The information in this message does not represent any financial or investment advice. They're just random thoughts in my head.
gm
**MACRO** - So inflation came in at 3.1% and core at 4%, right on the screws vs expectations and marking the second month in a row of decline. IMO that's very solid, we saw a strong payrolls number while inflation continues to come lower and we're not too far from the Fed's target rate of 2%. We've been at sustained lower levels for a few months now which is a far cry to the levels last seen in 2022, when the market was in full panic. It's pretty astonishing as this time 1.5 years ago I don't think anyone believed the Fed's actions would be able to steer towards lower inflation without destroying the economy. The economy is actually very strong and it feels like they may have somewhat been bailed out by the efficiencies created by AI. It all comes down to the FOMC now tomorrow and it would be nice if we get something a bit more dovish from the Fed although I'm not holding my breath. They have no real incentive imo to push anything aggressively, but JPOW will want to eventually take credit for his policy this year and I do think it's in his interest to keep stocks propped up. My guess is we get what we got last time with regard to rate cuts being planned for some point next year but not much granularity.
**CRYPTO** - Reasonable rebound from yesterday's lows sees BTC almost back at 42K and ETH at 2220. It appears that altcoins are on the move again with SOL and AVAX leading the L1 charge up to $71 and $39....the latter breaching new YTD highs and plenty of focus now seemingly switching to that ecosystem. The other one to look out for is INJ (Injective) which is up about 50% on the week. People have been spending a lot of time on these chains airdrop farming and because airdrops are now finally actually worth something it's bringing in a lot of TVL. I think the next bull market will move in metas but at the moment this "meta" of alt L1s to ETH just keeps going and there probably is a lot more room to run which begs the question, is it even a meta? It's going to be an exciting end to the year I think.
**NFTs** - Kind of meh on the NFT front it appears that prices seem to be trending a little lower again and that could have been coupled with the risk-off sentiment we saw yesterday. After a long period of time of NFT prices moving inversely to ETH, it now appears we are in a paradigm where they are correlated and I think that's because there is a continued obsession by market participants to multiply their ETH. I don't believe there were any notable large sales last week away from the usual Punks turning hands. IMO, like stuff like SOL or AVAX, I think the NFT market has shown its hand and has shown that it can act as a levered play on ETH this cycle, just as it did at the beginning of the last cycle. Makes it tempting to load the boat into "good" assets but I think you need to focus on the stuff that's liquid.
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GL today!