 Hello friends and thanks for hanging out with us here on the Marker Report today on Cointelegraph. We hope those here in the States had a great holiday and those around the globe welcome to the Marker Report this week. I am your host Benton and we are joined by our resident expert Jordan Finneseth, Yashu Gola in Samborgi. Jordan uses his background in psychology and human behavior to spot all the emerging trends in the crypto markets. Samborgi is our business editor at Cointelegraph where he brings a decade of experience and economic analysis in financial market writing and Yashu Gola is a financial analyst and markets writer at CT who has been covering crypto industry since 2014. Folks, we're here, we're back at it again. Happy Tuesday. What is going on this week? How are we feeling? Has sentiment changed at all since last week? Jordan, how are we feeling this week, man? I'm doing good. Had a nice little vacation yesterday just kind of hanging in there. It seems like it's about more the same going on with Bitcoin and crypto. People don't realize it's going to be a long, long hard slog through a crypto market or crypto winter, but we'll get there eventually. Don't lose faith. Very good. And Sam, how are we feeling this week? Well, all I'm really seeing is lower highs and fake rallies and not a lot of sentiment, not a lot of volume. Really nothing has happened. So it's pretty much status quo for me. All right. And we welcome Yashu back on the show. Yashu is going to have his own segment today that we're very excited to dive into with some of his technical analysis. Yashu, what's going on this week, man? Well, my one billion relatives are calling me again and again to know if it's a rally and are we in for a long-term rebound? So even a small spike really makes them excited, which I hate. So I actually kind of agree with Sam. I'm concerned about this. Exactly. It's been a long sludge as everyone has kind of alluded to here over the last couple months. Are we through the thick of it yet? No one knows. What we're going to dive into today is a comprehensive overview of where we are at. We're going to bring you some of the biggest articles this week and what could potentially forecast the months ahead. So make sure you are tuning in. If you haven't liked and subscribed, go ahead and do so now. We are Cointelegraph on YouTube and we're here Tuesdays, 12 p.m. So go ahead and hit that notification bell so that you know when we come on with the live special episodes, those could be coming up depending on what's happening in the markets. We want to make sure that you get your news first. And today, we're going to be giving away a $50 voucher to the Cointelegraph store. I want to take a quick second to pivot to the chat and thank everyone for tuning in. All the friends of the show. I see Vikram. I see Catherine. I see Luciana. Glad to have everyone here on today's show. I know we have an action-packed lineup for you, but first things first, we're going to go ahead and get into our weekly roundup video for this week. So you know that everything that's been happening in the Twitter sphere. So Danilo, let's go ahead and jump into our roundup for this week. We've been monitoring that Celsius situation, which I find was interesting to see that their liquidation point has gotten lower and lower. So hopefully, there's no more contagion, but we will see. It seems like things keep popping up week to week. Another interesting headline that I thought I saw in there was the FTX buying BlockFi. Real quick, curious to hear your guys' thoughts. Is FTX going to run the entire crypto world? Is it just going to buy out everyone and consolidate everything? Sam, I'll get this. You've seen that in other industries in the past and stuff. And I think I mentioned it a couple of weeks ago. I thought somebody would step in and try to help stem the contagion, which looks like SPF is doing. But I think they're just one of the biggest players in the field. They seem to be better off than even a coin base or something as far as what their back office looks like. So I think that they're trying to help out the whole industry, but I think there'll be plenty of opportunities for other companies to come in later. Well, there was quite a bit of conflicting reports on what we were going to see with that acquisition. It was initially reported at $25 million, but apparently they struck a deal later that gives FTX the opportunity or the ability to buy Block 5 for up to $240 million. So this level of consolidation, I don't think it's a great thing for the industry. But what this deleveraging effect has done is it's really weeded out all of the troubled players. And there aren't very many companies and good standing that are left. So you could probably expect it to continue as the contagion effects from what we've seen over the past, the market implosion that we've seen over the past six months begins to settle. Very interesting. Yashu, any thoughts about this whole FTX thing? Yes. So I do think that Block 5 is a great idea that is completely implemented wrong, because I think they never had the safety net to really face a crash like this. And I think FTX is investing in an idea and they can actually put money and make it better. So yes, between the conflicting reports as Sam mentioned, this would be a very great bigger deal because FTX is known to do things quite in a traditional manner. They have that approach. They take less risks and they work on a slow and organic building. So yes, it's a very positive move for the entire crypto industry if FTX jumps into buy Block 5. Does this set the precedent though that FTX is just going to be the savior when we hit these downturns in future times I guess? Is that the precedent that we're kind of setting here is that they then can bail out everyone in the future? I do kind of question that at the end of the day. Well, the reality is we don't have a buyer of last resort and crypto. No one is going to be backstopping the massive losses that we saw. So you're going to start to see some of these massive blue chip companies and crypto step in, but they can only absorb so much. I know that Sam Bank and Fried now has been connected with some miners as well. There's a lot of speculation about their expansion. But when crypto companies go bust, there's no one else, there's no one there left to help them. No government is going to step in to help them or bail them out. So remaining assets will be scooped up by existing crypto players and maybe even some players outside of crypto. You take a look at Celsius, there's been rumors that Goldman Sachs wants to buy their assets. So we'll see how that goes. Interesting times ahead. For this week for our market news, this one is crypto community eyeing three macro events to tip crypto scales in July. Typically we've seen historically speaking, when we get into these summer months here in the Northern Hemisphere, crypto markets heat up. We're not in the territory right now though with the bear market. So one of the big three things that we're looking for, Danilo, if you want to go ahead and just pull up this quick article written by Felix NG. And I want to go ahead and touch on some of these highlights and then get our experts insights. Because one of the big things that I pulled out of this was when we're in this crypto market crash, an overall