Speaker 1: Hey, it's Alex with the Token Metrics Daily Pulse for
Speaker 1: April sixteenth, twenty twenty six. Bitcoins sitting at seventy four
Speaker 1: thousand dollars and the shorts are absolutely piling in. Got
Speaker 1: a lot to unpack today, but first a quick word
Speaker 1: from our sponsor. Okay, So here's what's happening. Bitcoin funding
Speaker 1: rates just hit their most negative reading since twenty twenty three.
Speaker 1: If you're not familiar with funding rates, they're basically the
Speaker 1: fee that flows between longs and shorts in perpetual futures markets.
Speaker 1: When rates go deeply negative like this, it means shorts
Speaker 1: are paying longs to hold their positions. That's not conviction,
Speaker 1: that's crowding. And here's the thing. The last two times
Speaker 1: funding got this negative Bitcoin was within days of a
Speaker 1: local bottom, when everyone who wants to be short already
Speaker 1: is there's nobody left to sell the squeeze rights itself. Now,
Speaker 1: I want to be careful. Macro headwinds are real, and
Speaker 1: a crowded short can stay crowded longer than your margin
Speaker 1: account survives. But the setup gets your attention. Price is
Speaker 1: sitting just under seventy four thousand, basically flat on the
Speaker 1: day The shorts haven't been rewarded yet, they're paying to wait.
Speaker 1: So where does that leave the broader market? Pretty quiet? Honestly,
Speaker 1: Ethereum just above twenty three hundred, basically unchanged. Solana is
Speaker 1: the one name worth mentioning up about two percent, leading
Speaker 1: the majors total market cap around two point six trillion, flat.
Speaker 1: Bitcoin dominance at fifty seven percent, also flat. The more
Speaker 1: interesting picture is in the narrative data meme tokens up
Speaker 1: seventeen percent over the last seven days, gaming tokens up
Speaker 1: ten percent, AI tokens down four percent. That's a real
Speaker 1: rotation capital moving out of last cycle's hottest narrative into
Speaker 1: pure sentiment plays. Prediction markets are pricing out the optimistic
Speaker 1: scenarios two two percent odds on bitcoin hitting five hundred
Speaker 1: thousand by year end, just eight and a half percent
Speaker 1: on three FED rate cuts this year. The money is
Speaker 1: betting on more sideways grind. Let's start with the supply
Speaker 1: wall right in front of bitcoin. Exchange inflows are spiking
Speaker 1: as price approaches. Seventy six thousand short term holders are
Speaker 1: queuing at the exit. These are people who bought between
Speaker 1: seventy five and eighty two thousand during the last run
Speaker 1: and have been underwater. Since. The question isn't whether that
Speaker 1: wall exists. It does. The question is whether demand is
Speaker 1: strong enough to eat through it. If Bitcoin closes above
Speaker 1: seventy six thousand on solid volume in the next forty
Speaker 1: eight hours, that supply got absorbed. If it gets rejected twice,
Speaker 1: a retest of the low seventies becomes the more likely
Speaker 1: near term scenario. Next Drift protocol. Drift got hit by
Speaker 1: a major exploit, and instead of dying quietly, it raised
Speaker 1: one hundred and forty eight million dollars from Tether and
Speaker 1: partners then switched it to its entire stable coin infrastructure
Speaker 1: from Circles USDC to Tether's Tether. That's not a recovery,
Speaker 1: that's a pivot. Tether becoming the primary liquidity provider for
Speaker 1: a major Salona purpse exchange is a meaningful shift in
Speaker 1: how DeFi is structured. Circle loses a flagship integration, Tether
Speaker 1: deepens its on chain presence, Watch drifts open interest and
Speaker 1: user counts over the next week. If they were covered
Speaker 1: at pre exploit levels, the bet paid off. If not,
Speaker 1: the exploit did reputational damage. The capital alone can't fix Now.
