Speaker 1: Hey, it's Alex with the Token Metrics Daily Pulse for
Speaker 1: April sixth, twenty twenty six. Iran ceasefire rumors just move
Speaker 1: bitcoin more than most FED meetings do. We've got that strategy,
Speaker 1: buying another three hundred and thirty million dollars worth of
Speaker 1: bitcoin after losing fourteen billion in Q one, a North
Speaker 1: Korea hack story that keeps getting worse, and the IMF
Speaker 1: deciding today was a good day to warn everyone about tokenization.
Speaker 1: Let's get into it, but first a quick word from
Speaker 1: our sponsor. Okay, So here's what's happening. So Bitcoin hit
Speaker 1: a weekly high today, sixty nine thousand, four hundred dollars,
Speaker 1: up about four percent. And the thing that moved it
Speaker 1: wasn't an ETF filing or a FED pivot. It was
Speaker 1: ceasefire talks between the US and Iran. Unconfirmed ceasefire talks.
Speaker 1: Oil dropped, Bitcoin popped. Ethereum actually outperformed on the day,
Speaker 1: up nearly six percent. And while all that was happening,
Speaker 1: strategy Michael Sailor's company quietly added another four thousand, eight
Speaker 1: hundred and seventy one bitcoin for three hundred thirty million
Speaker 1: dollars their total holdings are now approaching seven hundred sixty
Speaker 1: seven thousand bitcoin. That's a lot of bitcoin. Here's where
Speaker 1: everything landed today, Bitcoin around sixty nine thousand, Ethereum just
Speaker 1: above twenty one hundred Solana around eighty two dollars. Total
Speaker 1: crypto market cap sitting at about two point five trillion
Speaker 1: now the detail worth flagging Bitcoin dominance is at fifty
Speaker 1: six and a half percent, and Ethereum outperform Bitcoin today.
Speaker 1: That's a small divergence, but it's worth watching. When Ethereum
Speaker 1: leads on a risk on day, it usually means alts
Speaker 1: A waking up too, and sure enough, the narrative trackers
Speaker 1: back that up deepin that's decentralized physical infrastructure basically crypto
Speaker 1: powered real world networks up thirty four percent on the week,
Speaker 1: AI tokens up nearly twenty four percent, mean coins up
Speaker 1: almost twenty one percent. The speculative end of the market
Speaker 1: is catching the most heat right now. Real world assets
Speaker 1: and DeFi these centralized finance are grinding higher, but they're
Speaker 1: the slow lane compared to the MEME and AI rotation
Speaker 1: happening underneath, and prediction markets are telling an interesting story.
Speaker 1: Seventy eight and a half percent odds that Bitcoin closes
Speaker 1: today in the sixty eight to seventy thousand band. That's
Speaker 1: basically the market saying this rally is real, but don't
Speaker 1: expect fireworks before midnight. Meanwhile, only three percent odds Bitcoin
Speaker 1: sets a new all time high before June thirtieth, Bullish
Speaker 1: on the day, skeptical on the cycle. That's a tension
Speaker 1: that gets resolved fast when a catalyst shows up. All right,
Speaker 1: so what's actually driving all this? Let's start with the
Speaker 1: geopolitical piece, because it's the most fragile part of today's story.
Speaker 1: The Bitcoin rally to sixty nine thousand is built entirely
Speaker 1: on reports of US RAN ceasefire talks, not confirmed talks.
Speaker 1: Reports of talks, oil dropped, Bitcoin moved inversely higher, and
Speaker 1: that oil to bitcoin correlation is becoming a real pattern now.
Speaker 1: Macro traders, the big institutional money that moves markets, are
Speaker 1: treating Bitcoin as a geopolitical release valve, which means when
Speaker 1: the world feels slightly less on fire, money flows in fast.
Speaker 1: The problem is the foundation here. A rally built on
Speaker 1: diplomatic rumors has a very specific expiration date. If either
Speaker 1: side denies the talks within forty eight hours, that bit evaporates,
Speaker 1: watch sixty six thousand, five hundred as the level that
Speaker 1: matters if this unwinds now. Here's where it gets interesting
Speaker 1: with strategy. They just reported their bitcoin holdings lost fourteen
Speaker 1: point four billion dollars in value in Q one twenty
Speaker 1: twenty six. Then they bought more three hundred and thirty
Speaker 1: million dollars more, funded through something called STRC preferred stock.
Speaker 1: Think of it like a special class of shares they're
Speaker 1: selling to raise cash, which they then used to buy bitcoin.
Speaker 1: The takeaway is that this isn't just corporate conviction anymore.
Speaker 1: The leverage is structural now, meaning it's baked into how
Speaker 1: the company is financed, not just a one time decision.
Speaker 1: They're issuing financial instruments to buy an asset that just
Speaker 1: dropped fourteen billion in a quarter. That's either the most
Speaker 1: disciplined high conviction trade in corporate history or a company
Speaker 1: that's too far in to stop. Probably both. Okay, so
Speaker 1: the drift hack we covered this yesterday, but the full
Speaker 1: picture today is significantly worse. Two hundred and eighty million
Speaker 1: dollars drained by North Korean operatives and here's the part
Speaker 1: that should make every d five protocol team uncomfortable. This
Speaker 1: wasn't a smart contract exploit, which means there was no
Speaker 1: bug in the code to find and fix. North Korean
Speaker 1: actors allegedly spent six months inside Drift's orbit, building trust,
Speaker 1: mapping internal systems, getting close to the right people. Then
Speaker 1: they drained it in minutes. The attack surface wasn't the protocol,
Speaker 1: it was the humans around it, and Circle's response drew
Speaker 1: criticism for being too slow to freeze funds. Circle being
Speaker 1: the company that issues the USDC stable coin and technically
Speaker 1: has the ability to block stolen funds. That points to
Speaker 1: a gap that matters. Even when stable coin issuers have
Speaker 1: the ability to act, the coordination speed isn't there yet.