positive sign for the industry is going to rely on some of these three big key announcements that are about to come up. So the CPI, which we've talked about on previous episodes, the next report comes out on the 13th. And one of the things that I wanted to notate is last time we saw this report come out, it was 8.6 CPI. So I want to kick this over to Sam. Why is this such an important marker for the macro environment currently? And what are you really looking for out of this next report on July 13? Sure. So it's an important metric for the macro climate because the Federal Reserve is tracking inflation and its monetary policies based in large part on inflation. As everyone watching is well aware, inflation is spiraling out of control. So the idea is that if the CPI print continues higher, then the Federal Reserve is going to take a more aggressive approach to trying to rein in inflation, right? Because the Fed's call on inflation or their miss call was probably the worst forecast I've ever seen. Imagine calling inflation to be transitory and then inflation goes out of control less than a year later, despite the fact that we all have access to the same data. So for those of you looking for a bullish take, what you want to see is you want to see the CPI begin to moderate, okay? Which means that the year over year growth is going to slow. That's what a lot of the hopeful people are looking at. I think we could probably see a CPI peak in June, especially as commodity prices begin to come down a little bit. But that just means that inflation is going to go, it's going to continue going higher, but the year over year increase is going to be smaller. So that's why everyone is looking at inflation because it informs what the Federal Reserve is going to do. The interesting thing is that the Fed actually doesn't use CPI as a benchmark. It uses the core PCE index, which actually understates inflation a lot more. All that said, the inflation numbers give us an indication of just how bad prices are going out of control and how much leverage the Fed is going to have to continue hiking rates despite the fact that we're likely heading into a recession. So I guess what would be a number that we're looking for, you know, heading into this? Is there any kind of, you know, could we touch as high as nine? Are we looking for stabilization around this like 8.6? So I haven't seen any forecasts yet. Usually the forecast will start coming out probably in the next couple of days. My expectation as of last month was that June may be the peak. We could see a print higher than 8.6 annually, year over year, I should say, for June before we begin to moderate in the second half of the year. So I think that's kind of my base case. But right now it's all about expectations and how to manage those expectations. Everyone's expecting the CPI to begin to moderate at some point. We just don't know when the peak is going to happen. It may have happened in May, but we could have another month of really hot CPI, especially as the homeowner equivalent rent portion begins to be more priced in. So we'll find out very soon. Very good. Go ahead. Yeah, I was going to say on the retail side, like that's the official, like how the official side is responding to it. But I don't even think the retail side is necessarily looking at the CPI so much as like just looking at their grocery bill. And they're not going to want to buy any kind of crypto until they know that they can feed their family for the rest of the year or anything like that. Like this is like, if we're waiting for a retail kind of drives a lot of the momentum and the market and institutions can maybe come in and bring big lifts. But retail ain't going to get any kind of excited about cryptocurrencies until inflation goes down, which might be a year or so. So yeah, it's going to be a rough go. And Yashu, how do you typically like to view the CPI when you're kind of like assessing the market situations? Is that a big indicator that you like to use in kind of the composite of information that you're analyzing? Yes, of course, because see, it is at the center stage of whatever that has been happening since March 2020. You know, we saw a very substantial growth of expansive, you know, quantitative easing, which really helped prop up the prices of every risky asset we know today. And when Fed announced that they're going to tone it down, we saw a correction, a very big correction after all. I think with even if inflation cools down in this report, it is only a validation that Fed's rate hike is working. But we really have to take it as a grain of salt that it is actually the indication that they will tone down their quantitative tightening as of now, because first, they have to wait and watch. That's what they have said in their previous FMC meetings that they are very much ready to hike rates by another 75 basis points in July. So if inflation even comes down, we might see to scale them back to 50 VPS, but we will still see a rate hike, because that is what the swap market is also predicting already that we will reach about 3.75% from the current 1.5, 1.75% slab. So we are looking to double that rate by the end of this year. So it does not actually amount that we will recover anytime soon. But any sign of slowing in slowing inflation is a good sign that will turn up in the later dates, in the later dates to provide us a bottom in the markets we trade in, especially the risky markets. Definitely. And Danilo, I want to pull up, this is a good segue for us, because Yasha, you mentioned the Fed interest rate hikes and the next FMC meeting later this month is on the 26th and 27th. So all eyes are going to be on the Fed. So as you mentioned, after they raise the interest rates by 75 basis points in June, one of the most significant monthly increases in 28 years, interest rates are expected to increase further following the Federal Open Market Committee meeting later this month. Sam, what is your take on what may come out of this FMC meeting? Are we going to expect another 75 basis points? Where do you think we're heading next in regards to this area? And what's to be expected on the potential impact on the crypto markets? Yeah, so I definitely agree with Yasha. I think markets, a lot of hopeful people on the market are underestimating just how much the Fed can hike rates in the cycle. I think there's a lot of people who are hoping that they're going to pivot very soon. I think they're emboldened to continue hiking for the foreseeable future. Obviously, the big wild card here is the economy. The Fed is hiking into a declining economy, which even the Keynesian economists will say you're not supposed to do. You're not supposed to be hiking rates into a declining economy. But given just how warped our financial system is, that's what the Fed is doing right now because they don't have a choice. So when it comes to actual recession and the economy, it usually takes a while for us to really confirm that we're in a full blown recession. Even if you go back to the 2008 financial crisis, it took quite a while and economic revisions for us to really know, oh shit, we're in a recession. So I think they're going to have a lot of leeway to continue hiking rates. I do see July being another month. Now one of the variables could be the PMI numbers, the purchasing managers index. If those collapse below 50 and stay below 50, there may be more pressure on the Fed to pivot. But any kind of pivot will probably be just a pivot in language. They might tone down their language sometime in the fall, but I expect them fully to continue to raise rates. Another variable is going to be the fall itself because typically September, October are volatile months for stocks. If we see another massive sell off that could put more pressure on the Fed to step in. But right now I see them emboldened. They have to do what they have to do. Their legitimacy is at stake. Whatever legitimacy they have left for completely blowing this call. So I expect another sizable rate hike and then a few more coming into end of 2022. Very good. In Jordan, I want to kick this to you next on July 28th, the US Bureau of Economic Analysis will release an advanced estimate of the US's GDP for the second quarter of 2022. After registering a negative 1.6 GDP decline in Q1 of 2022 Atlanta Federal Reserve's GDP now trackers expecting a negative 2.1 decline in GDP growth for Q2 2022. So Jordan, this brings me to the question, are we in a recession or is this still kind of impending? Is this going to allude to kind of what Sam was saying is that we don't really know it until we're actually the real part of the recession? What are your thoughts on where we are kind of currently from the macro landscape? Yeah, I'd say we're in recession now. Stock is a pullback, crypto is a pullback. Nobody's really happy with the way things are. If anybody that's been paying attention to the economic situation ever since 2008 knows that this whole system has been broken for a while. Yeah, we might all like, why doesn't somebody step up and just make the hard decisions? But then when they start making the hard decisions, we're like, no, lower interest rate, don't do that. But like Sam was saying, if they want to hold any kind of credibility whatsoever in the future, they're going to have to kind of keep going. And regardless of any kind of bucking that we're all doing, they're going to have to try and make a difference to solve the problem. Because if they can't, then why do they exist? What is their point if they can't do the hard decisions or make the decision, the choices that need to be done to actually get our economy back on track? And it's just like, we've been having it really good here in the US, especially for quite a while now. And they expect that it's going to continue like that forever is foolish in my opinion. We just got some hard times ahead of us, trying to like pull it together, reevaluate what you're doing. And like, if you need to find another path in life, I don't know, like, there's a lot going on right now. This is a time of big change going on. So I'm saying. And Josh, what are you seeing right now currently? Do you agree with with Jordan's assessment that we're kind of currently in this recession? Yes, it has already started happening. And we are feeling the pressure. We just need to wait for some more jobs report to verify this, because it is actually the jobs, you know, that signify that if people are losing their jobs, and if there is a panic in the market, that actually signifies that we are heading towards a recession or maybe in the recession. And if you just quoted the Atlanta report, and if you if you just notice that, you know, because their report really is based on an economic data. So during any given quarter, every time a new data point is released, you know, they update the output of the model until the whole quarter is complete. So at this point, you can compare the final output of the model against the actual real GDP for that quarter. So what really happens that I mean, in simple words, they tend to underestimate the GDP a lot. That is the one of the issues with this report. So what really what I'm really trying to say that the numbers you're looking at the GDP you know, pretty far they already if it's showing negative, it can be actually ultra negative, it can be like so so deep in because they are not actually tracking everything in that in that quarter, you know, it's just based on economic data. So yes, it is right, we can be in a recession, that is a very huge possibility. And by not believing Atlanta GDP, I think we are pretty much deep. If they are saying minus 12.1%, we are deeper than that. Very interesting. Sam, do you agree here? Are we in recession? What's your take? Yeah, well, a technical recession is defined as back to back quarters of negative growth. So if you get back to back quarters of negative growth, technically, you're in a recession, obviously in the slagflationary environment that we're in, it gets a little bit more nuanced than that. But I know you asked earlier, you know, what does this all mean for crypto on the market? So I spent years in the trad-fi industry, traditional finance, where I would monitor all the FOMC minutes, all the Fed meetings, all that stuff, because that's what the market's main signal was. I came to Bitcoin and crypto thinking that I don't have to care anymore about the Fed, you know, because Bitcoin produces block after block, it's a parallel financial system. Yet now everyone in Bitcoin and crypto is worried about the Fed. The reason is because they're all looking to daddy to bail them out. You know, they want daddy being the Fed to signal that, you know what, we're not going to hike rates anymore, we're going to ease again, which is going to be good for risk gases and hence Bitcoin and crypto because crypto and Bitcoin have demonstrated that they're a risk asset, especially since the COVID crash. So, you know, a lot of us Bitcoiners, we were right about inflation, but we weren't so right about the inflation hedge, at least not yet. So that's what it all means for the market. They're looking at the Fed for a signal to ease, which is going to be good for risk gases and that includes crypto. Very good. Excellent insights from our experts here. I want to take a second to pivot to the chat. I see a lot of us kind of talking here. We got some folks agreeing with Jordan. We got sheltered Corgi chiming in on the point that Sam had said recession equals negative GDP for two quarters. Rich new design. Welcome back. Make sure you ask your questions for our experts here. If you want them answered, chime in on chat. Also, don't forget to drop your Twitter handle in because we're going to be selecting a winner for $50 worth of swag at the coin telegraph store here at the end of the show. Now I want to pivot us into, we kind of talked the macro of the three big factors we're going to be keeping an eye on here in July. We'll pivot us into Bitcoin here and let's talk some local bottoms. Let's talk about where we are currently. There was a report the MVRVZ score is a tried and tested bottom indicator, but it is not back at the base yet. One analyst warns. And so I want to kind of take a second here to gather our thoughts. I don't know, is this an indicator that you all like to trade with or use this MVRV score and it kind of indicating that this new low 15.6 for Bitcoin. Are you all buying this? Is this something that you all like to use in your analysis? I will start here with Jordan first. I've only used it a few times. I pull it more off of looking at Bitcoin instead of Glassnode, but yeah, it's just it's more of an indicator to me that shows