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Deadfellaz did close to $100 million in trading volume back in 2022, and recently, there’s been a noticeable resurgence in buying activity around the project. After speaking to Betty, it’s easy to see why.

One of the biggest signals in NFTs is holder behaviour.

Deadfellaz has 61.4% unique holders.

77.24% of those holders own just one NFT, which makes that single asset psychologically harder to sell.

89.01% of the collection hasn’t moved wallets in the last year, and in some cases, probably since mint.

That level of conviction is absurd.

I don’t own a Deadfellaz NFT, but I’ve been seriously impressed watching Betty and Psych build through one of the nastiest bear markets this space has ever seen.

That’s the beauty of this cycle: we finally have visibility into who actually kept building when nobody was watching.

Do your own research, and make sure you watch the show above. This looks like a really strong project. Check out the collection here: Deadfellaz

Cheers, Jayden.

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The top 100 NFT collections by market cap are all up by huge percentages, which is something we discuss on the live today.

A heck of a conversation between me, Simon and Burge.

If you want to be closer to the community, the Carrot Lane Founding group is where it happens. That’s where the deeper conversations are, and actual friendships are being formed.

Founding members get:

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I’m noticing a theme.

Whether through DMs, livestream comments, or folks I speak to on calls, is that many are becoming pot-committed to micro-cap tokens, we’re talking assets with market caps under $500 million.

Me being sceptical is an undertatement.

The monumental landmine everyone will tread on is that there are too many tokens in that echelon of assets. Even if the token has a high memetic ceiling, the team is profound, or you genuinely like the technology, it still requires attention flows for it to drive buying pressure.

It’s the simplest and most underestimated explanation for what drives the price.

Price increases become a self-sustaining marketing tool because it drives more eyeballs to the asset, which in turn creates the next wave of buyers. That’s how these network adoption models can have parabolic price rises. Right now there’s too much diluted attention in these tokens and too many assets competing for the same capital.

Most people are better suited to sticking to one of the five battle-tested assets that are either Bitcoin or indexed against BTC, while simultaneously not letting NFTs become a blind spot. So playing on either end of the barbell in obvious coins and then culturally significant NFTs.

I believe NFTs are the Crypto opportunity everyone is overlooking.

We can now clearly see that the top 100 NFT projects by market cap are all up in percentage terms, while Ethereum, the underlying currency used to buy these assets, and Solana and Bitcoin have traded sideways. That’s significant because when Ethereum rises, the NFT becomes a leveraged bet on ETH, and you get this multiplier effect, which is why it tends to outperform.

In other words if you buy an NFT for 1 ETH and the buy-and-sell demand pushes it to 10 ETH, that’s already a great return. But if Ethereum itself also moves from today’s price of $2,300 to $10,000, that same NFT has effectively gone from $2,300 to $100,000.

That’s the magical multiplier effect. And in the right NFT asset, it’s a swing most people should at least consider taking.

In a world where everything digital is basically infinite, including coins, NFTs solve one very important problem: scarcity.

The beauty of the asset is its built-in supply friction: the psychology of the holder is that, as the price rises, they become less willing to sell, which means it trades hands less often.

Most holders tend to buy one from each collection and sit on it. Because the first use case is art, and humans socially signal through art, people organise around these assets. They meet online and in real life. It makes the experience of holding the asset much more immersive than coins, which then makes that one token much harder to sell because, in many cases, selling it feels like stepping away from your friendship group.

As Punk6529 says, the nature of the token shapes the holders, who in turn shape the nature of the token:

The single most important test, is can I imagine myself saying (or the token hodlers saying): "I have no intention of selling this token, I plan to give it to my grandchildren when I die and I hope they don't sell it either"

Selling an NFT feels like amputating part of your identity.

And right now, the behaviour pattern we are seeing in these NFT assets is that they operate much like coins, in the sense that they are network adoption models. It’s now a race to the top for the strongest networks, and all that really needs to happen is for these online communities to survive and develop a Lindy effect. If they survive a downtrend, they become increasingly difficult to displace because each new cycle increases the likelihood that these non-perishable assets will remain with holders rather than be sold.

Art has been upstream of wealth for hundreds of years. But the NFT technology itself operates more like a QR code on steroids, where the issuer can add anything of value to the contract layer in perpetuity. That makes the asset much more dynamic than most people realise.

It truly is an everything token.

What we’ve seen over the last 30 days is that CryptoPunks, which acts as an index for the NFT market in a similar way that Bitcoin does for altcoins, has been moving higher, and that’s starting to have a knock-on effect across other blue-chip collections.

Blue-chip trading volume.

Something’s starting to shift under the surface.

Trading volume on blue-chip NFTs is up substantially. It’s picking up in a way that’s hard to ignore and the market is still nowhere near all-time highs.

What NFTs are showing right now is that this is becoming a race to the top for the strongest communities.

You can already see the early signs in the data, with a clear uptick in trading volume, something a lot of notable commentators have started pointing out on the timeline.

Lewis:

BAYC: 11.26 ETH
Pudgy Penguins: 5.59 ETH
MAYC: 1.89 ETH

All green.

This isn’t one collection pumping.
It’s the entire blue-chip tier moving together.

When correlations tighten on the way up,
it’s usually macro rotation not project specific news.

Capital is rotating back into NFTs.
The floor doesn’t lie.

Blockcast news posted:

“NFT Market Cap Tops $2 Billion for First Time Since January

CoinGecko data shows the total NFT market value at around $1.95 billion in early May 2026, with daily sales over $2.5 million amid a broader crypto bear market.

Blue-chip collections are driving the rally, sparking chatter about undervalued gems that hit $15 billion at their 2022 peak.

Enthusiasts like CryptoKaleo predict big growth in a bull market, while communities share nostalgia for OG projects, blending hype with long-term belief in art and culture.”

Let’s ground this data.

When you zoom out, the chart below shows where we are in all-time blue-chip NFT trading volume. The NFT market cap is now $1.9 billion, which is up over $700 million in the last 30 days alone, but it’s barely a speck on a chart compared to where we were in 2021.

To put that into perspective, the entire crypto market cap is roughly $2.6 trillion, with NFTs accounting for just $1.9 billion, or 0.07% of the total.

