Large banks are now openly recommending small crypto allocations to high-net-worth clients. A few years ago, this would have been unthinkable.

If you don’t understand why they’re doing this now — after years of freezing accounts, blocking transactions, and calling crypto everything short of witchcraft – then you’re going to miss the entire play unfolding behind the curtain.

Wall Street’s early-stage playbook

Whenever a giant institution suddenly gets loud about a new market, it almost never means what people think it means.

Historically, when big banks wade into a new asset class, they tend to do one thing first: They smash it down.

Not because they’re evil cartoon villains (although it certainly doesn’t mean they’re not evil cartoon villains, either)…

But because, like you and me, they want to make money.

They want to buy the future cheap.

They want their wealthiest clients to get in first.

They want to control the narrative.

That means the little, “regular” ladies and gentlemen — the us — needs to be out of the way.

Call it conspiracy if you want… but, really, it’s a balance-sheet strategy.

And it’s nothing new.

The supercycle playbook

From 1999 to 2002, bullion banks like JPMorgan, Goldman, and HSBC trashed the price of gold.

They borrowed gold from central banks at ultra-low lease rates (often 0.5% or less), sold it into the spot market to depress prices, took huge short positions, and pushed miners into forward-selling programs that added even more synthetic supply.

They even helped shape the UK’s infamous pre-announced gold auctions — a format so flawed it practically ensured lower prices before a single bar was sold.

The result?

A systematically suppressed gold market that bottomed only after insane levels of capitulation, when entire governments panic-sold reserves.

On top of the UK’s Gordon Brown sale of 395 tons of the UK’s gold reserves… nearly 60% of the nation’s stash…

  • Switzerland dumped over 1,300 tons, selling early tranches near the $260–$290 lows.
  • The Netherlands unloaded 300 tons after declaring gold “strategically irrelevant.”
  • Canada liquidated virtually its entire reserve, much of it near the bottom.
  • And across Europe, countries like Spain, Portugal, and Austria rushed to sell ahead of the 1999 Washington Agreement, dumping into a market already crushed by the gold-carry trade.

All of them sold into the bottom… or pretty close to it.

And only then did the wealth desks start recommending it.

(Gold proceeded to go 8X.)

Now, if it were just gold, it would be a one-off thing. A chance-happening. Lucky timing.

But it’s not just gold.

They did it again.

The commodities supercycle

From 2002 to 2008, Wall Street’s commodity giants — with the usual suspects (Goldman, Morgan Stanley, and JPMorgan) in the lead — helped to ignite the last great commodity supercycle.

Seeing China’s industrial surge colliding with a decade of underinvestment in resources… the banks quietly spent years buying up physical infrastructure — oil storage tanks, metals warehouses, freight networks, and pipeline access — while building out massive derivatives books that let them shape the forward curves to their advantage.

With physical control secured, the banks launched a new class of financial products.

The pitch?

Commodities were “the new asset class.”

The now-famous commodity index funds funneled hundreds of billions — and eventually trillions in institutional exposure — into the very markets the banks had already positioned themselves to dominate.

Sure, China and global supply constraints lit the fuse — but Wall Street built the machinery that turned a normal boom into a historic one.

Only after the banks had already built their infrastructure, captured the flows, and loaded their balance sheets did the wealth desks begin telling clients to “diversify into commodities.”

Now? They’re doing it with crypto…

The playbook looks awfully familiar…

First, choke retail access.

For years, the big banks froze crypto accounts, blocked wires to exchanges, limited card purchases, and issued scary research notes.

That was the first phase: Restrict access, question the asset, and build quietly in the background.

Now we’re entering the next phase…trash the narrative publicly… while building and accumulating privately.

Remember when Jamie Dimon called Bitcoin a scam? Come to find out, JPM’s traders quietly bought the dips on European desks.

Bank of America compared crypto to tulips while becoming a lead distributor for Bitcoin ETFs.

And…

  • BofA was filing blockchain patents.
  • JPM built the world’s largest private blockchain network.
  • Citi launched tokenised deposits.
  • Fidelity mined Bitcoin and built full custody stacks.

All while telling retail “don’t touch this stuff.”

The big flip happens when they turn heel and begin opening up assets to wealthy clients.

Which is exactly what they’re doing.

Major institutions are now opening pathways for clients to gain crypto exposure — through ETFs, custody, and structured access.

This time, there’s an added layer.

For years, institutional capital couldn’t move into crypto at scale because the regulatory framework wasn’t there.

That’s changing. Fast.

With legislation like the CLARITY Act approaching the finish line, the final barrier to large-scale institutional participation may be about to fall.

And that’s when these patterns tend to accelerate.

Right on cue…

Now Bank of America is recommending a 1%–4% crypto allocation. Not to you. To Merrill and Private Bank clients.

JPMorgan has opened up pathways for clients — especially institutional or high-net-worth clients — to get crypto exposure, borrow against crypto, and participate in blockchain-enabled services.

Vanguard just flipped its long-standing anti-crypto stance by allowing its 50-million brokerage customers to trade Bitcoin and Ethereum ETFs… effectively opening crypto access to one of the largest pools of mainstream investors on the planet.

It’s the same playbook all over again.

Retail gets fear. And when they finally tap out (as they are now)? Wealth clients get the green light.

Then the supercycle begins.

Once is chance. Twice is coincidence. Three times? That’s a pattern.

And, by the looks of it, we’re staring straight at a pattern bold enough to stitch into a sweater.

Best,

James Altucher
Editor, Early-Stage Crypto Investor