How to Build Your Exit Plan: Forecasting Bitcoin’s Top and Selling Your Altcoins Strategically

Last time, we broke down Bitcoin dominance, market cycles, and what history teaches us about timing the crypto market.

But knowing when the market peaks isn’t enough.

You also need to know how high Bitcoin and the broader market could go—because your exit strategy depends on both price and time.

Today, I want to walk you through how to project Bitcoin’s potential top this cycle, use that projection to set realistic price targets for your altcoins, and know exactly when to sell—whether or not those price targets hit.

Let’s get tactical.

🔍 Step 1: Where could Bitcoin top out?

In our last post, we looked at market cap projections if Bitcoin reaches $100K, $150K, or $250K at 50% dominance.

Let’s revisit that:

👉 If Bitcoin hits $150K with 50% dominance, the total crypto market cap would be $5.7 trillion, with altcoins making up $2.85 trillion.

🪙 Step 2: Targeting the winning narratives

Once you’ve set a Bitcoin price projection, you can estimate what market cap your altcoins would need to achieve to rank in the top 100 or top 200.

Why does this matter?

Because you want to be in the coins leading the strongest narratives—the ones likely to climb into those ranks during a bull run.

For example, if the total market cap hits $5.7T:

✅ The #100 coin would need a market cap of $2.85B (that’s 0.05% of the total market cap).
✅ The #200 coin would need roughly $1.425B.

In other words: if you’re betting on a coin leading a key sector (AI, DePIN, RWAs, L2s, etc.), your price target should aim for a market cap between $1.4B and $2.85B.

This gives you a realistic ceiling to build your laddered sell orders.

📝 Step 3: Setting price targets and timelines

Once you’ve picked your narrative leaders, reverse-engineer the token price based on your market cap target.

Example:

Let’s say you own TOKENXYZ, with 500 million tokens in circulation.
If you’re aiming for a $2B market cap:

👉 Target price = $2,000,000,000 ÷ 500,000,000 = $4 per token.

This becomes your upper sell target.

But here’s the key: you don’t just sell at $4.

You ladder out along the way:

✅ Maybe 20% at $1.50
✅ 20% at $2.50
✅ 30% at $3.50
✅ 30% at $4+

⏰ Step 4: Tie your exit to time and price

Here’s where many investors fail:

They wait for their sell targets—but ignore time.

History shows Bitcoin dominance falls for 4–10 months during a bull run before recovering.
The bull market itself lasts 10–11 months after Bitcoin breaks its ATH.

👉 That means you have a finite window to sell: ~10 months from the start of dominance decline.

If your price targets aren’t hit by the end of that window, you sell anyway.

Put simply:

✅ Sell when your targets hit OR when the clock runs out—whichever comes first.

This prevents you from holding into the bear market waiting for prices that never come.

🧠 Step 5: Build discipline into the plan

Why take this approach?

Because this strategy protects you from two things:

1. Missing the top while waiting for higher prices

2. Selling too early out of fear

It forces you to sell systematically, not emotionally, based on market data and historical timing.

It also simplifies decisions mid-cycle:

No more asking “should I sell?”—your plan answers that for you.

💡 Putting it together

Here’s the capstone:

✔️ Pick your Bitcoin price projection ($100K, $150K, $250K).
✔️ Estimate total and altcoin market caps.
✔️ Choose leaders in winning narratives that can reach top 100–200 ranks.
✔️ Set price targets based on reasonable market cap ceilings.
✔️ Ladder out sales across those price points.
✔️ Exit fully if either your price target or the bull market clock (10–11 months from ATH/dominance drop) is hit—whichever comes first.

Markets reward those with a plan.
Not gamblers. Not hopers.

You’ve now got the blueprint.
All that’s left is to execute.

In the next post, I’ll break down how to identify the strongest narratives and coins that could lead this next cycle.

Let’s make this bull run count.