That’s minuscule.

To borrow Punk6529’s expected value framework, there is a 50% chance that NFTs double and account for 1.4% of the total crypto market cap, and a 50% chance they go to zero.

So you stay delta neutral: 50% × 0.14% + 50% × 0% = 0.07%. That’s roughly where we are today.

I like this probability framework for anchoring decision-making because it gets you closer to thinking in outcomes, not certainties, while also factoring in that crypto itself is expected to grow as a share of the total investable asset market.

If you take the total investable market at around $200 trillion, and crypto today sits at $2.6 trillion, that’s roughly 1.3%. Using the same framework, there’s a 50% chance that doubles to 2.6%, and a 50% chance it goes to zero.

Personally, I think the chances of NFTs doubling their share of the crypto market from here are significantly higher than the chances of them going to zero, which makes the expected value positive.

And that’s before factoring in that crypto adoption itself is likely to increase over the same period, meaning the total crypto market cap, currently at $2.6 trillion, could realistically grow to $10–15 trillion this cycle. And if the expected value is positive, it makes sense to have some exposure to the best-performing NFT assets, given their finite supply and the multiplier effect of Ethereum rising.

But the real fuel may come from trading card games and this hybrid model of phygital collectables, where companies like Courtyard.io are spending $80 million a month on PSA-graded cards, which are largely sold as digital receipts (NFTs).

With the world becoming increasingly digitised, the odds of higher prices continue to increase, particularly when you’re buying historically and culturally significant art, where there is always a reason for people to return to it.

Right now, we just need time to do the heavy lifting.

Over time, holders become increasingly unlikely to sell, while new demand is likely to keep coming in.

If we reach the volumes we did in 2021, we’ll have some crazy moments.

The data is quietly disagreeing with the crowd.

One of the truisms of the crypto space, especially when we’ve seen ludicrous assets like memecoins based on obscure ideas run into the billions in market cap, is this:

If you’re having an allergic reaction to something, someone on the other side of that trade is having a positive one.

And the only thing you need to do, if you want to be successful in this space, is find out why.

Like an old cricket coach used to say to me when I was underperforming as a batter and trying to cover it up by pointing the finger elsewhere: “Jay, there’s no hiding place for data.”

And it’s true of NFTs right now.

I read so many comments from people in denial, or saying things like “NFTs are dead, bro.”

But the data says otherwise.

I’ve crammed as many as I could below into one chart, but all of the top 100 NFTs by market cap are up by multiples.

Final Thoughts

Ever hear those stories of people who got into assets early, like the early Bitcoin or Amazon crowd, and you sit there wondering how they saw it so early?

That’s where we are with NFTs.

I think it’s the second bite of the apple, where most people are still carrying that early PTSD from missing Bitcoin and defaulting to denial.

Most people still think NFTs are a bit faddy, when in reality they’re one of the only things in crypto that make real sense as a use case, because they’re effectively an everything token.

So now is the time to lean in or at the very least get educated.

You might be sitting there as someone who already holds crypto but is still very new to NFTs, so as a thank you for reading this far, I’m going to make some suggestions on assets to look at, and I’ll link the projects below.

All are risk adjusted entries into the space. But I will say this: you need some kind of moat around your assets, and it all hinges on sustained attention.

There are three catergories I lean towards.

First, historically significant art, where you only need time to do the heavy lifting because there’s always a reason for folks to come back to them. You can’t go back an recreate that first or early moment. Most people don’t realise there is an entire antiquities market in NFTs.

Second, culturally significant art that captures a moment or movement, like top artists XCOPY and Beeple.

And third, IP plays.

These are much harder to get right because they depend heavily on the founder’s ability to drive demand, and you also need confidence that they have an altruistic view of business and will see the project through. It’s akin to investing in a start-up.

The most obvious thing people miss about NFTs, aside from their first use case being art, is that we’ve all grown up on the internet, and NFT art captures internet culture, which means there will always be demand.

The only cost of entry is an open mind.

Do your own research. But I recommend these as a soft entry into the space.

XCOPY

Beeple

Curio Cards

Veefriends Series Two

World of Woman

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NFT prices are pumping. The top 100 collections by market cap are all up by huge percentages, which is something we discuss on the call.

A heck of a conversation between me, Simon and Burge, with great questions from the audience.

If you want to be closer to the community, the Carrot Lane Founding group is where it happens. That’s where the deeper conversations are, and actual friendships are being formed.

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Thank you , , , and many others for tuning into my live video! Join me for my next live video in the app.

An uncomfrotable amount of Carrot Lane subscribers played the four-year cycle.

They made the call to sell in December, which at the time felt like a smort decision, and after the Ten Ten crash, which registered as the largest liquidation event in Crypto history, who could blame them?

Then, when Donald Trump started bombing Iran, it only reinforced that feeling that getting out was the right move.

The issue is what happens after that.

Selling at a profit, if there is any, triggers a tax event, and that immediately becomes your hurdle rate. So, unless you’re never planning to invest in crypto again, you’re already starting from behind the start line. Then, when crypto drops like a broken elevator, and that stomach-churning fear kicks in, most people don’t buy back in with the same size because they’re too scared to lose it.

It ultimately leaves you with less exposure to the very assets that tend to outperform in an uptrend.

So the TDLR is that it’s mostly brain-dead and pointless unless you need the money for real life. If that’s the case, do what you’ve got to do, but don’t get confused into thinking it's an effective trading strategy.

The volatility is a function of how these assets work, and if you can add during a downtrend, it gives you the compounding on the back end. Caveated with, you need to be in the right assets.

So you either add into the pain or do nothing. Controversial opinion, but it’s highly unlikely that you’ll successfully trade around the asset.

A lot of you are in your first cycle and have stepped into a number of the assets I’ve spoken about and covered in detail, and whether it’s SUI, NFTs, PNKSTR, SOL, XRP, Bitcoin or Ethereum, there’s enough evidence there to suggest they outperform when financial conditions improve.

So it’s not about blaming the assets for underperforming, but zooming out to understand when financial conditions are improving.

