BTC

ETH

S&P 500 Futures

$99,708.50

$3,974.25

$6,098.00

(+2.30%)

 (+2.95%)

(+0.26%)

Note: All percentages shown above are referenced to the previous business work day's 09:00 (GMT+8)

GM 🌳

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November 2024 Market Recap

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Our Daily View

What We Are Covering Today

  • U.S. job growth rebounds with rising rate cut expectations; Trump’s policies heighten Fed challenges ahead (More in Macro & TradFi)
  • Michael Saylor urges the U.S. government to use Bitcoin as a store of value; ADA Foundation X account hacked (More in DeFi & CeFi)
  • BTC collective mining balance drops while whales accumulate; Tether minted another $2B USDT (More in On-Chain)
  • ATM IV dips post-US employment data; Skew reflects confidence despite retracement concerns (More in Crypto Derivatives)
  • BTC and ETH retraced from resistance level to challenge key support level, with narrowing Bollinger Bands suggesting decreasing volatility (More in Crypto Technical Analysis)

Macro & TradFi

U.S. job growth accelerated in November, with nonfarm payrolls rising by 227,000 after a hurricane-impacted 36,000 increase in October, surpassing forecasts of 200,000. Despite the rebound, economists suggest averaging October and November data to gauge a cooling labor market trend. The unemployment rate edged up to 4.2%, while average hourly earnings increased by 4.0% year-over-year, reflecting steady wage growth. The report supports expectations for the Federal Reserve to cut interest rates by 25 basis points at its December meeting, marking its fourth reduction since September. However, persistent inflation above the 2% target and policy uncertainty under the incoming Trump administration leave the 2025 monetary policy outlook ambiguous. According to CME FedWatch Tool, Fed Fund Futures pricing in a 85% probability for a rate cut later this month, up from 66% a week ago. 

In other news, President-elect Donald Trump confirmed he will not remove Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell before his term ends in May 2026, despite prior criticisms of Powell’s monetary policy decisions. In an interview, Trump reiterated his commitment to enacting tariffs, mass deportations, tax cuts, and government spending reductions as cornerstones of his upcoming administration. Economists warn these policies could elevate inflation, complicating the Fed’s ability to further lower interest rates. Trump also outlined plans to reduce entitlement spending, curtail aid to Ukraine, and reassess NATO involvement. While Powell affirmed the Fed’s independence under legal protections, concerns persist about potential conflicts between Trump’s economic agenda and central bank policy. Trump also expressed support for a ceasefire and negotiations to end the war in Ukraine, and suggested China could help.

U.S. stocks showed a mixed performance last Friday, with the Nasdaq up 0.81 percent and the S&P 500 rising 0.25 percent to record highs, while the Dow declined slightly by 0.28 percent. Stronger-than-expected November jobs data fueled optimism, benefiting tech giants such as Amazon, up 2.9 percent, and Meta, up 2.4 percent. Investors now turn their focus to upcoming economic events, including U.S. CPI data on Wednesday, December 11, at 21:30 SGT, and the ECB's interest rate decision on Thursday, December 12, at 21:15 SGT, which could further shape market sentiment.

DeFi & CeFi

  • Saylor urges the U.S. government to use Bitcoin as a store of value
  • Cardano Foundation X account hacked, posting fake tokens and URLs
  • Sushi CEO announced plans to launch multiple new products in 2025
  • "SOLV" token set a new record for Hyperliquid's auction
  • Sushi DAO proposes a diversification strategy to reallocate assets from 100% SUSHI to 70% stablecoins

Michael Saylor, the executive chairman of MicroStrategy, has strongly advocated for the U.S. government to abandon gold in favor of Bitcoin, suggesting that selling all the U.S. gold and investing in Bitcoin would "demonetize the entire gold asset class" and increase the value of Bitcoin to $100 trillion. He criticized gold as an outdated store of value, highlighting its vulnerabilities, such as the ease with which it can be confiscated or manipulated, and the challenges of transporting large amounts across jurisdictions. Saylor's comments reflect a broader push within the crypto community, with figures like Mike Novogratz also predicting that Bitcoin could surpass gold as the primary store of value. Some even foresee the creation of a Bitcoin reserve by the U.S., which could drive the price of Bitcoin up to $500,000.

The Cardano Foundation’s X account was compromised on December 8, 2024, by an unknown party, leading to the posting of false announcements. Initially, the account shared a thread about a fake Solana-based token called $ADASOL, claiming it was "Cardano, reimagined for Solana’s speed and innovation." The scam generated over $500,000 in trading volume before traders identified it as a fraud. Following this, the account posted a false notice about the Cardano Foundation being served with an SEC lawsuit and ceasing support for the $ADA token to comply with regulatory requirements. The Cardano Foundation quickly confirmed the breach and assured the community that they were working to restore security, with further updates to be posted on their LinkedIn page.

On-Chain

An on-chain analysis by Santiment showed that Bitcoin's mining wallet balances had been steadily declining since April 2024, but the recent drop of 85,503 BTC within 48 hours marks the most significant decrease since late February. This substantial sell-off reduced mining balances by 4.1%, from 2.08M BTC on December 4 to 2.00M BTC on December 6. However, mining wallet activity has shown minimal correlation with Bitcoin’s price trends throughout 2024. On the other hand, non-mining whales and sharks have continued accumulating BTC, which provides stability to the market and offsets potential downside risks from miner sell-offs. This is a net-neutral impact but traders should continue monitoring miner behavior and overall market sentiment as it will be crucial to understanding its potential impact on BTC price.

In another analysis by Lookonchain, Tether minted another 2B USDT, bringing the total USDT minted across Ethereum and Tron networks to a cumulative amount of 19B since November 6. This continuous and substantial influx of stablecoins into the market indicates a massive injection of liquidity, likely aimed at fueling further trading activity in the crypto space. Such large-scale USDT minting often correlates with increased market buying power, which potentially acts as a driver for upward price movements in majors like BTC and ETH. For traders and investors, this signals heightened activity but also warrants close monitoring of how this liquidity impacts overall market dynamics and sentiment in the coming days.

Derivatives

  • The funding rate for BTC and ETH remained positive.
  • Deribit Implied Volatility Index (DVOL) for BTC and ETH remained flat at 58.26 and 72.67, respectively.
  • The 30-day 25-delta skew (C-P) for BTC remained flat at 3.41 while that of ETH fell to 3.40.
  • The futures market witnessed $404.32M in liquidations over the weekend, with longs representing 60.38%.

Net Annualized APR

Perp (USDT pair)

Long on

Short On

29.24%

XRP

Binance

Bybit

28.30%

BNB

Binance

OKX

21.13%

XRP

OKX

Bybit

Notes:

1) Pairs observed include BTC, ETH, SOL, BNB, XRP, LTC, and DOGE vs. USDT perps. 

2) CEXs observed include Binance, Bybit, OKX & dYdX.

3) Lookback period is 24 hours.

BTC’s at-the-money IV for both 30-day and 7-day IVs subsided to 55.19 and 57.81 respectively after the slew of US employment data reflected a robust US economy. However, IV appears to be picking up again ahead of the US CPI data release due on Wednesday.

BTC's options term structure has remained in backwardation, with traders focusing on near-term contracts as they anticipate increased price volatility in the upcoming week. The inability of BTC's spot price to sustain levels above 100K has fueled concerns of a potential retracement in the days ahead, highlighting market caution and short-term risk aversion.

BTC's skew remains positive despite its spot price failing to hold above 100K, with the 7-day call-put skew rising to 2.62 and the 30-day skew increasing to 3.41. There appears to be sustained market confidence in BTC's price action heading into December, suggesting traders anticipate potential upside despite recent price challenges.

Lastly, @Paradigm highlighted a session in which calls are the top instrument sold. Key BTC trades included the sale of 1000x 27-Dec-24 $110K Calls and a sold 975x 6-Dec-24/13-Dec-24 $110K/$108K Call Calendar. For ETH, notable activity featured the purchase of 14,000x 31-Jan-25 $8K/$10K Call Spreads and the sale of 6,750x 27-Dec-24 $4.4K Calls.

Crypto Technical Analysis

BTC is currently at $99.7K and testing the support level of $99.5K. If this support fails to hold, it may retrace further toward $94.8K, a 4.9% decline. A bounceoff from the current support level will show that BTC can sustain the price action above the $100K level, a psychological resistance level for traders and potentially challenge the ATH of $104K. The Bollinger Bands are contracting which signals decreasing volatility while the 20-period SMA acts as a support for the price action during pullbacks.

ETH broke through the $4K resistance level over the weekend before selling pressure took over and caused the price to decline to current levels of $3.95K. ETH is currently finding support at this level where a failure to hold could lead to a pullback towards $3.77K. The Bollinger Bands are relatively tight, indicating lower volatility and potential consolidation in the market. The price is currently trading towards the lower band which suggests ETH is testing the support levels. RSI level indicates that ETH is on a declining trend but traders should monitor these key levels for confirmation of the next price move.

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TRHX Research (Formerly Treehouse Research) 🌳