Plus: Someone threw the Satoshi statue in a lake

Welcome

GM. This market’s crisp like a green apple, and we’re taking the first bite. Satisfying af.

Time to dig into what’s inside this juicy bite:

🍍 US macro drama.

🇺🇸 Crypto regulation updates.

🍋 Satoshi Nakamoto statue went missing, guy lost $900K because of an old approval + more

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🍍 Market flavor today

Find out more about the Fear & Greed Index here.

Name		Price	24H	7D
Crypto Market Cap: $3.76T 1.76% (24H)
	Bitcoin BTC	$114,599.36	1.02%	-1.22%
	Ethereum ETH	$3,637.29	5.15%	-2.60%
	XRP XRP	$3.02	4.89%	-2.24%
	BNB BNB	$757.91	1.77%	-7.26%
	Solana SOL	$164.89	2.21%	-10.43%

Prices as of 11:00 AM EST. Click here to see live data.

Phew, okay, where do I start…

Last time we checked in on Wednesday, Bitcoin was at around $117K, Ethereum was at $3.7K, and the other top altcoins were higher as well...

And yeah, we skipped two days of the newsletter - but it's just a coincidence. We had nothing to do with the downturn.

So… wtf actually happened?

Well, traders went risk-off. And you can see it not only in crypto prices but in ETFs too:

👉 Bitcoin ETFs ended last week with $927.1M in outflows;

👉 Ethereum ETFs lost $152.3M on Friday alone.

Still... why?

The rate cut odds jumped 40% in two days. Here’s why

Stop looking at me like that - I SWEAR I didn't do anything.

Macro stuff is to blame here. Let’s walk through it 👇

1/ The Fed meeting

The Fed kept interest rates the same.

No surprise there - markets were already 98% sure this was gonna happen. So this wasn’t that big of an issue.

The real drama came afterward, when Fed Chair Jerome Powell spoke at the post-meeting press conference. Markets were hoping he’d sound more relaxed - maybe drop hints about rate cuts starting in September.

Well... he didn't.

Instead, he said the Fed is ready to cut rates if needed, but didn’t give any clear signs it would happen soon. His comments were a bit more cautious than people wanted.

That disappointed the market - and it showed.

Earlier last week, traders thought there was a 65% chance the Fed would cut rates in September. After Powell’s press conference, that dropped to 43%.

Jerome Powell's speech hurting portfolio

Source: @dogeofficialceo

Still, a lot can change before the next Fed meeting on September 17.

Specifically, the Fed's watching two things:

👉 Inflation;

👉 The job market.

If inflation cools down or the labor market weakens, a rate cut becomes more likely.

Which brings us to…

2/ June PCE data

The day after Powell’s speech, we got new Personal Consumption Expenditures (PCE) numbers.

PCE tracks how much Americans are spending on goods and services - and it’s the Fed’s fave way to measure inflation.

Here’s the logic: If people spend more → demand rises → businesses struggle to keep up → prices go up = inflation.

And… the latest numbers came in hotter than expected:

👉 June PCE inflation: 2.6% (vs. 2.5% expected);

👉 Core PCE inflation: 2.8% (vs. 2.7% expected).

That’s two months in a row of inflation rising.

So yeah, not ideal if you’re hoping for rate cuts.

Mike Wazowski bruh meme

But then, something else happened.

3/ July jobs report

On Friday, we got the July jobs report, which revealed that the US added only 73K new jobs.

That’s much lower than the expected 106K.

But that wasn't the part that had everyone shook - it was the fact that the May and June numbers were heavily revised. Like, really heavily:

👉 May: from ~144K jobs down to just 19K;

👉 June: from ~147K to only 14K.

That’s a total of 258K jobs erased from the record. That’s a huge downward correction - and it’s a sign the job market is slowing down.

And that changed market sentiment almost instantly - traders are now pricing in an 83.7% chance of a rate cut in September.

Target rate probabilities chart 08-04

Source: CME FedWatch

Because, like we said, the Fed needs one of two things to justify cutting rates:

❌ Lower inflation (which we’re not seeing yet), or

✅ A softer job market (which just showed up).

