- BTC: ~$62,000 (down ~2% today) - ETH: ~$1,740 (down ~2%) - 30 year fixed mortgage: ~6.6% (ticked up this week) Last week we got the good news we'd been waiting on. The job market finally started showing cracks, which is the thing we've said for months would eventually start pushing the Fed toward cutting rates. This week we got a gut punch we didn't see coming though that really hurt our view. Iran blew up the peace deal. So let me be straight about our own calls, because that honesty is the whole point of these updates. We did say the war would probably drag on longer than most people expected, maybe into 2027. That part is playing out. But we also thought this particular deal would hold, because it was a genuinely good deal for Iran. Them torching it caught us off guard because it was sooo good for them. So let's get into that. ____________________ Why this shocked us...... Look at what Iran walked away from. The deal handed them $300 billion to rebuild, lifted the sanctions strangling their economy, and let their oil flow and earn again. The IRGC could have stayed in power and ruled Iran untouched. The main thing they had to give up was the nuclear weapon. They said no. That tells you something heavy. They want the bomb more than they want their own economy and country to flourish. Crazy. Which means this probably escalates before it gets better. ____________________ What it means for your money..... Iran attacked ships in the Strait of Hormuz, the narrow stretch of water where about a fifth of the world's oil passes through. The US struck back. Oil jumped about 5%. When oil climbs, everything costs more to make and move, so the fear of inflation comes right back. Here's why I'm adding mortgage rates to these updates. Watch what the 30 year mortgage did this week. It climbed to around 6.6%. A war on the other side of the world just made it more expensive for a regular family here to buy a house. I hope this help to show how connected all this is.

Everything we've been talking about is showing up so today's market update will be short and sweet but with something new we've never talked about before. We expected this chop. We expected inflation to stay sticky and resolve over the next few months. But today's news on inflation scared the market and down we went. So let's get into it! BTC - $59,900 ETH - $1,566 _________________________________ Inflation: The numbers came in hot today. PCE inflation metric came in at 4.1% the highest since April 2023. Scaring the market and basically rising everyone's worry of a rate hike, but we expected sticky inflation, the problem is that it came in hotter than expected. Iran War is solved, but is it really solved? The deal almost fell apart at the last second once again. I think even though it's "solved" on paper, the market is still skittish. Core PCE is at 3.4% - this is important because it's inflation WITHOUT energy and food. Meaning technically you would expect this to be lower because oil and food have been driving inflation metrics up, but we got the opposite. It's actually going up. Why? Because this AI build out of data centers are driving up costs for consumer products like PCs, smart phones and other products. So the market basically read this and thinks inflation will actually stay elevated even longer than expected. This is something that we haven't talked about and is important because it's what actually making it hard for the Fed to cut rates and it's actually making it easier for them to hike. So will they? We do not think so. We expect the Fed to hold rates at the next meeting again. We've talked about this before but the consumer is saving less and spending more, not because they want to but because they have to. If they hike rates, they risk squeezing the consumer even more. So the sequence of events is still the same. We expect inflation to cool down over the next few months but this does add a big wrinkle to the timeline more than anything else.

BTC: ~$62,000 ETH: ~$1,660 Big headline? Trump just threatened to seize Iran's main oil island this morning. Markets are correcting on the news and Bitcoin dropped into the price channel we shared last week.... but markets know there's no easy answer here. Every escalation extends the timeline. And an extended timeline means our thesis plays out later ... which lets be honest... gives Bitcoin time to drop more. However the most important thing to do right now is pay attention and not lose focus! So where does the momentum go? _______________________________________________ #1 — What's Driving Momentum Downward Trump posted on Truth Social that the U.S. will seize Kharg Island — Iran's main oil export terminal, about 90% of their crude shipments — "in the not too distant future." He told Fox News he'd stop everything tonight if Iran just signs the deal. My honest read: if we wanted that island, we'd have it already. The U.S. bombed Kharg's military infrastructure back in March and deliberately left the oil infrastructure untouched. You don't preserve something you plan to destroy. He's trying to pressure Iran into a deal but I think it's just TACO. There's an acronym some analysts use: TACO. Trump Always Chickens Out. His pattern is to escalate to the edge, then negotiate. But I think this is why it's important to pay attention because we could get a surprise deal done where the straight opens. This is why we have to stay focused. If this happens, then markets will rip upward. _______________________________________________ #2 — Why This Is a Stalemate, Not an Invasion Iran isn't still fighting because they think they can beat us militarily. They're fighting because if they stop and it looks like a surrender, the regime doesn't survive. A deal that destroys them from the inside is worse than a war. So the only deal Iran signs is one where they get to save face. Which means at some point Trump has to soften the language and give them that exit. Backtracking is actually the smarter play here and we know he's done it before.

