something very quickly during the crypto collapses because I was kind of right at the center of the story.”

He called out Luna about six weeks before it collapsed in May 2022.

Plus, he was getting into scruffs on social media with former Celsius CEO Alex Mashinsky just a few weeks before Celsius nosedived into the ground in mid-2022.

“I was battling Mashinsky on Twitter and YouTube in May. In June I told everybody to get the hell out of Celsius because it was a Ponzi scheme, and then it went to zero on June 12th,” he states.

Oh, and he came up with a super creative name for Sam Bankman-Fried, the disgraced FTX founder: “Scam Bankster-Fraud.”

A court has now ruled SBF guilty of messing with over a million people’s funds.

“It ended up in all the paper magazines. Scam Bankster Fraud is how New York magazine adapted it for their headline,” he explains.

What content can people expect?

Klippsten claims that if you follow him on X, you won’t see apology posts or slip-ups. He says he sticks to what he says and is 100% sure it’s on point.

“If I state something, I fucking have the goods.”

While he might pull your leg from time to time, he’ll always check back in the threads in case some people mistakenly believe it’s true.

“If I don’t have the goods I’m asking questions. I’m trying to figure it out,” he says.

Klippsten says that he’s straight-up honest, and you’ll get the feeling you know him by following his feed.

“I wear my heart on my sleeve. So you’re gonna get pretty unfiltered commentary from me about Bitcoin, geopolitics, and macroeconomics,” he says.

He is also a fan of shooting hoops, but that content doesn’t hit as hard as the orange pill content.

“I don’t get very many likes for my basketball tweets, but I’m not gonna stop. If you like basketball and Bitcoin, I’m your guy,” he laughs.

What content does he like?

Klippsten runs an investment platform that is solely focused on Bitcoin, so it doesn’t take a genius to work out the kind of accounts he follows.

“I really like high signal Bitcoiners that have been around for a long time, that pay really close attention to the line between a fact and something that they don’t know for sure,” he says.

However, just a heads-up, you’ve got one chance with Klippsten. Save the bluffing for the poker table, because if you pull that near his feed, he’ll probably hit that unfollow button.

“I don’t like those who claim to know something that isn’t true. You’re done for me if you can’t do math or you promote things that aren’t true. I hate false narratives.”

Now, Klippsten is fine with vouching for a few people who don’t stumble too much, including ZuckBucks CEO Giacomo Zucco, Synonym CEO John Carvalho, and Swan Bitcoin’s education head, Stephan Livera.

Oh, and investment strategist Lyn Alden, “because she is just never f****** wrong.”

Content he doesn’t like includes anything that distracts people from the Bitcoin mission.

“For most people, the last six years there has been false marketing from crypto. It’s been the 50 billion dollars worth of crypto VC pumping these coins. That’s what people had to wade through. They had to fight through that to find a little bit of Bitcoin signal and it’s really really difficult and most people fail at it.”

Predictions?

In the Hall of Flame chair, guests often get a bit cagey when the price prediction question drops.

Not Klippsten, though – maybe his confidence is flowing over from the basketball court.

Klippsten isn’t shy about throwing out a seven-figure price prediction for Bitcoin.

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“In 2030, the price will be a million dollars a coin in 2020 dollars,” he forecasts.

After accounting for inflation, we are looking at potentially “$1.3 or $1.4 million dollars per Bitcoin.”

Before you get too excited, he adds that there “will be corrections on the way.”

Klippsten says that Bitcoin ETF approval will set off a chain reaction for finance bros worldwide.

“Now you have cover your ass for every financial advisor and financial manager in the world to recommend Bitcoin because if it’s good enough for Larry, it’s good enough for me,” Klippsten claims.

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Ciaran Lyons

Ciaran Lyons is an Australian crypto journalist. He's also a standup comedian and has been a radio and TV presenter on Triple J, SBS and The Project.