kind of the history of it. And when the indicator gets really low, it's kind of around the time that a bottom comes, which is currently around now. It's still going to go a little lower compared to previous backs, but it's kind of similar to some of the other indicators that are out there that show around the time that a bear market bottom comes. This indicator also hits a low. I don't know. I've been started a dollar cost average and other things, not necessarily Bitcoin. I don't know, because what I've just noticed, my portfolio has actually kind of stayed pretty level of last few months actually, maybe because the altcoin markets are so illiquid that the coins have dumped so much that everybody's like, I'm just going to hold it till the next one now. And so everybody's kind of focused on Bitcoin and Ethereum markets. So they're kind of taking the biggest dumps while a lot of the altcoins are staying pretty steady just because nobody wants to do anything with them. So I'm kind of looking at those coins maybe more to start dollar cost averaging into. But yeah, I don't really try to pick a Bitcoin bottom. I just kind of get into the general vicinity of a bear market bottom and started doing my thing just like I did back in 2019. You heard it first there. Sam, how are you approaching this kind of current Bitcoin dilemma? Are you trying to time a bottom or are you trying to just dollar cost average in and accumulate as much as you can during this phase? Well, in terms of Bitcoin bottom, obviously the cliche, you can't pick a bottom, blah, blah, blah, all that stuff. We all know that. I do expect us to head lower at some point just because we've had such a long consolidation now below 20,000. Any kind of rally has been sold. And we haven't really had an impressive rally yet. So I do expect a leg lower, probably into the mid teens. So for me, it's not really going to make much of a difference in the long term, whether I scoop up now or scoop up at 16,000. In terms of my Bitcoin strategy, it's to accumulate over time and to accumulate as much Bitcoin as I can. So I'm not changing my strategy at all when it comes to that. Very good. Yashu, how are you approaching things right now, especially when we're kind of looking at Bitcoin? I know we're going to be diving into a little bit later in your segment, but just kind of your overall high level view of where this bottom potentially could be and how you're approaching and assessing the situation. See, I'm always backing against the macro fundamentals. And as far as people do not have money to buy these tokens, if we are really heading towards a game where people are losing jobs and inflation is super high, even when it cools down, it's really way, way higher than what Fed really anticipates to be near 2%. So in the cycle, any kind of NVR, VZ score, it can predict that, yeah, we are completely oversold at this point. And even RSI, a very classic indicator, indicates the same that we are oversold in a Bitcoin market on weekly timeframes. But it does not mean that we bottom out, because there has been many instances in the history of traditional finance in which any market who slips into an oversold territory, it stays there for weeks or months. So yes, it simply reflects that, yeah, Bitcoin has the tendency to bounce, but it does not really mean that it will bottom out. So we really have to watch what really Fed is going to do. One of the viewers actually commented that, listen to the Fed, follow the Fed. It's actually a smart statement. Whoever you are, yeah, that's what I'm actually trying to say. You really have to look into the macro fundamentals and any kind of indicator standalone cannot work in your favor. Very good. Now I see Catherine Rhodes asking, what coins are Jordan DCA into now? Jordan, if you feel comfortable sharing, if you like to provide some insights, how are you, you're the all coin guy, how are you approaching the all coins right now? Well, this is an investment advice. First off, this is just my opinion. But I'm like in Chainlink, it's a good long-term fundamental project. Polkadot too, I think is going to be nice and big in the next big rally. A newer coin that's actually, I think it's on Kusama, it's called RMRK, just in the NFT field. So those are a few of the ones that I'm really looking at right now and IMX too. Yeah. The gaming and NFT sector is probably going to be a big pool as far as, especially when more non-crypto people start coming into crypto, those are going to be the sectors that they're more likely to come into. So I'm looking in that field. But yeah, Polkadot, Chainlink, RMRK, and IMX are some of the ones I'm looking at right now. Very good. Danila, I do want to do a quick screen share about Bitcoin and then we're going to pivot over Ethereum next. So Danila, if you wouldn't mind bringing up this tweet from CryptoBullet, these are some of the important levels that they notated with 16K, was the average deviation from the moving average 50 day is down negative 25%, 14K, 2019 echo bubble top, 12.2K is the Celsius liquidation level, which I now think is a little bit lower. And 10.7K is the key horizontal level. So these are kind of levels, I guess that CryptoBullet is monitoring and pull up this chart here. This appears to be the Bitcoin trading view chart here of him kind of mentioning how it's crossed that moving average there. So let's pivot into Ethereum next. We've talked about Bitcoin, but Ethereum's average gas fees have fallen down to $1.5. This is huge for those who have been operating on the Ethereum network for the past year or two. You've seen the gas fees, how ridiculous this has been. Is Ethereum heading down the right path here with lowering these gas fees and making sure that it's a little bit more scalable. Jordan, I'll kind of kick this over to you first, since you are the DeFi expert here in-house. I don't ever judge what Ethereum is doing during a bear market because nobody's using anything. I want to see what it's like when it's actually being, when everybody's over there going crazy over this NFT project or that, I guarantee you the gas price is not going to be $1.57. So I don't know, I haven't seen big announcements upgrading the Ethereum blockchain. It's more scalable now. So that factor is just a sign of not people not using the network right now. So I need to see what it's like when it's during a time of high use, what the gas prices are like to be like, yeah, Ethereum's starting to figure it out. Because again, not even the merge is going to solve the gas problem. So we'll see how that goes. So what I'm hearing is that you're saying that this is just lack of use right now. Was NFTs driving a huge component to those high gas fees earlier in the year? Yeah, NFTs, land sales, all these types of things were just like crypto kitties back in 2017. Anybody trying to use Ethereum, even back in the early 2021 when DeFi was really popular, it was expensive. So anything that causes a lot of people to start using Ethereum makes the Ethereum fees go up. So right now, the fact that they're low just tells me that nobody's using the network. Very good. Yashu, is Ethereum ever going to completely roll out all of their updates? Or are we going to spend the next decade hoping and wishing? Oh, my God. It's asked me a very difficult question. Whatever the answer, I'll be chased by trolls. I