Since BTC has always been shaking up and down in all possible ways, it seems that for every pattern you see now, there exists a pattern in the past that matches it.
I think you will keep seeing the same patterns coming back, until that last time when it doesn't repeat and it goes to zero or in a straight line to the moon.
So my belief is strongly: You can't predict what will happen to the price of an asset just by looking at the graph. I think one should look into the tech, think and decide for yourself if there is a use case and then bet on it, or not bet on it and then just HODL or not HODL. All the rest is just FOMO, FUD, hype, scam and market manipulation, which will get you nowhere.
Someone finds an exploit that allows them to steal funds from any wallet (not likely) or computers get sufficiently powerful enough to crack the encryption used and discover private keys. Basically, if something happens that breaks security at a fundamental level, Bitcoin immediately becomes worthless or worth very little until a fix is issued. If a fix is issued and the problem is not too detrimental (as in only one or a few people have access to the hack) then we could see a hard fork like ETC to ETH and the original Bitcoin could retain some value. If, however, an exploit is fount that everyone could potentially perform, I could see it going to $0 as exchanges would de-list it and no one would be able to or want to trade it. I don't think that's likely to ever happen though. People have been trying to hack Bitcoin for years and so far they've all been unsuccessful. The only way I can see it ever happening is if quantum computers (or a similarly powerful technology) becomes mainstream. Even then, I think we would see it coming well enough in advance and a hard fork could be issued ahead of time to increase security. Anyone left using the old Bitcoin would do so at their own risk.
That's true. People just don't understand it. Sure, it's a risky investment and it could very well drop significantly (like we've recently seen) but it can't drop to zero without something going horribly wrong. We have a hard enough time finding consensus on forks and software upgrades. There's no way the entire market is going to sell and take the price down to zero. As long as nothing is broken, there will always be buyers.
However, the price doesn't have to reach zero for you to effectively loose the majority of your investment. If, for example, you bought all of your Bitcoin at $19,000, you would be at a significant loss right now. I think that's what most people really mean when they say it could go to zero. They're basically saying it's an extremely high risk investment and you would be safer going into more traditional investments. Personally, Bitcoin is the first investment I've ever made. I believe in the technology and I believe it will increase in value. I could invest in something else, but seeing a small increase in value over the course of a year and a market that moves at a snail's pace is no fun. I like investing in Bitcoin because it is exciting. It's a roller coaster ride and I'm enjoying it. It's like seeing a technology growing and evolving right before my eyes. I'm only investing what I can afford to lose and if I hadn't invested, I would just be spending the money on stuff that I don't really need, so it's just a fun experiment for me. If it goes to a million dollars, awesome! If it goes to zero, oh well. It was fun while it lasted. Either way, I'm still okay financially.