Speaker 1: There's no audit firm that checks for six months of
Speaker 1: social engineering, and that's the uncomfortable reality every protocol team
Speaker 1: needs to sit with. And then the IMF, the International
Speaker 1: Monetary Fund, basically the global financial systems referee, weighed in
Speaker 1: on tokenization today. Tokenization, if you're new to the term,
Speaker 1: is the process of putting real world assets like stocks
Speaker 1: or bonds, onto a blockchain. The IMF said the quiet
Speaker 1: part loud tokenization doesn't eliminate systemic risk. It just moves
Speaker 1: it onto faster rails. Here's what that actually means for you.
Speaker 1: Their specific concern is that if tokenized assets settle peer
Speaker 1: to peer without a central bank backstop, a liquidity crisis
Speaker 1: in one corner of the market could cascade at blockchain
Speaker 1: speed think two thousand and eight, but the contagion travels
Speaker 1: faster than any regulator can respond. The bottom line is this.
Speaker 1: The IMF warning isn't saying tokenization is dead. It's saying
Speaker 1: governments are going to attach conditions to it before they
Speaker 1: let it scale, things like requiring central bank oversight of settlement.
Speaker 1: And since the market for putting real world assets on
Speaker 1: chain is growing fast right now, with institutions filing products
Speaker 1: left and right, that regulatory framework is coming sooner than
Speaker 1: most people expect. If any G twenty central bank formally
Speaker 1: endorses that framework in the next week, expect it to
Speaker 1: reshape pending product filings immediately. One more thing on the
Speaker 1: supply picture for bitcoin, even with today's rally seventy thousand,
Speaker 1: is a real ceiling on chain data, which means tracking
Speaker 1: where coins actually moved and at what prices shows heavy
Speaker 1: supply concentration just above current prices. Coins that changed hands
Speaker 1: between seventy and seventy three thousand during the twenty twenty
Speaker 1: four to twenty twenty five period haven't been sold yet,
Speaker 1: which means those holders are sitting on losses and likely
Speaker 1: to sell the moment they break even. That overhead supply
Speaker 1: acts as a ceiling until volume or time clears it,
Speaker 1: and layered on top of that is CPI on April tenth.
Speaker 1: That's the inflation report, and a hot number would push
Speaker 1: back expectations for interest rate cuts, which puts pressure on
Speaker 1: risk assets like bitcoin. A market that just rallied on
Speaker 1: geopolitical relief doesn't have the fundamental momentum to absorb a
Speaker 1: supply wall and a hawkish inflation print at the same time.
Speaker 1: If bitcoin closes above seventy thousand, five hundred on strong
Speaker 1: volume before Thursday, the supply wall is being absorbed and
Speaker 1: this rally has legs. If it stalls below seventy thousand
Speaker 1: into the CPI print, sixty six five hundred is the
Speaker 1: next level to watch. All Right, before we get into
Speaker 1: the risks, quick word from our sponsor. Okay, we're back.
Speaker 1: Let's talk about what to watch for. So what should
Speaker 1: you actually be watching for on the risk side. First,
Speaker 1: the geopolitical rally has no confirmed foundation. One denial from
Speaker 1: either side of these Iran ceasefire talks and the bit evaporates.
Speaker 1: Sentiment driven moves on diplomatic rumors are the most fragile
Speaker 1: kind of rally. There is the same speed that brought
Speaker 1: the price up can take it right back down. Second,
Speaker 1: strategy's position is now a systemic variable in a way
Speaker 1: it wasn't before. Seven hundred and sixty seven thousand bitcoin
Speaker 1: funded through preferred stock issuance, which means they borrowed against
Speaker 1: the company to buy bitcoin. Means a sustained draw down
Speaker 1: below their average cost basis creates force selling pressure that
Speaker 1: didn't exist in previous cycles. They're not just a buyer
Speaker 1: any more. They're leveraged instrument correlated to bitcoin price, and
Speaker 1: that changes the risk math for everyone. Third, the drift
Speaker 1: hack changes the threat model for every DeFi protocol with
Speaker 1: a team, a discord, and a hiring pipeline. Six months
Speaker 1: of human infiltration drained two hundred and eighty million dollars.
Speaker 1: The takeaway is simple, you can't patch human trust. Every
Speaker 1: protocol that hasn't audited its internal access controls and social
Speaker 1: engineering exposure is sitting on the same attack surface right
Speaker 1: now looking ahead. Two things on my radar for the
Speaker 1: next week April tenth is CPI the inflation report. That's
Speaker 1: the one prediction. Markets are already pricing inflation scenarios, and
Speaker 1: a hot number kills the rate cut narrative, which means
Speaker 1: risk assets go back under pressure right as the geopolitical
Speaker 1: rally fades. The timing is not great if you're bullish,
Speaker 1: and watch for the drift post mortem. If it arrives
Speaker 1: within seven days and name specific operational security failures, it
Speaker 1: becomes the template for what every Salona protocol needs to
Speaker 1: audit immediately. If it's delayed or vague, assume the lawyers
Speaker 1: have taken over and the useful information won't surface for months.
Speaker 1: That's the daily polls for April sixth. If you got
Speaker 1: something out of today's episode, share it with a friend
Speaker 1: who's into crypto. Honestly, that's the best way to support
Speaker 1: what we're doing here. And if you want the full
Speaker 1: written breakdown with all the sources, the newsletter is at
Speaker 1: tokenmetrics dot com. As always, this is educational content, not
Speaker 1: investment advice. Crypto is high risk. Do your own research
Speaker 1: before making any financial decisions. I'm Alex, see you next time.