The ISM Manufacturing Index is one way to look at that, as it’s essentially a monthly sentiment survey sent to 4,000 people working in supply chain management, asking about new orders, employment, inventories, and exports, which provides a forward-looking view of where the economy is heading.

It’s as sharp as a surgeon’s scalpel.

The problem right now is that oil prices have increased by more than 50% over the last six months, and the threat of war is keeping many people on the sidelines. It’s a giant red herring. Historically, periods like this are often when people should be gradually adding to their highest-conviction positions.

Sticking to the sweet spot of battle-tested assets and not drifting too far out on the risk curve into obscure ecosystems.

The ISM oscillates like a heart rate monitor, as shown in the chart below. It moves between contraction and expansion approximately every four years, which is a direct result or influence of the 3 to 5-year debt refinancing cycle. It gives you the clearest read on where the economy is heading, rather than relying on lagging indicators.

At its core, it’s a measure of productivity, which feeds into corporate profits and ultimately has a knock-on effect on stock market prices.

A reading above 50 and trending upward typically suggests we’re moving into a bull market environment, while a reading below 50 and trending downward points toward a bear market, and right now the forward-looking projections are starting to turn positive with three consecutive months above 50, which is usually an early signal that conditions are improving even if sentiment hasn’t caught up yet.

Crypto’s silver bullet.

Folks are still clinging to the four-year cycle, as if Satoshi Nakamoto had hardwired a neat little seasonal pattern into the code for everyone to trade off.

It’s not how this works. The four-year cycle is really just a byproduct of the debt refinancing cycle.

As Michael Howell, the maestro on liquidity, says, markets are now liquidity machines that facilitate debt refinancing.

“Modern economies run on debt, not real investment. And, financial markets are now just liquidity machines that facilitate debt refinancing, where asset prices (P) depend on:

• Global Liquidity (L), not fundamentals, and

• Risk positioning (P/L), such as duration targeting, passive investment strategies, not valuations

Hence, in our macro-framework:

P= L x P/L

However, finance is fragile. Investors now play a survival game, where Central Bankers and risk managers, not traders, increasingly call the shots. Winning requires tracking liquidity, not earnings. Crises happen when cash flows dry up, not when assets are overpriced. Central banks must keep the system running by backstopping liquidity provision.”

What he’s saying is that the economy runs on borrowed money.

Governments, companies, and banks are constantly borrowing and refinancing debt to keep things moving.

That means markets are less about “is this a great company making loads of money?” and more about “is there enough money flowing around the system?”

Translation:

• Liquidity = how much money is available to invest
• Positioning = how willing people are to take a risk with that money

Most folks missed this part.

In 2021, the Fed extended debt maturities by a year, pushing the timeline out, and now you’ve got roughly $9 trillion in debt that needs to be rolled over this year, meaning a huge amount of capital is about to flow back through the system.

Then you’ve got what Kevin Warsh has been saying, which adds another layer to this. He’s expected to be next in line for Fed Chair, and he’s already suggested rates should have been cut sooner, implying the current Federal Reserve is behind the curve.

His view is that they’re missing what’s happening in real time, especially how AI is improving business conditions, and if productivity is rising off the back of that, inflation becomes less of an issue, which gives the Fed more room to keep rates lower than people expect.

Kevin Warsh:

“I don’t think the data will show these productivity gains for many years after the anecdotes reveal them.

What’s that Bezos quote? “At moments of huge consequence, at turning points, if you have a set of data telling you one thing and a set of anecdotes telling you the other, listen to the anecdotes.” One hundred percent. I think Jeff is exactly right.

The anecdotes have already started to turn.

The difficulty for policymakers, whether that’s central bankers or fiscal authorities, is that the economy is going to be growing but it won’t show up in the productivity statistics for a while. So they’re going to have to make a bet. Is the economy actually becoming much more productive? Is the technology spreading into more sectors? And what should they do about it?

My simple version of this is that everything technology touches gets cheaper.”

Bitcoins consolidation

The setup here is fairly straightforward.

Bitcoin has been moving sideways for nearly 12 weeks now, holding up well amid global uncertainty and erratic oil prices. That kind of strength during uncertainty usually points to a move higher rather than lower.

All it really takes is a shift in tone. That could be positive news about Iran, rate cuts from the Federal Reserve that Polymarket isn’t pricing in, or the obvious political incentive for the Republican Party to support stronger markets heading into the November midterms.

Very soon, liquidity can flow back into the system, creating a much stronger backdrop for asset prices.

The sideways strength of BTC aligns with what technical analysis and Bitcoin investing expert Michael Van De Poppe has said for a while: the longer the price compresses and moves sideways, the more aggressive the eventual move tends to be, and in bullish structures, that usually resolves to the upside because it reflects accumulation rather than weakness.

He said recently :

“The longer it ( a consolidation) lasts, the heavier the breakout will be”.

NFTs are now exploding.

I’ve been going live on TikTok daily.

The thing that keeps catching me off guard is how many people are getting pot committed to smaller, illiquid altcoins while having little to no exposure to assets that have actually been battle-tested.

They’re basically missing the main trend, just capturing the low-hanging fruit in BTC, ETH, SOL, XRP, and instead going all in on microcaps and memecoins. Yuck.

As a double whammy, a huge blind spot for everyone right now is NFTs, even from folks in the NFT space.

The first real use case of NFTs is art, and art sits upstream of wealth in crypto. But more than that, they’ve solved digital scarcity, and in many cases, they’re more stable than holding a random microcap token.

There’s also a different dynamic at play because the art layer is expressive, so people build a connection to the asset in the same way they would with a collectable, but at the same time, those assets organise communities, so when you buy into a collection, you’re also stepping into a built-in network or friendship group.

Then, when you remember an NFT is also a contract, it opens the door for added value, whether that’s access, events, ticketing, education, claim for a physical item or anything else the issuer wants to layer in, so it’s like a QR code on steroids with an art layer instead of some squiggly barcode.

The current trend of the NFT space reminds me of something an old cricket coach used to say: “there’s no hiding place for data”, and you can see NFTs starting to move the way you’d expect, with IP-led projects gaining traction first, and over time that likely shifts toward more thoughtful, culturally significant art and historically relevant projects.