mean, come on, ask me a simple one. But yeah, I think I agree with Jordan there. Feces are just a reflection of if people are using the network or not. If there's a demand in network, so there's so many people want to use it and there's so little space for them. So of course, the fees increases because then the miners is the king. And right now, I don't think anybody is in a condition of using the network. People bought into NFTs in DeFi and we are looking at this implosion across the sector with so many companies going down due to liquidation issues. So DeFi is in trouble, in a way. NFTs, their sales have been plummeted as well. And most of the NFTs we know were actually launched upon Ethereum blockchains. So it just narrows down to the same place that nobody is using it. And as you asked something about the future, so at the risk of really attracting something, even if they switched to POS, we still have to see they do it right. We have already been looking in so many other projects like Solana and we are looking at so many other projects. But the good thing is that Ethereum already has this already like so many takers who want to stay with the network. So once they launch the POS, I cannot actually speculate on how well it will perform given that Ethereum will be competing with the emerging chains at the same time such as Cardano, which started with very great update recently with Wassilhar folk. And then we have our launch, the POS Solana. So I also have said that in the earlier analysis that it's a very co-joint space. And if Ethereum remains lower for people, they will just move out of it. So you really know comments on how they will do until I see what they do. Very same. I'm curious to hear your take though. When we go into this next bull run, is DeFi going to be just as explosive as the previous? Where do you think kind of DeFi is in its current state? And how resilient will it be in the next run? Well, I guess DeFi has served its purpose. If you get blown up in DeFi, don't expect anyone to come bail you out, right? Those are for the big banks. The big banks get bailed out. And DeFi, if you get wrecked, you're left holding the bag. I think there's something there with DeFi. I think that you're going to start to see more adoption in the next cycle. It might be a more crowded environment. I think you're definitely going to see more GameFi coming on board. You're probably going to see a lot more of the social tokens, decentralized social media. It might be a more crowded field. But I think that DeFi is here to stay. There's a lot of kinks in the system right now that need to be ironed out. And I think that's it's going to move in that direction for the next cycle. So that's that's what I'm expecting anyway. Very good. And the last topic that I want to dive into today is stablecoin. So we went from macro to Bitcoin to Ethereum. Now we're going to touch on these stablecoins. One of the big headlines from this week was circles USDC on track to topple Tether USDT as the top stablecoin here in 2022. We have seen Tether in just about every single market. We've seen how it goes hand in hand with things. But why is this potential for USDC to topple that Tether position such a big deal? I want to start this out with Sam and see what your thoughts are about this whole USDC potentially overtaking USDT here in 2022. Well, we've seen circle do a lot of good work in terms of working with regulators and we've seen adoption grow substantially. I think now USDC is the second largest stablecoin market cap, but it's growing rapidly. So it might not be long before USDC is number one. You also saw back a new Euro backed stablecoin. So it seems to have carried a lot of favor with more institutional investors or people who are really concerned with the regulatory side. USDC and circle have done a good job there. I just think it's growing. I think there's adoption there. I think that the yields that are promised aren't overly hyped up. So I think in terms of market perception, I think USDC is viewed as a safer bet. Then again, Tether has been the recipient of a lot of FUD. If you recall, Tether came into existence as a way to really help crypto traders access liquidity because it was very difficult to get a banking on ramp into crypto back in the day. So a company came in and started offering a stablecoin and it solved a lot of the problems. Not saying Tether is perfect, but I think it's been receiving a lot of FUD perhaps unnecessarily. So I think USDC is gaining traction and that could continue. I think stablecoins will play a pretty substantial role in crypto adoption moving forward and perhaps a better alternative to what I like to call slavecoin, which is the CBDC. Wow. So are CBDCs going to compete head to head with USDT or USDC in the future? Maybe not. For example, CBDCs have no threat on Bitcoin, for example. They don't necessarily have to threaten the stablecoins, but I think just the way the CBDC projects are rolling out, it seems like central banks are really pushing this as an extension of their power. I don't want to live in a world where CBDCs are undominant. I do not want to live in that world because basically all of us will have an account of the Fed, which means that they can cut off our access to money anytime we do something they don't like. So that's the real threat, I think, with CBDCs. There's a lot of issues there, but I think with stablecoins what you see is that a lot of people in developing countries are using them to bypass inflation and restrictions and things like that. So I think stablecoins do have a viable market and we've seen that. I think most normal people are not going to just jump into stablecoins. They haven't gotten into crypto so far. They're not going to just jump into something that the government is not pushing them towards. The government is going to push them towards CBDCs. The only difference right now is that it's not a setup established system, but a CBDC is going to basically be like the US dollar or the current fiat system. It's just definitely a little bit more controllable by them. So I think that the majority of people are unfortunately probably going to start off with CBDCs. Maybe that'll help bridge them into cryptos. That's what we all hope as crypto people. But most people just kind of go along with the legacy system. So I don't see that changing anytime soon. And as far as USDC and USDT, I think USDT has kind of been the black sheep of the family. It had a lot of controversy over the years from way back in 2017. We're like, virtue for different financial companies or which bank holds the reserves for this coin. So I think the USDC might be trying to pivot towards more legitimacy. It's an established company that's always worked within the framework of the US regulations. So I think even that's maybe just kind of help bring more legitimacy to the crypto ecosystem by saying having USDC be the top stablecoin versus USDT. In Yashu, is there anything from like a mechanical technical perspective that would really differentiate USDC versus USDT? Or has this just come down to personal preference and the amount of security that one may feel like they get behind each stablecoin? Well, the core tenet of both the project is the same to provide people an alternative to US dollar that can execute their trades faster. So that is the function