Speaker 1: Bitcoin quantum vulnerability. Developers are proposing BIP three six y one,
Speaker 1: a plan to freeze wallets that are vulnerable to quantum
Speaker 1: computing attacks. A meaningful chunk of early bitcoin, including coins
Speaker 1: that almost certainly belong to soadosh sits in wallets using
Speaker 1: older cryptography that a powerful enough quantum computer could crack.
Speaker 1: BIP three six' one would freeze those wallets before that
Speaker 1: becomes a. Problem the counter argument From bitmex's research team
Speaker 1: is that a freeze could be, weaponized locking out legitimate
Speaker 1: owners who simply haven't. Upgraded no clean, answer but serious
Speaker 1: developers debating this publicly means quantum risk has graduated from
Speaker 1: thought experiment to active protocol. Concern two quick regulatory, notes
Speaker 1: the UK's fca opened a consultation on crypto. Rules actual
Speaker 1: rules are probably twelve to eighteen months. Away South korea
Speaker 1: is moving. FASTER a live government pilot of tokenized deposits
Speaker 1: for public spending planned FOR q. Four that's not a white,
Speaker 1: paper that's a treasury department putting real money on chain
Speaker 1: and seeing what. Breaks europe, Talks asia runs pilots quick.
Speaker 1: Hits france is doubling security at crypto conferences after a
Speaker 1: wave of physical attacks on. Executives trump Backed World Liberty
Speaker 1: financial is proposing a vesting schedule to calm frustrated token,
Speaker 1: holders And ohio's casino regulator just Find calshie five million.
Speaker 1: Dollars winning the federal battle with THE cftc doesn't mean
Speaker 1: the states are done, fighting all, Right before we get
Speaker 1: into the, risks quick word from our. Sponsor, okay we're.
Speaker 1: Back let's talk about what to watch. For three risks worth. Maiming,
Speaker 1: first the supply wall at seventy six, thousand a large
Speaker 1: cohort of holders bought between seventy five and eighty two,
Speaker 1: thousand and if demand can't absorb that selling, pressure the
Speaker 1: rejection could be. Sharp, Second tether's EXPANDING d five foot.
Speaker 1: Print drift's pivot is one data, point but If tether
Speaker 1: ever faces a redemption stress, event the contagion path THROUGH
Speaker 1: DeFi is now significantly wider than it was a year. Ago,
Speaker 1: third memes up seventeen percent in seven, days WHILE ai
Speaker 1: tokens bleed four. Percent sentiment driven rallies reverse faster than they.
Speaker 1: Build If bitcoin stalls at seventy six, thousand while memes
Speaker 1: are still, running the most speculative assets get hit first
Speaker 1: when sentiment. Turns three things to watch over the next. Week,
Speaker 1: first how bitcoin handles seventy six thousand that test is
Speaker 1: probably coming in the next forty eight to seventy two,
Speaker 1: hours and how price responds sets the directional tone for everything. Else,
Speaker 1: Second South korea's blockchain deposit token pilot procurement and technical
Speaker 1: specs expected in the coming weeks ahead of THE q four.
Speaker 1: LAUNCH a sovereign government putting tokenized deposits into live spending
Speaker 1: is a bigger real world adoption signal than MOST DeFi
Speaker 1: protocols will ever. Produce, THIRD bip three six point. One
Speaker 1: if major bitcoin core contributors engage seriously within the next seven,
Speaker 1: days the quantum vulnerability debate moves from social media to
Speaker 1: the actual protocol. Roadmap that's the pulse For april. Sixteenth
Speaker 1: if you want the full written breakdown with all this so,
Speaker 1: data subscribe to the newsletter at tokenmetrics dot com link
Speaker 1: in the show, notes and if this was, useful share
Speaker 1: with someone who's watching the same charts you. Are this
Speaker 1: is educational, content non investment. Advice always do your own.
Speaker 1: Research I'm, Alex see you next. Time