PNKSTR.

One of the benefits of being in a private group is speed.

You can share opportunities as they’re happening rather than after the fact, and with something like PNKSTR, getting in early was crucial, though we’ve had a second bite at the apple.

The token itself has been flat for a while and has bled out, but you can see what happens every time anticipation builds around a Punk being bought (or sold) through the protocol: the price starts to lift again, so the interest is sustaining.

PNKSTR is an automated protocol that operates independently, constantly buying and selling the most iconic digital artwork in the space, CryptoPunks.

It works through an automatic flywheel. Every buy and sell takes a 10% rake that goes into a treasury. Once the treasury can afford a floor Punk, it buys one and instantly relists it at a 1.1x premium.

When that Punk sells, the proceeds are used to buy back and burn PNKSTR tokens, creating more fees that feed back into the system to buy the next Punk.

The deflationary design has people hooked because it’s a simple loop that makes sense.

People finally have a way to get price exposure to an iconic piece of digital art without having to sell a kidney.

More people are realising there is less risk associated with the asset vs say memecoins.

While nothing is bulletproof, there is some level of support from the assets in the treasury, and with around 41 CryptoPunks now held, your downside to zero is protected, provided you think they will sell at some point. Which to me is obvious.

I’ve been open about Adam (the founder) not being as visible as he could be. But the reality is, this runs without him. Every Punk sale becomes its own marketing event anyway, so the machine keeps turning.

For me, the recent price action, up 74% in the last 30 days, suggests it has moved beyond the proof-of-concept phase and has now been properly battle-tested. If Ethereum and NFTs start running again, this could get interesting quickly.

But I’ll repeat what I’ve said from the start. This is not a core allocation, I think, around 10 per cent at most. Again, you do you.

The monthly chart below shows it outpacing both Ethereum and Bitcoin in an uptrend, while still sitting at a tiny $18 million market cap, all while being pegged to the value of CryptoPunks.

NFTs are impossible to sell once you’re attached.

The best assets run to ridiculous prices and shut most people out, and when conditions tighten, there’s no real floor, just full-blown capitulation.

PNKSTR sits in the middle of that and plays the volatility. People will say you can just buy fractionalized NFTs instead, but I’d rather lick a 9-volt battery than own that. There’s nothing appealing about holding 0.01 per cent of something you don’t really own, while someone else gets the benefit of the actual asset.

As Web3 savant and pseudonymous Punk6529 puts it, owning fractional assets actually loses value because it often trades at a discount to the net asset value:

“In any case, every properly fractionalized NFT / NFT collection with a redemption mechanism (Fractional, Whale, etc) has always traded at a discount to NAV because it is boring - just hanging around owning a 1% of a punk in the hope that later you will sell it for more, is very boring IMHO. I bought some fractionalized $APE back in 2021 and almost died on the spot from boredom. One the other hand (referring to PNKSTR), “we will collectively own a lot of punks forever”, I dunno, that seems more fun and interesting and you can “do things” with them.”

SUI.

SUI is my bet for this cycle.

It’s a combination of things that line up, the low float, the strength of the team, the tech and its ability to potentially bring large parts of Web2 onto it, plus Raoul Pal being involved on the advisory board and publicly stating that a large portion of his liquid net worth is in the asset.

Then you layer on the price action, which consistently outperforms in uptrends, it’s gathering mindshare across the timeline, and it tends to move closely with Bitcoin, which just makes it one of the cleaner bets this cycle.

I struggle to find anything else at a similar market cap that ticks the same boxes.

I wrote about SUI when it first launched and, more recently, put out a full research piece on it. A lot of readers got in early, which was great to see, but many people also got in near the highs.

No one could have predicted how things would unfold, whether it was tariffs, the Iran situation, or the October 10th liquidation event.

At the end of the day, it’s still largely indexed against Bitcoin, so the real question is simple: does Bitcoin go higher from here? I think it does. And if that plays out, the smaller, less liquid assets tend to move harder on the upside.

The same volatility that creates that upside also brings the drawdowns. That’s the part most people avoid. But in reality, that’s usually where the opportunity sits, adding on the downside instead of slamming your laptop shut and walking away from the market.

If you pair SUI against Bitcoin over a longer time frame, it outperforms, mainly because it’s smaller, less liquid, and still tied to Bitcoin, which means the moves tend to be more aggressive in both directions.

You can also see a clean wedge pattern forming, which typically leans towards an upside break if momentum holds.

Final Thoughts.

The saying that a smooth sea never made a skilful sailor could never be truer in times like these.

But you must zig while others zag, and a whole bunch of folks are going to get caught offside here: either trading in and out of the assets and thinking this entire year will be a bear market, or turning away from the space.

Lean in, folks.

This is not meant to be easy. I know it sucks when something you hold goes down, but the promise of the technology has not changed. We just need financial conditions to play ball.

The ISM is showing a strong uptick for three months in a row, with the next update on the first Monday of each month. You can see clear anecdotal evidence that Kevin Warsh is a political weathervane who will do whatever Trump wants. Or as Elizabeth Warren called him, “Donald Trump’s Sock Puppet”.

He can have his head as far up Trump's ass as he likes for all I care. In fact, the further the better, because he will likely make our assets go up.

No need to overthink it.

Play the barbell. On one side, you capture the trend through obvious blue-chip crypto tokens. On the other, you avoid overcommitting to risky micro-caps while making sure NFTs don’t become a blind spot by owning culturally significant art, historical pieces, or the strongest IP plays. Read that again.

NFTs will outperform everything. The data does not lie.

I stand by these Crypto assets even if the timing was off.

If you want to be closer to the community, the Carrot Lane Founding group is where it happens. That’s where the deeper conversations are, and actual friendships are being formed.

Annual members get:

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The content of this article is for informational purposes only and should not be considered financial, tax, or legal advice. You should consult a financial professional before making any significant financial decisions.

Simon was away with work commitments, so it was just Burge and me. We went deep into the NFT ecosystem, breaking down some of the projects making moves while answering questions along the way.

We also covered PNKSTR, crypto tokens, and where we think the cycle is heading.