If hiring continues to slow, the Fed may have no choice but to cut rates - even if inflation stays elevated.

So, the next jobs report will be critical.

We'll have to wait and see.

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🏇 Train. Race. Win. Repeat

07-25 Mission image: Owners Club

Did you wake up this morning thinking, "Man, I need a digital horse"?

... No?

Well, you're about to.

The new BitDegree Mission introduces you to Owners Club - a racing game where you train, race, and level up AI-powered NFT horses to compete for real rewards.

It's the first game from the Invincible GG universe - aka the new home of competitive, skill-based, play-to-earn gaming.

Finish the Mission by August 24, learn a thing or two, and chase a prize pool juicier than a watermelon:

🎁 2,500 Bits;

🎁 100 USDC;

🎁 20 NFT bundles each worth up to $600.

Saddle up, coach. These horses aren't gonna train themselves 🐎

Start Mission

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🥝 Memecoin harvest

These tokens went from zero to "pls stop" in a day 😬

Data as of 07:25 AM EST.

Check out these memecoins and plenty more here.

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⚖️ Crypto regulation updates

Today’s market update gave you a headache?

Sorry, I know, it's a mess. So, let’s look at something a little more wholesome: regulation.

(Yeah, these two words feel like they don't belong in the same sentence. But hear me out.)

Here’s what’s new in US crypto policy - and it’s actually quite exciting:

1/ The White House Crypto Report dropped

People were hoping it would confirm a US Bitcoin Reserve.

Spoiler: it didn’t. (At least not yet.)

Instead, we got a 160+ page roadmap showing us how the US wants to lead in crypto - which is also important.

Here’s what the report promises in a nutshell:

👉 Clearer rules for crypto companies and DeFi builders;

👉 Support for stablecoins - but no CBDC;

👉 Custom tax rules just for crypto.

The White House's tweet about the Digital Assets Report

Source: @WhiteHouse

And that’s only half the story.

2/ SEC Chair Paul Atkins announced "Project Crypto"

If you’ve been in crypto for a little while, you know the SEC hasn’t exactly been our bestie.

But this? This is a full factory reset.

Project Crypto is the SEC’s plan to modernize outdated securities laws and bring crypto into the US financial system.

What’s actually changing? Here’s the short version:

The SEC will clarify what counts as a security, commodity, stablecoin, or collectible;
Token launches like ICOs and airdrops could legally happen in the US again;
You can hold your own crypto, and companies can build all-in-one platforms without needing 50 licenses;
DeFi devs will be protected and decentralized systems won't need middlemen;
Startups might get an “innovation exemption” to launch faster while still protecting users.

Paul Atkins tweet about Project Crypto

Source: @SECPaulSAtkins

This whole thing feels a bit like an ex pulling up with "Sorry, I was kind of horrible before… wanna start over?" 💌

But unlike your ex, the US is actually doing something to change their old ways.

And that's... something.

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🍋 News drops you can't miss

😬 Someone lost over $900K from their crypto wallet because of an old token approval they didn’t even remember signing. They probably gave access by clicking on a sketchy site or fake airdrop, and that let the scammer drain the wallet later.

🗽 A statue of Satoshi Nakamoto went missing from a park in Lugano, Switzerland. Turns out someone threw it into a nearby lake, but the city authorities managed to fish it back out.

🚓 Indian authorities have arrested a CoinDCX employee. The guy, Rahul Agarwal, is a software engineer whose login info was apparently compromised - and that’s what let hackers steal around $44M in crypto.

⚖️ Nathaniel Chastain, a former product manager at OpenSea, had his conviction overturned by a US Appeals Court. He was originally found guilty of using insider info to buy NFTs before they went live on the site.

🔍 Arkham Intelligence uncovered a huge Bitcoin theft that had gone unnoticed for years. On December 28, 2020, a Chinese mining group called LuBian lost 127,426 BTC in a hack that was never publicly revealed.

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