and they are actually quite performing at well. The real problem is that we have already seen the collapse of some of the most so-called trustworthy firms in the sector. So all of these doubts that has been thrown at Tether right now, it's, yeah, it has started to hurt them. So which has resulted in such a massive decline in the reserves in the past two months ever since Tether collapsed. So there is a lot of distrust and I think Tether, yes, any kind of deep egg that has happened in the history, they have been able to come back out of it. They have been able to stabilize their coin. So in theory, they have not really told people that we cannot actually redeem your coins. There is no report like that. As far as I know, I've never seen anybody complaining that they actually neglected refunding your money. So I think they are doing what they can and recently I also read that their CTO announced that they will go through a big 12 you know, auditing round by a big 12 firm. And so everything will be far more clear after that. But it's just a promise for now. So when I talk about USDC, I think they were built upon the flaws of USDT, the so-called flaws of USDT. They tried to take care of all the issues that were prevalent in that company, all the doubts they try to focus on by getting regulated by FinCEN and 12 other regulators in US by releasing their audit reports. So they have been pretty much trying to make sure that they are clear of all the troubles, which is why we are looking at this, you know, so-called flipping event approaching recently. That does not actually kill Tether though. Tether still has, you know, has not like, you know, given any reason to be not trusted by because they are redeeming their coins. That's it. That's all I know, because that is why we are looking at this $1 peg even with this reserves going down. Fascinating. And you know how I know we're in a bear market is when we are arguing about USDC and USDT. Very good. Well, you guys heard it here from the experts in their thoughts about some of the biggest news in the space right now and what to be on the lookout for here in the weeks ahead. A couple big meetings, a couple of big reports coming out. So we're going to see what shakes out. I think things are going to be gloomy here for the next foreseeable future. So we'll see what happens. But go ahead and drop your Twitter handle in the chat. We're going to be giving away $50 to the CoinTelegraph swag shop at the end of the show. What we have next for you is a quick crypto tips. And we're going to tell you how about how to think long term in these markets. So, Danilo, let's go ahead and jump into our crypto tips for this week. All right. Many new traders want to make it big fast. Many create unrealistic expectations, hoping to be lucky enough to make millions in just a few months. It is possible not to make money fast from the market and having long term plan and that will help you continue to be positive. Long term trades have proven to be successful investing methodology. Elite tier investors like Warren Buffett prefer this method, but it requires in depth research and analysis. In addition, long term investments require a lot of patience at it as it is a buy and hold process. Many traders find it hard to stay put with their long term plans as they intend to close trade once the investment moves about 50% upward or downward making many miss out on big market opportunities. In 2021, Bitcoin had daily volatility of about 5% and increased from $13,373 all the way up to $61,000 between October 20th and October 2021. That was about a 460% increase within a year for a long term trader, but heaps cashed out at first sight of decent profit, missing out on later gains. Remember, we're not advising on when you should take profits or how to manage your funds. You are best positioned to make the decisions on your crypto investments and this does not constitute investment advice, financial advice, trading advice, or any sort of advice. Make sure you set your targets and are comfortable with this. There will always be the fear of missing out. You could have had bigger gains. You could have had less losses. Set your profit targets for what you feel to be comfortable and be in this for the long run. Those are our crypto tips for this week. Thank you, Danilo. All right. Now I want to take a second to check the chat. We have people chattering in there. Looks like we have Enigma VSN. Did you guys take profit off Bitcoin at the top? Let's answer this quick community question. I'll kick this to Jordan first. Did you take profits at the top of Bitcoin? I took some profits, not on Bitcoin, but some other cryptos, but I wish I would have taken more. Sam, did you take the profits at the top? I've sold no Bitcoin and it's going to take a lot for me to sell my Bitcoin. I took profits from altcoins into Bitcoin. Yes, I did. I'm not saying it was at the top, but it was on the way up and then later on the way down when the writing was apparently on the wall. If y'all show your profits at the top. Well, accidentally I did because I was just taking a trip. I just wanted to go to Egypt, enjoy some things and I needed some cash. So, accidentally I sold some bitcoins in December and it turned out to be, I was not calling for it, by the way. I was still going to hold that long term five year holding kind of a guy, but yeah, that was for the trip. I'm lucky I took that trip. Very good. I'm grateful that I decided to buy a house this year because it was right at the right time in that first peak early in April. Yeah, I caught that one. Yeah, that's what matters actually. You should only sell when you need the money. I mean, or just keep some, for the rain check, you should have some stable coins, of course, for that. But yeah, I was too bullish by November. Even then I was thinking that it won't go down. So yeah, it was very accidental for me. And having that long term view, I think always helps, especially during moments like this, when you can kind of zoom out and see, okay, maybe I'm positioning myself for the next run, but for those long term holders like Sam, sounds like it doesn't matter what day it is, he wants his Bitcoin and he wants to hold on to it. So I know we have some exciting stuff that we're going to be diving into with Yashu next. He's going to give us his in depth analysis about Bitcoin's inverse correlation with the US dollar, hitting a 17 month high. So let's go ahead and get into Yashu's expert segment for today. So now have a floor. So before actually beginning, I just want to say that Bitcoin and the US dollar should not actually have a direct correlation with each other. It is simply because the dollar derives its strength or weakness from the performance of its top rival assets, such as the Euro, Pound, Swiss Frank. So there is actually nothing that connects these two markets. So what we are seeing in the name of their inverse correlation, as I written in my article, is actually it's very purely psychological because right now Bitcoin is trading like a riskier asset while the dollar is offering what it offers the best during an economic crisis, which is called safety. So let me take a few steps back just to explain why, because traditional investors, you know, what we have looking in the past few centuries in the stock market that what they actually do is they