If you want to be closer to the community, the Carrot Lane Founding group is where it happens. That’s where the deeper conversations are, and actual friendships are being formed.

Founding members get:

• 1-2-1 accelerator call with me

• Private members-only group chat

• Daily, real-time market discussions

• Monthly deep-dive group calls

• Direct access to the community and a premium research newsletter

See you on the other side!

Join Founder group here: https://www.carrotlane.com/subscribe

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This article/video content is for informational purposes only and should not be considered financial, tax, or legal advice. You should consult a financial professional before making any significant financial decisions.

We covered everything across crypto, NFTs, and the current market, dipped our toe into Simon’s dating life, what Burge has planned for the in-person meet-up, and where we think things are heading next.

There were 247 people on the stream, which was awesome, and it’s down to you lot showing up live and sharing it that we continue to grow the way we do.

Most of you may not know that Carrot Lane has an inner circle called the Founders group, where we share trade ideas, jump on private monthly calls, and stay ahead of the curve when opportunities present themselves.

If you’re serious about making the most of this cycle, not just getting into the right assets but also understanding when to sell and building real connections, this is the group for you.

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It sounds a bit airy fairy, I know. But in this live stream I break it down properly, sharing my screen and walking through the actual signals that suggest we’re likely to be in a much stronger position over the next 3 to 6 months.

While most people were playing the four-year cycle and selling out, feeling comfortable because prices were down, that same crowd often ends up chasing the move later and feeling under-allocated.

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Today’s live was one for the ages!

Simon, Burge, and I caught up to discuss the Bitcoin rally and the trickle-down effect on some other assets in the space. We touched on the Iran situation, but also spoke about our thoughts on the current cycle.

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Today’s newsletter was originally sent to paying subscribers back in November 2025. Since then, there’s been a wave of new readers coming in from TikTok and Instagram, so I wanted to reshare this piece to reinforce my stance on the asset I cover in this blog.

Volatility is the price you pay for exponential upside. Too many people at times like this decide to be tourists and step away, only to return when prices are climbing. The crazy upside is only possible in moments like this.

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As famous investor Peter Lynch once said:

“Far more money has been lost by investors preparing for corrections or trying to anticipate corrections than has been lost in corrections themselves.”

I’m reading a ton of theories about where this market is headed, and most of them drift further from reality than a drunk pigeon.

Last August, I got very vocal about a new blockchain called SUI, which was showing early signs of gaining mindshare on the timeline and outperforming most of the top 20 coins in price, and at the time, going toe to toe with Solana’s resurrection from $8 lows.

Adeniyi Abiodun, former Head of Research and Development for Facebook’s Libra project and now one of the five Co-Founders of SUI, explained the project's vision.

Adeniyi Abiodun:

“Our Vision for Sui is to build a global coordination layer for intelligent assets, going beyond traditional blockchains. We’re creating a decentralised web stack that supports everything from smart contracts to decentralised storage with Warus, a global storage layer that is more distributed and cost-effective than AWS (cloud storage). This infrastructure will underpin a wide range of applications, offering unprecedented security and decentralisation.”

So it’s an infrastructure play designed to onboard the entire Web2 world onto Web3 seamlessly.

This matters because companies like Netflix, Apple, and Disney each burn through about $500 million a year on cloud-storage fees, the kind of money that makes you wonder why the whole Web2 internet wouldn’t jump to SUI’s high-speed, cost-efficient blockchain.

Franklin Templeton and BlackRock are actively leveraging SUI for tokenisation, and SUI has also partnered with the parent company of TikTok, ByteDance, for Web3 gaming and SocialFi apps.

This is no Mickey Mouse operation.

The ex-Facebook team is extraordinary. The technology is mind-blowing, and when I heard that macro and finance expert Raoul Pal was on their advisory board, it sealed the deal for me as a final, but significant, safety signal.

There’s one fundamental truth about SUI that very few notice.

It’s newer and smaller, which means it can rise faster than larger assets. If one person is in the network and one joins, that’s a 100% increase. But if one joins a network of 50, it’s only 2%. You get the idea.

The same logic applies in reverse, too, because it’s newer and more speculative, it also tends to bleed the most during drawdowns.

The drawdowns have been a stomach punch that, if I’m brutally honest, I didn’t expect at this stage in the cycle, not just in crypto but across financial markets.

It may come down to a simple explanation everyone knows but barely anyone’s clocking: crypto folks still glued to the old four-year cycle, convinced it’s time to sell because they think a bear market’s around the corner.

Rekt co-founder Mando pointed out that sentiment is scraping the floor. You only need ten minutes on X to feel it.

The Fear and Greed Index is at its weakest since the FTX collapse and March’s “tariff tantrum.” It measures Bitcoin sentiment across six signals: volatility, trading volume, social activity, surveys, Bitcoin dominance, and Google Trends. It’s about as sharp as a surgeon’s scalpel when it comes to sentiment.

Folks may be selling purely because they think the four-year cycle is running out of road.

Mando says he doesn’t expect a deep drop, though the sideways chop could drag on longer than most people want to admit.

I think he’s right.

Mando:

“I am bullish on Risk Assets. At the same time, I am slightly data-driven, and I am cognizant—and have been for a while—that this was the four-year cycle time, and my bet was that it was going to extend. That being said, I think 50% of the market thinks on a four-year cycle because a lot of the OG Bitcoiners think like that. And if they all believe it, then maybe the market does go through a bit of an extended dip here, and you have to respect that that’s what the market believes. I don’t think it will be deep, and I think it will be a buying period. I do think that the correlation to M2 will return pretty aggressively. In 2026, M2’s only going higher, so I’m a buyer.”

Macro Indicators

Liquidity has been the puppet master of the financial markets.

I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve seen that M2 chart Mando references lined up next to Bitcoin with its tidy 12-week lead. Bitcoin basically shadowed the money supply until recently.

Now sentiment has flipped bearish, even though global M2 is sitting at an all-time high.

Some people (including me) blamed the government shutdown and reduced spending. Others (not including me) insisted it was the end of the cycle.

The mistake is assuming rough economic conditions automatically mean falling asset prices. They don’t. Central bankers don’t wait for the house to burn down, so they pump liquidity the moment smoke appears.

As Mike Howell, the global liquidity maestro since the 1980s, has shown, asset prices move in lockstep with central bank balance sheets.

When those expand, asset prices follow.

Mike Howell:

“If you have an expanding Fed balance sheet and an expanding injection of capital, that’s a recipe for very strong global liquidity. The best time for asset prices is when economies are slow and sluggish, but policymakers are trying to stimulate them, and that’s what we’ve got.”

Right now, the Fed is cutting rates.

Once those rates drop to a more sensible level, they’ll have to refinance roughly $7.4 trillion in debt that’s coming due, the same can they kicked down the road during the 2020 refinancing wave.

The key point is simple: this debt has to be rolled over.

But when rates were near zero, most of it was refinanced with an average maturity of about 5.5 years, not the 3–5 years most people assume. There’s a growing view online that the liquidity story still holds, people are just getting the debt maturities wrong.

According to the Joint Economic Committee’s September update, as of Q3 2025, roughly 31% of U.S. publicly held marketable Treasury debt, about $9.39 trillion out of $30.3 trillion, will mature within the next 12 months.

So that takes us to September 2026.

That’s a massive cluster of near-term maturities. It ramps up the chances of a rollover because the Treasury has to refinance that wall of debt, and when they do, asset prices tend to float higher, and our magic internet money gets its ticket to the gates of Valhalla.

What this says to me is we need to extend our time horizon, not that the cycle is over.

As business cycle expert Julien Bittel says:

“Nothing new here. The Fed won’t start QE until they can roll over debts at more sustainable levels – meaning rates have to come down first. Also, when we talk about “moar cowbell,” we’re talking about global liquidity, which can come from the PBoC (for example), private credit creation, rate cuts, a weaker dollar, or lower bond yields. All of these ease financial conditions and support growth. Phase One: Rate cuts.Phase Two: Debts get monetized.”

It looks like there are some early signs of the Fed moving into panic mode.

The SRF, or Standing Repo Facility, is like the Fed’s emergency cash tap for banks.

When money gets tight, banks can borrow short-term cash using Treasuries as collateral. The issue is, they’re not using it, which worries the Fed. If banks avoid the SRF even when they need cash, it means there’s a deeper problem in the system, and that’s why nerves are rising.

Macro expert RP thinks something structurally will happen imminently.

Raoul Pal:

“I think this week the Feds hand will be forced to tweak the plumbing to avoid a month-end and year-end funding crisis. Crypto is currently trading like a stressed funding vehicle reflecting the broken plumbing, while stocks are cushioned by buybacks and performance chasing for now, but risk a repeat of 2018/19 if not solved immediately. It’s clear the Fed are concerned, hence the meeting with the banks and NY Fed to understand why the SRF isn’t being tapped enough to resolve this. The fear from markets and the Fed is rising.”

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To loop back to Julien Bittell’s point about interest rates, we need to note that rates are dropping worldwide.

There are other factors besides the Fed.

Just look at the G-20, which comprises the world’s strongest economies: all but two are lowering rates. One is Japan, which has had record and returning inflation, and the other is Switzerland, which is already at a 0% interest rate.

The entire world is reducing rates, and people on the timeline are shitting their pants. Just think about it logically, if people have more money in their pocket, will they buy more or less crypto? Doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure this stuff out.

The current movement, driven by basically the entire world, does not signal an overheated market or end-of-cycle behaviour, but rather the opposite.

The macro outlook is very positive.

Take the steady decline in oil prices, which is essentially a tax on the entire system.

When oil is high, it costs more to move goods, produce goods, and live day to day. That drains money from businesses and consumers, leaving less to invest, so assets like crypto and stocks stagnate or fall faster than a broken elevator.

When oil prices drop, it’s like giving the world a giant fucking pay rise.

We know our magical internet money is just a product of financial conditions and people having more money in their skyrocket for discretionary spending.

Costs ease, spending picks up, and central banks face less pressure to keep rates high, freeing up liquidity that flows back into markets and lifts risk assets.

The dollar’s been quietly losing strength, and that’s a good thing.

Most of the world owes money in dollars. So when the dollar pumps, those debts get harder to repay. Countries need more of their own currency to buy the same number of dollars. That drains liquidity and tightens conditions, as we saw around Jan/Feb, right after Trump took office.

It appeared he was using a strong dollar as a stick to beat foreign leaders with during negotiations around the tariffs.

When the dollar softens, the pressure eases like letting a bit of air out of an overinflated tyre because there’s less crowding out of spending. But it also meant that China could print a shit ton of money without destabilising their local currency. And they did.

In short, a weaker dollar means stronger markets, and that’s exactly what we’re getting.

The ISM (Institute for Supply Management)

I share this data point often because I think it’s the bellwether for everything.

It’s the only thing I can think of that isn’t mid-curve nonsense or a misleading signal.

The ISM, specifically the PMI (Purchasing Managers’ Index) headline figure, is basically the economy’s pulse check.

It tracks the health of US manufacturing and services, and it’s one of the clearest signals of what’s coming next for liquidity and markets.

When the PMI runs hot, business activity surges, inflationary pressure builds, and central banks tighten the screws with higher rates. Liquidity dries up, and risk assets like crypto usually take the hit.

When the PMI cools, the opposite happens. Growth slows, central banks ease off, and liquidity flows back in, giving crypto, stocks, and other risk assets a fresh breath of oxygen.

In short:

• High PMI = overheated economy

• Low PMI = cooler economy

Right now, PMI has bottomed.

A score below 50 means cooling conditions, and anything around 60 signals overheating.

We’re far from the mania phase. We’re nowhere near the chaos of paying $500 in ETH gas fees like it’s confetti.

At 48.7, the reading shows we’ve bottomed, but it oscillates like a heart-rate monitor, and the next move looks to be up.

Again, you don’t need to be a brain surgeon to guess where the next move might be, considering the entire world is easing financial conditions.

Final Thoughts.

That’s why I’ve moved most of my crypto into SUI (my PNKSTR and NFTS haven’t moved).

I’m playing the multi-cycle game because these chances only show up every four years.