The University of Michigan's Consumer Sentiment Index dropped to 44.8 this month. That's the lowest reading ever (since they started tracking it in 1952). Seventy-four years of data, and Americans have never felt worse about the economy than they do RIGHT NOW. Meanwhile, the S&P 500 just posted 8 straight winning weeks. So which one is telling the truth? Here's what's actually happening to everyday people: - 57% of Americans say high prices are eating into their personal finances (that number was 50% just last month) - Inflation expectations for the next 12 months climbed to 4.8% - Long-term inflation expectations hit 3.9%, highest in 7 months - Gas prices are surging because of supply disruptions in the Strait of Hormuz - Lower-income households and folks without degrees are getting squeezed hardest And here's why Wall Street doesn't reflect any of that: - The S&P 500 is dominated by a handful of mega-cap tech companies riding AI hype - Stock prices reflect corporate earnings and global revenue, not what you're paying for eggs - The market can climb while your purchasing power shrinks, and that's been happening for years This is what inflation looks like when you zoom out. Wages chase prices but never quite catch up. People who own assets watch their portfolios grow. People who hold cash watch it slowly evaporate. And the gap keeps getting wider. This cash/fiat system is designed to make holders poor slowly overtime. And it's why you have to pay attention hard assets that cannot be printed into oblivion. So where does Bitcoin fit? It solves this exact problem. - There will only ever be 21 million Bitcoin. No central bank prints more of it - Your dollars have lost roughly 25% of their purchasing power since 2020 - Bitcoin's monetary supply policy was written in code 17 years ago and hasn't changed since - It keeps running regardless of who's in the White House or what's happening in the Strait of Hormuz The stock market says things are great. Your grocery receipt says otherwise.

If there was ever some folks you'd expect to be winning at Bitcoin, it's the Trumps. Memecoins. NFTs. A whole presidential campaign wrapped in crypto promises. But Trump Media's Bitcoin bet tells a different story. Here's what happened: - Trump Media bought 11,542 Bitcoin at an average price of ~$118,000 per coin - Bitcoin dropped 35% to ~$77,000 - The company reported a $405.9 million net loss last quarter - Today, on-chain data shows they moved 2,650 BTC ($205 million) to exchange Crypto.com They appear to be selling. Into the dip lol. What went wrong? - They dumped $1.36 billion into Bitcoin at one price point near the peak - They had no strategy for a drawdown - When the price dropped, pressure to sell got louder than any conviction to hold Connections, influence, and hype don't protect you from bad strategy. The rules of Bitcoin don't care who you are. The fix is boring. And it works. It's called DCA (Dollar Cost Averaging). Here's how it works: - Buy a fixed dollar amount on a regular schedule (weekly, biweekly, monthly) - When the price is high, your fixed amount buys less Bitcoin - When the price is low, that same amount buys more - Over time, your average cost smooths out and you stop watching the daily chart If they had spread that $1.36 billion across 12 monthly purchases, their average cost might be closer to ~$92k per coin, not $118,000. And they'd still be holding. So here's the takeaway for regular folks: Bitcoin is healthy. Has been for 15 years and counting. The network processes a new block every 10 minutes, same as it did yesterday, last year, and the day Trump Media bought in. The code kept running. The strategy is what broke. DCA works because it takes your feelings out of the buy decision. And in Bitcoin, feelings are the most expensive line item on your balance sheet. Have you ever panic sold something and watched it recover? What did that teach you? Let us know. We wanna hear from you!