Crypto Suddenly Battered

Barely 24 hours ago, Bitcoin reached an all-time high near $73,700 and total crypto assets were zooming toward $3 trillion. But there's nothing like a fresh batch of hotter-than-expected U.S. inflation data to tame even the most savage bull market.

Bitcoin earlier today cratered in Asian trading, falling sharply, first breaching the sub-$70K mark and eventually sinking to as low as $66K.

Okay, we're not even talking about the consumer price index (CPI) which as of a few days ago was considered benign, as the data came, went, showing little change in the inflation picture in February.

No, Thursday's spooky print came courtesy of the producer price index (PPI), often described as a gauge of wholesale inflation, and which increased by 0.6% in February, double the expected number forecast by most economists.

And so, risk-asset investors recoiled in fear of that macro "boogey man" holed up in a closet with a bunch of creepy mannequins, waiting to leap out.

A crypto hedge fund, Ouroboros Capital, said the PPI print "confirmed the market’s fears that the resurgence of inflation since the start of the year is here to stay.”

Markets have turned on a dime in terms of thinking the Fed will lower interest rates later this year. The notion of the central bank hitting its inflation target of 2% anytime soon would seem to be now off the table, as are any rate cuts, Ouroboros Capital said.

Bond yields climbed in Thursday's trading session, reflecting the return of a "higher for longer" sentiment about rates, one that itself seemed long gone.

The closely watched benchmark 10-year Treasury yield reached 4.29% yesterday. But take note the 10-year yield has since come down to 4.27%, which has abetted equity index futures, shooting higher this morning as Wall Street looks to end the week on a positive vibe.

If a bubble has popped, somebody go better tell Bitcoin because it has suddenly bounced from that low of $66K.

As of 9:20 a.m. (EST), BTC was $67,700.

The collective total market capitalization of some 13,300 worldwide coins tracked by CoinGecko now sits at $2.7 trillion after a decline of 7% in 24 hours.

That was as of 8:10 a.m. (EST). Bitcoin fell 7.6%. Ethereum fell 7.4%. XRP, Cardano and Dogecoin all shed in the vicinity of 10%-13%.

Among some other casualties of the Ides of March mauling are Solana's memecoins, WIF and BONK, each down 15% in the past day.

Meme assets based on dogs, cats, celebrities and political figures are tumbling (left and right) but there is at least one frog-themed coin, Book of Meme (BOME), skyrocketing this very moment, resulting in some widespread second-guessing of one poor rich trader who, per Lookonchain, spent 50 SOL to snap up 170 million BOME. What was an $8K bet quickly turned into a $120K profit; so the trader in question cashed out. Then BOME quadrupled, meaning the 170 million tokens would have been worth about $993,000 if the trader waited a day before selling, per Cointelegraph, following a debate online that included one opportunity-cost-agnostic commenter opining, “profit is profit.”

Clearly, though, Bitcoin SV is today’s big loser, down 21% in 24 hours. The project's founder, Craig Wright, is not Satoshi, and did not author the Bitcoin whitepaper, a judge has ruled.

OpenAI's attorneys ridiculed Elon Musk's lawsuit in which the billionaire mogul alleges OpenAI not only double-crossed him but in general is mishandling mankind's push into the age of computers that can think.

In court filings, OpenAI's lawyers (presumably crafting their own succinct verbal jabs) called the suit "incoherent" and "a fiction" and accused Musk of conjuring a supposed founding agreement just for the sake of his "frivolous" suit.

Musk was an early backer of OpenAI; however, he threw up demands, then walked away, as OpenAI has shown via some dredged emails shared on blog posts published last week in response to the suit.

Musk isn't the only one worried about what OpenAI cofounder Sam Altman and his cohorts have planned.

Earlier this year, U.S. House of Representatives Speaker Mike Johnson said Congress should "stay mindful of potential risks" while also "encouraging innovation." Altman, after meeting with the key Republican lawmaker back in January, told reporters later that the two discussed "trying to balance tremendous upside and figure out how to mitigate the risk" of AI, while adding he was "excited to see what the legislative process will do."

Yesterday, TikTok found out how things can work on Capitol Hill as the House passed a bill to effectively ban the wildly popular social video app. The Senate now must weigh in. And early Thursday came word of a curious wrinkle in this particular “techlash” saga: former Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin declared he was forming an investor group to buy TikTok from ByteDance, a Chinese technology company viewed by lawmakers as beholden to the Chinese government (one that is probably not too keen on the idea of TikTok being snapped up by a buyer in the U.S.)

TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew insinuated a sale is a non-starter (CNBC). China Foreign Ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin, meanwhile, described the House bill, dubbed the "Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act," as underscoring a kind of “robber’s logic” toward TikTok (Financial Times).

Which reminds us – did you see Robinhood got a glowing review from Bernstein researchers initiating coverage of HOOD. They gave it a super bullish rating based on projections that the market value of digital assets is poised to nearly triple to $7.5 trillion by 2025. “A monster crypto cycle,” Bernstein has dubbed this Bitcoin-ETF-led environment.

While traditional online platforms like Schwab remain reticent about crypto, Bernstein bets that Robinhood’s crypto business resurgence will "restore its fortunes back again with investors.”