
Crypto markets face volatility as geopolitical tensions rise and a heavy week of macroeconomic data approaches.
AI-generated summary
The Wall Street Journal reported that the U.S. is evacuating personnel from Middle Eastern embassies due to increased threats from Iran. This follows a memo from the Director of National Intelligence.
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GM!
Today’s top news:
Crypto majors cool over the weekend; BTC at $80.2k
BTC ETFs close week with $300M net inflows despite outflows Thurs+Fri
Solana trading bot Bloom was exploited for $947k; team promising reimbursement
Big week ahead with RH earnings Tues, FOMC Weds and Q3 GDP + PCE data
Pump announced a $2.5M Squads competition kicking off today and running 2 weeks
Bitcoin Breaks Below $80,000 as Iran Fears Hit the Weekend
Bitcoin slid below $80,000 this weekend after the Wall Street Journal reported Saturday that the U.S. is rapidly evacuating personnel from embassies and military bases across the Middle East. In a Friday memo to Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Director of National Intelligence Jay Clayton wrote that “Iran has substantially increased efforts to target U.S. personnel.” The evacuations go well beyond earlier reports of diplomatic staff being pulled from Saudi Arabia.
BTC currently sits at $80,160, down 2.4% on the week. Ethereum fell 3.8% to $2,322, Solana 3.2% to $101 and the broader CMC20 index is off 2.3%.
Over 30 days, Bitcoin is down 4.8%. The majors around it average down 16.5%, more than three times as much. Ethereum off 13.6%, Solana 17.1%, XRP 17.4%, Hyperliquid 17.4%, Dogecoin 22.3%.
There is some positive. Zcash is up 8% on the week while everything else bled, and sits up 135% on the year. Monero is up 37%. Privacy is still catching a bid, in a week when the lead story is governments evacuating people ahead of attacks.
And we have a big week ahead. The Fed decides its next move with interest rates Wednesday at FOMC with Kevin Warsh’s press conference after, the ECB follows Thursday and the Bank of Japan Friday. Q3 GDP and September PCE data land on Thursday, the same day Coinbase and Strategy report after the bell.
Arguably more important than those above, at least for onchain, is the Robinhood earnings call on Tuesday the 27th. Will Vlad and crew address the tokenized stock pushback? Will they mention Robinhood Chain and its memestonk ecosystem? Will they launch a builders grant program? Big questions to answer, and ones that will likely decide the near-term future of that ecosystem.
And of course, U.S. midterms are eight days away. Expect another volatile week…
Macro Crypto and Markets
Crypto majors are slightly red; BTC +0.2% at $80.2k; ETH +0.4% at $2,330; SOL +1% at $101.5; HYPE +2% at $77; ZEC +4% at $1,230
Top alt movers include QNT (+17%), ENA (+5%) and PYTH (+6%)
Oil -2% at $101; Gold +0.4% at $4,025
Stock futures are slightly green as oil falls; DOW +0.35%, Nasdaq even
Crypto faces its heaviest macro week of the quarter with Fed, ECB and Bank of Japan decisions Wednesday through Friday alongside Q3 GDP and PCE, plus earnings from Robinhood and SoFi on Tuesday and Coinbase and Strategy on Thursday
Goldman Sachs expects global growth to hold broadly stable through 2027 but sees downside risks building from higher energy prices, rising bond yields and slowing AI investment, while arguing that cooling inflation and AI’s growing visibility in employment data mean central banks hike less than expected
Wells Fargo, Cisco, Marvell, Arm, Moderna and Intuit joined the companies objecting to tokenized versions of their shares on the OKX-ICE venue, taking the count to 22 in eight days
Electrum patched a flaw that let malicious servers steal funds from users bumping a transaction fee, after the wallet trusted servers to report pending transactions without verifying signatures
Corporate Treasuries & ETFs
The Bitcoin ETFs saw $138M in net outflows on Friday; the ETH ETFs saw $4M in net inflows in a welcome reversal
Meme Coin Tracker
Meme leaders were mixed; DOGE +1%, SHIB even, PEPE -1%, PENGU +3%, TRUMP +2%, SPX +3%, BONK even
Robinhood chain leaders were mostly green after a bad Saturday selloff; Pons +6% to $160M; AI +8% at $59M; Cashcat even at $90M; GF +85%, Bow +20% and Gage +33% led top movers
Solana top movers included Launch +50x, Kimchi +70%, Dood +60% and Claudia +50%; Stonk +13% to $133M
Token, Airdrop & Protocol Tracker
Hyperliquid led onchain protocols in revenue on the week with $14.74M, followed by Pump with $13.76M, Papertrade with $6.67M, and Collector Crypt with $5.31M
Solana trading bot Bloom said attackers drained about 9,408 SOL worth $947,000 from 49 wallets belonging to nine users by exploiting a third-party module to gain remote code execution, insisting no private keys were compromised and pledging to reimburse 100% of stolen funds
Pump.fun announced a $2.5M squads competition that will start today and run for 2 weeks, with the top 3 squads earning prizes based on PNL + uPNL
AI outlook — possibilities, not facts
Robinhood earnings call will address tokenized stock pushback.
Possible · Within days

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