Last cycle, it was Solana. Four years prior, it was Ethereum as the anointed one. Both took 90% drawdowns on the chin. So SUI’s current correction isn’t fun, but it’s tame in comparison, and it says nothing about the quality of the asset.

Funnily enough, when I was speaking to Bren, an expert in technical analysis, he said if you saw those drawdowns in a stock, you’d assume the company was dead. He’s right. It really comes down to not applying old frameworks to a new set of rules.

Bitcoin has always experienced at least 5 brutal 30%+ drawdowns each cycle, and solid altcoins often drop by 60%+ in the process. As crazy as it sounds, it is actually completely normal.

I’ve seen this movie before. I held through ETH crashing to $80 after the ICO boom, Solana dropping from $247 to $8, and my NFT portfolio swinging from $1.4 million to $25k lows.

Now it’s SUI’s turn.

Nothing has fundamentally changed. There’s still a low float with only 37% of tokens on the market, so significant supply friction, and the market cap sits around $6 billion, with little buy pressure required for price gains.

The punchline is that the debt needs to be rolled over, but the Biden administration extended the maturity of the debts presumably to lock in the 0% rates for a longer period.

The bigger picture is extremely bullish.

The structural issues in the market might actually accelerate the Fed stepping in and tweaking the plumbing, as Raoul mentioned.

We’ve got $7.4 trillion in debt rolling over in the next 10 months, interest rates set to fall across 95% of central banks globally, oil prices retreating, the dollar index sliding (which adds liquidity), and the ISM already bottoming out and waiting for a rebound.

And for those saying, “But Jay, what about the AI bubble?”, people, including me, have been calling tech stocks a bubble since 2008.

Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway just dropped $4.9 billion into Google’s AI promise. He’s a value investor to the core, so either it’s a bubble or it’s undervalued. It can’t be both.

My take? We go much higher after some short-term pain.

Batten down the hatches, add where you can. Touch some grass. Kiss your dog on the fucking head.

Whatever keeps you sane, because in the end, we win.

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Me, Simon, and Burge met up this weekend to map out how we grow the lives and check out a few venues for the in-person meet-ups. Things are starting to take shape.

No April fools nonsense either. Just a straight conversation. We got into Bitcoin, crypto, NFTs, and PNKSTR properly.

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Simon jumped back on, fresh from his “European travels”, and we got into it. Bit on the manosphere documentary, insider trading in government, some NFT projects, and where we think crypto’s heading.

Proper conversation.

We’re also meeting up this weekend, me, Simon and Burge, to map out the next phase of the live streams and sort a spot for the next meet-up.

If you want to be a bit closer to all of this, not just watching but actually involved, the Carrot Lane inner circle is where it happens. That’s where the better conversations are and where things tend to get shared before they’re obvious.

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Kevin Warsh isn’t cut from the usual economist cloth.

The highly measured, articulate, and slightly self-deprecating soon-to-be Fed chair once put it like this:

“If we learned anything in economics, it’s that productivity gains come before wage gains. And if you can’t be part of that productivity revolution, then the story of the US being the shining city on the hill starts to look more like a myth.”

He sounds dovish on US growth.

He’s also adamant the country needs to lead the charge on AI. And yet at the same time, he’s famously hawkish on inflation. Or at least, that’s how it looks on the surface.

Not long after Trump announced Warsh as Jerome Powell’s successor, gold, silver, and Bitcoin assets began to nuke, which the market read as “he’ll keep rates higher for longer”.

It’s the mistake every Tom, Dick and Sally is making.

Warsh grew up in upstate New York, and as a teenager, he was selling race programmes at Saratoga Race Course. Didn’t take him long to figure out a little trick to juice his tips.

He’d give eight different customers eight different horses, telling each one his “lucky pencil” had picked a winner. By the end of the day, one of them would come back convinced he was a genius and tip him accordingly.

Warsh later joked it was a foolproof way to pocket a nice bonus on big race days. Early lesson in finance, too. Always hedge your bets.

He’s not exactly short on connections either. Warsh is married to Jane Lauder, the billionaire heiress and granddaughter of Estée Lauder, as well as the daughter of billionaire businessman Ronald Lauder.

Trump once described him as “central casting,” while the media were a bit less generous, slapping him with the “nepo baby” label.

Where things start to get a bit murky is with those ties. Ronald Lauder has long been a major Republican donor, dropping $5 million into MAGA Inc in 2025.

He’s also an old college friend of Trump and is widely credited with first floating the idea of the US buying Greenland, partly for its mineral wealth to support AI expansion, and partly for its strategic value.

In interivew Lauder was quoted:

“Trump’s Greenland concept was never absurd, it was strategic. Beneath its ice and rock lies a treasure trove of rare-earth elements essential for AI, advanced weaponry and modern technology. As ice recedes, new maritime routes are emerging, reshaping global trade and security.”

These ties have naturally sent the spotlight burning a hole through Warsh and his potential appointment as Fed Chair, especially given the role is supposed to be strictly impartial and politically independent.

That independence exists for a reason. It’s there to stop things collapsing like a Jenga tower once rate decisions get heated, and to keep policy grounded in data, not political pressure or short-term election cycles.

And we’re already seeing how messy that can get. Jerome Powell, the current Fed chair, has come under fire, being called “mentally troubled” and “grossly incompetent” by Trump for not cutting rates.

Kevin Warsh is human, and these ties give you a rough idea of where he might lean and how he could shape monetary policy.

He served as a Federal Reserve governor during the 2008 financial crisis, one of the youngest ever to do it. Even as the economy was dragging itself out of the Great Recession, he stayed firmly hawkish on inflation. That didn’t go down well with everyone, especially with Democrats under Obama in power, and earned him the “political weathervane” label.

Now it looks like his next bet could flip the script. Lower rates, push productivity, and lean on AI to keep inflation in check.

Kevin Warsh:

“We can’t make any perfect predictions, but my guess is this is the most productivity-enhancing wave of our lifetimes, past, present and future. The way I think about it is the cost of curiosity is now zero.

When I was in public school, even the cost of curiosity had friction. When I showed up in California for the first time during orientation, you still had to go to the library and dig through a card system, even if it was on a computer, just to find a book. So it’s a very big deal that the cost of curiosity is now zero. The fruits of knowledge from that curiosity are now larger than ever before.

