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!

I Think The Bears Are Walking Into a Trap. Buckle in, this one is worth it. Bitcoin - $75,900 Ethereum - $2,070 For the last few weeks, I’ve been saying the move higher felt like temporary relief, not a full reset. Bitcoin bounced hard from the $60k range, Clarity Act headlines gave the market hope, and rumors of the Iran War winding down gave people a reason to get bullish again. But relief is not resolution. So yes, we were right to not fully trust the rally. The CLARITY Act still has not passed. The Iran War is still affecting oil and gas. The dollar is still strong. (actually going up still - temporarily) And Main Street (every day people) is still feeling way more pressure than the headlines want to admit. So let’s break down what I think is happening. ___________________________________________________________ 💠 #1 - The rally was relief not the breakout and the pullback happened. Bitcoin is now sitting near the lower area of the range we’ve been talking about, around $72k to $75k. This is the zone I’ve been watching. Not because I think Bitcoin is broken. I don’t. But because the market got ahead of itself. People saw positive headlines and started acting like the problems were solved. But they weren’t solved. They were just paused, delayed, or maybe slightly improved. A market can rally on hope, but it eventually has to face the actual facts again. And the actual facts are simple: Gas is expensive. Oil is still a problem. The Fed is still stuck. The consumer is getting squeezed. And the dollar is not giving crypto an easy path higher yet. So no, I do not think the pain is fully over. But I also do not think this is the start of some giant collapse to $55k per Bitcoin. That is where I think bearish people are making the mistake. _______________________________________________________________ 💠 #2 - Inflation may stay high, but that does not mean the Fed will hike. This is the part I think a lot of people are missing. If inflation is rising because people are spending too much money, the Fed can raise rates to slow demand.

I just had a conversation with a friend who simply asked "Why buy Bitcoin and not any of the other coins that exist? Aren't they the same? Simply put, the answer is - No. They are not the same. Bitcoin is not “just another crypto coin.” In fact, most other coins are more like tech startups. They need users, developers, revenue, partnerships, apps, adoption, and constant upgrades to justify their value. Bitcoin is different. Bitcoin is trying to solve one very specific problem. "How do you store and transfer value without needing to trust a bank, company, government, CEO, or middleman?" With normal money, we trust a lot of people in the background. We trust banks to hold our money correctly. We trust governments not to print too much. We trust payment companies not to block us. We trust financial institutions to keep accurate records. We trust regulators to catch the bad actors after something goes wrong. Bitcoin flips that model. Instead of saying, “Trust us,” Bitcoin says, “Verify it yourself.” There is no CEO who can change the supply. No company that can dilute you. No board that can issue more shares. No bank that has to approve the transactions. No hidden balance sheet. No secret monetary policy. That is why I treat Bitcoin differently than the rest of crypto. Other coins may succeed like businesses or networks and it's important to say that we invest into other tokens as well. Some like ETH or Solana may have real use cases. But they usually still depend on teams, roadmaps, customers, revenue, hype, and execution. Yes, Bitcoin also has a bitcoin core development community, but it's open sourced and decentralized in a way others aren't. Bitcoin already solved the thing it was designed to solve: A scarce, transparent, open monetary network where the rules are known in advance and anyone can verify them. So when I talk about Bitcoin, I’m not saying “all crypto is good." or "all crypto except Bitcoin is bad" I’m saying Bitcoin is the one asset in crypto that is most clearly trying to solve the deepest money problem: trust.

BTC - $81,250 ETH - $2,293 Big News this Week? - Trump visits China to Strike a Deal with over 17 US based CEOs. This includes the biggest news in tech like Tesla's Elon Musk and NVIDIA's Jensen Huang to make a deal that could lead to peace in Iran. Overall picture - Fundamentally the market looks bad, but recent positive news like a potential US and China deal + Clarity Bill passing the Senate Banking Committee is pushing up the market to record highs.... but something feels off because the DXY (dollar index) - this shows how strong the USD is - well it's going up at the same time as ETH and BTC. [---NEW CHART ADDED BELOW - DXY (DOLLAR INDEX)---] Usually when the dollar gains strength it means that things that you buy with dollars become cheaper. That means stocks, crypto, houses etc etc etc... because technically you use less dollars to buy each thing - meaning each dollar is "worth more"... sounds complicated but hopefully that helps. Okay, but listen...this is not always the case and that is where I have mixed feelings. Let me be clear ------- I DO NOT THINK THE PAIN IS OVER. I think we're still due for a correction in the market, you can see how price is struggling to maintain above the red upper trendline we've been tracking over the last few weeks. Also, the consumer is still hurting and by in large, retail is completely out of crypto. I'm not hearing anyone talk about BTC and ETH out in public like before, everything has been AI and stocks related. So as we talked about in our previous market update we would need to see 3 things change before I change my mind about the crypto markets turning postive. #1 Iran War Over/Solution/Deal (China might make this happen now) #2 Clarity act Passed (halfway there now) #3 DXY/Dollar Strength Index falling But now I'm starting to see that DXY is actually trending up not just because of the negative economic situations we have but because we're starting to see US dominance in oil + bonds return. Previously many countries sold their US bonds off, including China which sold off close to 50% - approx. $650 Billion dollars worth. So this technically isn't a great sign in the short/medium term but I don't think it stays this way. I think if US and China strike a deal we're going to see bullish price action even if the DXY stays higher than we'd like.