Market Wrap: Higher Inflation Expected to Send Bitcoin and Gold Higher Into End of Year

Bitcoin hit an all-time high Wednesday before falling back.

AccessTimeIconNov 10, 2021 at 9:47 p.m. UTC
Updated May 11, 2023 at 6:28 p.m. UTC
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Bitcoin reached an all-time price high of about $68,950 on Wednesday after a report showed higher-than-expected inflation in October. The cryptocurrency eventually returned some gains as short-term overbought signals appeared on the charts.

Gold also rose to its highest level since June following the U.S. inflation report. The precious metal reversed its negative correlation with bitcoin on Wednesday as seen in the chart above.

“The knee-jerk reaction to the hottest inflation reading in 30 years triggered risk aversion which was accompanied with a strong dollar and weakness across the top cryptos,” Edward Moya, an analyst at Oanda, a foreign exchange brokerage firm.

“Wall Street is quickly realizing that inflation is not fading just yet and demand for inflation hedges will remain strong into the end of the year,” Moya wrote.

Latest Prices

  • Bitcoin (BTC): $65,916.17, -2.37%
  • Ether (ETH): $4,641.23, -3.04%
  • S&P 500: $4,464.71, -0.82%
  • Gold: $1,852.17, +1.23%
  • 10-year Treasury yield closed at 1.563%.

Get ready for stagflation

“Our view that there has been a profound paradigm shift in the global economy: The risk of inflation being durably above official targets is now a serious risk, and it is featuring prominently in corporate and household decisions once again,” Deutsche Bank strategists wrote in a research note on Wednesday.

In response to the inflation report, Deutsche Bank lowered its near-term economic growth forecasts and said it now expects a period of “stagflation” – a period of stagnant demand and high inflation.

“For markets, financial conditions remain incredibly accommodative by historic standards, and even as break-evens [market-based inflation expectations] have risen over the last couple of months,” Deutsche Bank wrote.

Bitcoin exchange outflows continue

The supply of bitcoin on exchanges continues to decline, which could indicate a preference among investors to hold BTC in wallets instead of making their coins available to trade on exchanges.

“As a result of continued exchange outflows, the aggregate BTC exchange balance has fallen to multiyear lows of 12.9% of circulating supply,” Glassnode, a crypto data firm, wrote in a blog post.

Exchange outflows continued during BTC’s price consolidation last week, which provided a bullish signal ahead of the fresh all-time high on Wednesday.

Bitcoin balance on exchanges (Glassnode)

Altcoin roundup

  • Tether to launch on Avalanche: Tether’s USDT will become available on the Avalanche blockchain to support the long-term growth and sustainability of the network, CoinDesk’s Helene Braun reported. This is the ninth blockchain that Tether has launched on, after previous integrations on Polkadot and Solana, among others. The world’s largest stablecoin by market capitalization will also begin trading on cryptocurrency exchange Bitfinex to provide investors with fast and low-cost access to the token.
  • Ethereum Name Service tokens soar after $500 million airdrop: Ethereum Name Service, a protocol that issues non-fungible tokens (NFTs) that can represent Ethereum addresses as well as web domains, launched an airdrop portal, which led to a surge in price for its decentralized autonomous organization, CoinDesk’s Andrew Thurman reported. Airdrops are a token distribution method that awards a portion of circulating tokens to Ethereum addresses that fulfill certain parameters, for example the purchase of an NFT.
  • Beeple’s ‘Human One’ sculpture and NFT sells for nearly $29 million: HUMAN ONE, a 3-D video sculpture by artist Beeple has sold for $28.9 million to a Switzerland-based online bidder, Barron’s reported. The sale also included an NFT. The video sculpture is a hybrid of physical and digital technology and shows a striding person in silver garb wearing what seems to be a space helmet. The final sale price was double the amount estimated for the art piece.

Relevant News

Other markets

Most digital assets in the CoinDesk 20 ended the day lower.

Notable winners as of 21:00 UTC (4:00 p.m. ET):

  • Algorand (ALGO): +4,28%
  • Chainlink (LINK): +3.14%
  • Litecoin (LTC): +2.06%
  • USD Coin (USDC): +0.01%

Notable losers:

  • The Graph (GRT): -11.71%
  • Cardano (ADA): -8.21%
  • Polkadot (DOT): -7.66%

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CoinDesk is an award-winning media outlet that covers the cryptocurrency industry. Its journalists abide by a strict set of editorial policies. In November 2023, CoinDesk was acquired by the Bullish group, owner of Bullish, a regulated, digital assets exchange. The Bullish group is majority-owned by Block.one; both companies have interests in a variety of blockchain and digital asset businesses and significant holdings of digital assets, including bitcoin. CoinDesk operates as an independent subsidiary with an editorial committee to protect journalistic independence. CoinDesk employees, including journalists, may receive options in the Bullish group as part of their compensation.

Damanick Dantes

Damanick was a crypto market analyst at CoinDesk where he wrote the daily Market Wrap and provided technical analysis. He is a Chartered Market Technician designation holder and member of the CMT Association. Damanick is also a portfolio strategist and does not invest in digital assets.

Helene Braun

Helene is a New York-based reporter covering Wall Street, the rise of the spot bitcoin ETFs and crypto exchanges. She is also the co-host of CoinDesk's Markets Daily show. Helene is a graduate of New York University's business and economic reporting program and has appeared on CBS News, YahooFinance and Nasdaq TradeTalks. She holds BTC and ETH.


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