distribute their portfolio in two parts. It's called a 60-40 portfolio strategy. So they keep 60% of their, I mean normally they keep 60% of their portfolio in stocks, which is a riskier asset and 40% in bonds, which is actually a safe haven. So, but if we look at the first half of 2022, the 60-40 strategy is bleeding millions of dollars out already. And the reason why, because if you look at S&P 500 stock index, which is the benchmark stock index, it's down over 40% year to date. And on the other hand, the yield on 10 year, which is also a benchmark yield, the 10 year US Treasury note is also like up 65% in this year. And there is actually a thing that when the yield rally, the bond rates fall. So we are looking at this big portfolio, 60-40 portfolio where stock is also falling and the bonds are also falling. So that is why they are bleeding millions of dollars. And if by any luck, if they are holding Bitcoin in the same portfolio, the same Bitcoin, which is down more than 60% in this year, so I can't even imagine the losses they are making. So imagine like that investor, what, what, where would you go in this market when your entire portfolio is red? Where do you find, you know, the next thing where you can actually put your money? So yes, you can, you have the option to long energy stocks because, you know, energy prices are higher. So they can go there, they can long agriculture commodities for the purpose of hedging, or simply they can just move back to the dollar because that is what a traditional safe haven looks like. It's a global reserve asset. So like I said, there is no direct correlation. It is just this riskier asset is when bond is, bond is also acting like a riskier asset. So you have no way to go but to the dollar. So which is why we are looking at this inverse correlation and very accidental inverse correlation between Bitcoin and the US dollar index. So moving forward, what I want to say that is because we have FOMC officials, you know, they are giving thumbs up to another 0.75% rate hike. And as I told you in the show, it's right now 1.5% to 1.75%. So what we are looking at is traders are now betting that by the end of this year, the rate will be 3.3%. So that's after a drop in inflation, it just is spending for May and a slide in US manufacturing activity in June. It means that the US growth is actually slowing down, which could have the Fed either pause or scale back its QT attitude, which is quantitative tightening attitude. So yeah, we have some months of pain ahead of us. And in that, in that moment, we can see that the dollar is already creating an overbought position and Bitcoin is in oversold position. So yes, we are looking at this inverse correlation to continue in the future, in which Bitcoin will bottom out and US dollar bit top out. And this is how this inverse correlation will last. But yeah, they are still not directly correlated to each other. That's all I guess. Jordan or Sam, do you have any questions for Yashu first? How high do you think the DXY can go? I mean, we just cracked 106 today, which is, you know, I thought that we may have peaked a little while ago at 105 and then it went back down. Do you have any insight how much longer this can go up? Sam, I think we'll have to go and do some technical analysis if you have, if I have a minute. So I'm going to share the screen. And I'm always, you know, late when I'm sharing the screen because that's who I am. Hang on. So yeah, here we are. You're looking at this dollar currency index. I'm just going to remove this detail, switch to a more apprehensive format here. Add some RSI just to see their levels. And yeah, just close it down. So you can see already on this weekly chart, we are actually creating a bearish divergence. You have this higher high, a very high actually on RSI. And there's where you have a top here. And then we make a lower RSI and another higher high in the prices. So you can see this divergence between the rising prices and falling RSI. That is actually an indication that the market is reading it wrong. So yes, we might spend some time in the zone 106, 1012. We can, yes, because the macro fundamental supported the Fed is going to increase interest rates. By the end of this year, it has to be 3.35 percent according to the dot plot. So yes, we can spend some time here, which means more, you know, bearish divergence here. And once it's done, once we have like completely exhausted our time in the RSI zone here, we will see a drop down where it will drop. I mean, that's the question. So I'm actually just going to zoom out this thing to one month. I mean, DXY was born before I was born. So, you know, I always amazed that it was, there was something before me. So this is what I'm actually anticipating. If it tops down in here, because we have seen this is the previous target here. If I simply switch it here just a moment, yeah. So we can simply see that the next range target is right now in year is 108. So I'm really anticipating that for this year, we might hang out around this point. There are some psychological supports here, which you know, so we might see a rally to 112 or 110. But this is where I think this DXY market can top out. So I'll just stop sharing. And so I mean real quick, Gashu. So like, what is it telling you why is that particular chart so important when you're kind of like analyzing assessing your next move in the markets? Because see, I mean, technical analysis is all about the things traders before me have done. It really shows us, you know, where they were the most active and where they were the least active. So we are just using on the psychological factors or for entering a position. But which is why I always try to combine the fundamental into it. The reason I'm saying it's going to go up is because we still have a hawkish fed around us. And they are looking to interest raise interest rate as we had discussed earlier. So it could it could lead to a stronger dollar down the road. As I discussed that the 60 40 portfolio is already suffering. And because of these rate hikes, the interest, I mean, the interest rates on this bond yields, they are also going to go up. So yes, there is no way to escape this scenario for now until, you know, Fed decides that yes, you can escape. Yes, I'm going to just tone down on all the free money I had taken. So I'm just going to tone it down. I'm going to give you some back. I'm going to make sure that there's enough liquidity in the market. That is when the dollar actually falls. Yeah, it seems to me like everybody's kind of flooding into the dollar because there's nowhere else that's safe. Like no asset has been going up except for oil went up for a while, but even that's kind of been going down lately. So like everybody's running to the dollar because it's the only choice seems like that's actually a good point, you know, that's actually a good changes on that on that side. Exactly, Jordan, because you know, in the index, we have like 53% you know, Euro, that's how it's done. It's like compared with 53% of the Euro. The Euro right now is going down because of all the trouble that your political issues taking place in the Eastern Europe and the inflation, the gas issues, you know, they are running into a very great inflation mode right now. So the confidence in their economy is pretty low and that is why Euro is underperforming against dollar for a very long time. So yes, that's actually a good point that this can also actually propagate, you know, this US rally further. Excellent insights. We appreciate you walking us through all that. You've got it, folks. The macro level, the insights, the detail, the TA, we got it for you. I see Nick Sals looks like he's a newcomer here to the Market Report. Welcome, Nick Sals. Glad to have you here in the comments. Vikram, tell him what's up, man. All right, next week, I got the Markets Pro segment here. We're going to give you two of the tokens you should have been watching this week based on some of our indicators on that platform. And don't forget, we're going to be giving away our $50 swag gift certificate at the end of the show for those that are dropping their Twitter handle in the chat. We will select that at the end of the show. But first, let's go ahead and get you the two tokens you should have been watching this week with our Markets Pro platform. All right, folks. Mina, that was the token you should have been watching this week trading under the ticker M-I-N-A. And this one was caught by our Newsquake alerts, which these are these automated alerts that instantly notify users of market moving events. What happened this week? Wobby Global recently announced that it would list Mina information that a Newsquake alert rapidly shared with Markets Pro subscribers. The news dropped when the token was trading at around 63 cents and less than 24 hours after that, the price shot up to 77 cents. That's a 21% increase. And one of the big things that we want to talk about here is this Newsquake alert. I see on the screen, it looks like we have the other token that we're going to be talking about today, which is CONV. This one hit on the Vortex score and Vortex score is a comparison between current market and social conditions of those in the past. A high Vortex sort of 80 or higher is considered confidently bullish. Conversely, Vortex sort of 30 or lower is historically bearish. Well, what happened this week? CONV, a multi-chain protocol utility token on the Ethereum and Moonbeam network. Massive price pump early in the week on June 26, a high Vortex score began to light up, rising from 94 to the rare, the unicorn folks, the rare 100 Vortex score. That's the strongest we've ever seen. This string of strong scores alerted Markets Pro subscribers of a potential trading opportunity based on past conditions. Sure enough, that price was at .000792 when scores began flashing and it soon skyrocketed. It's weekly high of about .002 cents. That's a 173% increase. If you have Markets Pro folks, you are going to get these alerts. You're going to be able to action these trades as quickly as possible and it will link you straight to the exchange so you can make that trade happen within an instant. Folks, that's the power of Markets Pro and that's why we want you to give it a go, give out Markets Pro a try. All right. Thank you, Danelle. That was going to wrap up our Markets Pro segment today and we're going to allow folks to stick their Twitter handle in the chat. We appreciate everyone tuning in around the globe today and we're going to select that one winner for that $50 gift card. But I want to hear closing thoughts today. I want to hear not financial advice, but give me life advice. Maybe we'll start with Jordan. Yeah. I always say, go out and enjoy life because crypto is going to suck for a while, man. Like the whole world economy is kind of going to shit. So to expect crypto to just blow off, it's not realistic right now. So make a game plan like Benton talked about earlier, have a long-term plan set, pick your bottom, pick your price, you're going to buy it, pick your price at the top, set those on an exchange and then go outside and enjoy the sun because it's going to be a rough couple of months, man. Like look for a bull market in 2023 or maybe 2024, right? I always love Jordan's insights. It's very simple yet you got to take it to heart. You got to get outside. There's a life outside of crypto. So Jordan always appreciate you bringing a little light into the situation. Not everything is about crypto. Sam, let's hear your closing thoughts, any insights, any advice you may have for those watching at home today? Well, if you decide to sell your bitcoin, you have to start asking yourself, then what? So you sell your bitcoin, your bitcoin is gone. Okay, now what? Like what's the game plan? Is the game plan to continue to accumulate the fiat death spiral? Are you going to take that fiat and convert it into any other asset? If you give up your bitcoin, now what? So I just wanted to kind of think about that. Everyone is so eager to maybe sell a pump that might come. And I expect there to be a pump made back to $30,000 at some point, but you unload that then what? The goal should be to accumulate as much as you can. Not financial advice is my opinion, but have that perspective. Don't be so eager to part with your bitcoin just because the bear market is affecting your mood. So keep that in mind. Excellent insights. Always maintain and manage the emotions during these times. Great insights from Sam. Yashu, any closing thoughts or life advice for us today here on the Marker Report? Well, if I say life advice, dude, guys, just watch Top Gun. It's one of the best movies I've ever seen. That's like I'm like blabbing about it all week. Yeah, if you haven't seen Top Gun, watch Top Gun. And as far as crypto is concerned, yes, make money, learn a skill, make more money. That's where you will be able to make sure that you have enough money to spend and not sell your bitcoins because, yes, you have to survive through this market. If you sell now, it's going to be a loss making trade, but in five years later, you will be looking back at your portfolio and, you know, just kicking yourself. Why did I not listen to maybe Sam's advice that too? Yeah, hold it for a while. And so this is very important that your liquidity needs should come handy. So yes, always be dependent on a skill to make money, not trades. Investment is a good advice, but do not just waste all your time 24-7 trading. It's not good. Very good, folks. We appreciate, yes, Jordan, you got something to add. In bear markets, the best way to make money in crypto is to work in crypto. She's working crypto, right? That's the only way you're going to make money in the bear market. And we're hiring here, folks. We're hiring at Cointelegraph. So yeah, make sure you check out our jobs. We're good advice from all of our panelists today. My advice for you is have that long-term vision. We are going to be in this for a while. So zoom out, enjoy your life. Crypto is not 100% everything. It could be a large part of it, but understand there's a life outside of crypto. Folks, I'm going to give you the winner for today, the crypto Twitter handle that I'm going to select today is going to be, looks like Ahmed Bawazir at BAWA underscore 77. You are our winner today. You get $50 to the Cointelegraph swag shop. Folks, this has been real. We appreciate everyone for tuning in from around the globe. Always special moments here on the market report. And until next week, we hope you're tuning in. Don't forget to like and subscribe. Cointelegraph on YouTube. We're here every Tuesday, 12 p.m. Eastern. Until next time, folks, over and out.