Thursday, Jan 26, 2023

Oil price trends, why bitcoin is so hard to value, network growth, and misleading claims of "green" blockchain use cases

“Science is what you know, philosophy is what you don't know” – Bertrand Russell ||

Hi everyone! You’re reading the premium daily Crypto is Macro Now email – thanks so much for being here. In these newsletters I focus on the growing overlap between the macro and crypto ecosystems as well as market drivers. I don’t go into protocols or specific applications, and I don’t consider the recent and ongoing shenanigans in certain market participants relevant to the big picture evolution. I prefer to look ahead. Nothing I say is investment advice, though! I hope you find this useful – if so, feel free to share with friends and colleagues.

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MARKETS

Eyes on oil

The recent drop in the oil price has given the global economy some more breathing room, not only in terms of the urgency of energy stocks for developed and developing economies, but also for the impact on headline inflation and, well, the cost of pretty much everything via downstream effects.

This breathing room is one of the main factors supporting the growing conviction that we will see a Fed pivot this year (in spite of official pronouncements to the contrary), helped by the not-as-bad-as-expected earnings for many companies given the lower input costs.

In other words, a lower oil price is very good news.

It’s not all rosy, however: