What happened today? 12 Jan 26'
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Another weird market session leaves me wondering how the ETF marked performed today. Bitcoin topped out twice at the $92.5k price level, yet it has been making higher lows with high volume over short periods. This activity suggests aggressive market buying is slowly absorbing the limit sell orders remaining in the book. It feels as though traders are accumulating and extracting the rest of the live supply; however, the market has not yet validated a rapid swing, as the expected stdev raise hasn’t materialized yet. As soon as we break $92.5k, I see a clear path for non-stop momentum upward. With no hard stops left to trigger selling pressure, the next price discovery could be $100k or a direct move to ATH.
Rising geopolitical tensions sustain this volatile view. While the US attempts to support internet access in Iran—with Elon positioning Starlink as the alternative—military jammers in Iran are blocking the signal. Simultaneously, Trump fights on all formats, though China seems to be taking the penalties; he has proposed new 25% tariffs for countries doing business with the Islamic Republic of Iran, and we know China is the biggest buyer of Iranian oil. The conflict extends beyond the Middle East. European countries are stepping up to lead the US in taking care of Greenland; NATO is committed to Arctic security, with the UK and Germany discussing plans for a military presence there. Meanwhile, Russia continues launching overnight attacks over Ukraine, and Venezuela is capturing the media cycle.
Privacy continues to be a key sector, specifically regarding the increase of European surveillance threatening civil liberties. The BND program in Germany focuses on accessing internet communication transmitted abroad, while EU commissions’ espionage activities have somewhat subsided. The Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s draft goes far beyond EU-wide chat control attempts, aiming to control internet traffic entirely. In Italy, the government is forcing internet cloud providers to delete and block specific services; Cloudflare was fined for refusing to censor sites that a shadowy cabal of European media elites deemed against their interests. Even Dubai, the supposed “capital” of crypto where everything is legal, has banned privacy tokens and tightened regulatory frameworks. Ironically, on the day this news broke, ZEC, XMR, and RAIL were up.
In the US, Trump is pushing the limits in every aspect. He hates Jerome Powell—we all know that—and now Powell is facing the threat of legal action. Powell answered these public threats with a clear statement: “The threat of criminal charges are the consequence of the FED serving interest rates based on our best assessment that will serve the public, rather than following the president.” Powell is effectively the first FED chair fighting openly against the administration. I don’t know where it ends.
With all Geopolitical and FED problems, the market remains in a bullish setup for Bitcoin, though the time horizon has lengthened. Bullish calls are being pushed from January to March, albeit with higher strikes, but ETF flows must follow to sustain momentum. While other minerals are ripping, Bitcoin is facing an unjustifiable lag. Crypto volumes remain dead, and DEX volumes keep trending down. The only DEX maintaining positive momentum is pumpfun, where new memecoins continue to launch and race from 0 to $100m mcap. There is a niche in this area, while the majority of other protocols suffer. Unichain is a clear failure at this stage. Instead, the world is focusing on AI and prediction markets, where volumes are through the roof—more than triple the supposed peak during the US election.
There is, however, positive structural news: South Korea is ending its 9-year corporate crypto ban. They are opening the market with a hard limit of allocation at 5%, signaling a massive push forward for crypto adoption.
I have a specific story for today regarding copper. With copper price increased, currently at $5.93, up from $4 at the start of 2024—the surge is already impacting criminality and vandalism. It has become lucrative to strip copper from inside cables, damaging network systems, voice signals, digital data, and emergency signals. This creates critical infrastructure problems for nations. We may be entering a super cycle for copper, driven not only by data centers and robotics but by the incremental purchasing required to restore and increase these cables. New security actions must be proceed.
GDP following power, electricity price problem impacting not just AI services and products, but households. As demand increases, the marginal price dictates the cost; if supply does not outreach demand, prices will soar. The lag between demand and supply is clear, and the real sufferers are the consistent buyers: the people. Trump is being proactive here with the mid-terms in mind; creating a sense of affordability is critical. He is enforcing rules to make data centers and tech companies responsible for the grid strain, ensuring Americans don’t pay for corporate power consumption via higher utility bills.
To summarize, everything is heating up. Geopolitics is on fire. Minerals are on fire. Trump is on fire. The economy is on fire.
AI & Tech: Gemini is launching a new Universal Commerce Protocol (UCP), allowing an open standard for agents to communicate and powering direct buying in AI mode.
Crypto Economy: The sector is lagging fundamentally, with YouTube viewership plunging to 5-year lows after a 3-month decline. Long-term Bitcoin holders are distributing, but at a lower rate.
Institutional Growth: Despite the retail lull, infrastructure is expanding. Bitgo is filing for a US IPO, VelaFi raised $20m in series B to expand stablecoin payments, Standard Chartered is expanding its crypto business by launching a prime brokerage service, and Saylor bought another $1.25b worth of Bitcoin at a $91.5k average.