For most of the last 20 years, what we would say in economics is that the best of everything accrued the most significant gains. The best basketball player, the best violinist, the best programmer, the best mathematician, the best of everything.

At this moment that’s probably still true, because the world is changing so quickly. Market structures are changing and businesses are being redefined. So the question becomes: what country is most likely to benefit the most from the cost of curiosity being zero and the fruits of knowledge being as large as ever?

I think it’s the United States. That might sound like a very parochial view from a has-been government economist, but I believe it. I think the best companies in the world are here and the most talented engineers are either here or want to come here. That’s an amazing development.

So this productivity wave should happen in the United States first. It won’t happen evenly, but those that strike first and drive productivity first will differentiate themselves from their peers in their industry. They’ll have higher margins, bigger market share and a larger opportunity.

That’s why I think it’s such an exciting moment for the United States.”

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The anecdotes are showing up before the data.

Official economic data is always late to the party.

Warsh’s view is that during big tech waves like AI, the data understates what’s actually happening. On paper, it looks muted, while the ground under people’s feet is already shifting. He says you can see the anecdotal evidence, but the numbers just haven’t caught up yet.

That leaves policymakers with a tough call.

Productivity could be quietly improving, but the official stats won’t reflect it for a while. So do you trust the data, or what’s happening right in front of you?

The Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis dug into this, and the numbers are pretty telling.

In the first three quarters of 2025, AI-related spending added 0.97 percentage points to real GDP growth, or 0.90 without data centres. At the peak of the dot-com boom in 2000, that number was 0.81.

It’s not just the contribution either. AI made up 39% of total GDP growth in 2025, or 36% excluding data centres, compared to 28% in 2000.

So while people are still debating whether AI is overhyped, it’s already doing more heavy lifting than the internet did at its early peak.

Warsh’s view is pretty blunt.

Central banks and governments will have to choose between trusting lagging data and trusting what’s actually happening on the ground.

Because if you wait for the spreadsheets to catch up, you’re already behind.

And history tends to play out the same way every time. When technology spreads, it drives costs down.

Kevin Warsh:

“For has-been government economists like me, we’re going to look at the data. And I don’t think the data will show these productivity gains for many years after the anecdotes reveal them.

What’s that Bezos quote? “At moments of huge consequence, at turning points, if you have a set of data telling you one thing and a set of anecdotes telling you the other, listen to the anecdotes.” One hundred percent. I think Jeff is exactly right.

The anecdotes have already started to turn.

The difficulty for policymakers, whether that’s central bankers or fiscal authorities, is that the economy is going to be growing but it won’t show up in the productivity statistics for a while. So they’re going to have to make a bet. Is the economy actually becoming much more productive? Is the technology spreading into more sectors? And what should they do about it?

My simple version of this is that everything technology touches gets cheaper.”

Warsh looks set to run the Greenspan playbook

Alan Greenspan saw something everyone else missed.

In the mid 90s, while most economists were panicking about an overheating economy and calling for aggressive rate hikes, he took the opposite view. He bet that technology would do the heavy lifting.

His thinking was that the rise of computers, software, and the early internet was making businesses more efficient. More output, less cost pressure meant growth without the usual inflation spike.

Many of his contemporaries wanted to slam the brakes on the economy, but Greenspan held off on raising rates. He kept rates relatively stable and let the economy run hotter than normal.

The approach earned him a reputation as a masterful technocrat, capable of steering markets with precision.

He trusted the tech wave more than the traditional playbook.

Kevin Warsh:

“If you’re looking at the data, my view is you’re backward looking. You’re going to be late. You’re not going to realize the country is able to have non-inflationary growth faster.

So you’re going to have to make a bet.

The closest analogy that I have in central banking is Alan Greenspan in 1993 and 1994. The internet revolution was with us. He believed, based on anecdotes and rather esoteric data, that we weren’t in a position where we needed to raise rates because this technology wave was going to be structurally disinflationary.

A lot of his peers at the Federal Reserve, and certainly in the academic profession in economics, said the economy was overheating and that rates needed to go up because it would be inflationary.

But he sat on his hands and persuaded his colleagues to be patient.

As a result, we had a stronger economy, more stable prices and greater U.S. competitiveness.

I suspect that over the next couple of years, that decision will become central to the Federal Reserve and other big central banks.”

Bitcoin is the new American dream.

The current Fed chair, Jerome Powell, hasn’t exactly been a fan of Bitcoin.

Or the wider crypto space.

He once said “relatively unsophisticated investors” chase price when it’s going up, and warned there’s no promise it continues.

He’s also been clear that cryptocurrencies aren’t real currencies in his eyes. No intrinsic value. Not backed by the government.

It’s night and day compared to Kevin Warsh. He’s described Bitcoin as “just software”, but meant it as a compliment. A well-designed system that competes with traditional finance.

Kevin Warsh:

“For all of our fellow Americans, that lets them get a piece of the American dream without going through some labyrinth that costs them five percentage points right off the top. That’s the market opportunity.

I think it’s good for the United States, and I’ll make a final point. I think it’s good for competition in financial services.

If I were being really honest about my time in government, I served during the ‘08 financial crisis. What I would have hoped after the crisis is that we’d have a more competitive banking system.

Instead, we have a less competitive banking system.

That’s the market opportunity, and technology has a way of driving a set of products and services now that was probably impossible 5 or 6 years ago.”

Final Thoughts.

This whole thing has a bit of a family affair feel to it, mixed with some insider baseball.

Warsh’s family connections aren’t nothing. And the idea that his decisions could tilt toward keeping voters happy as midterms approach is far from far-fetched.

Trump posted to his Truth Social:

“I have known Kevin for a long period of time, and have no doubt that he will go down as one of the GREAT Fed Chairmen, maybe the best. On top of everything else, he is “central casting,” and he will never let you down.”

And in a completely opposite tone, Senator Elizabeth Warren came back with:

“Kevin Warsh spins fairy tales about the president, he’ll say anything President Trump wants him to, doesn’t matter whether it’s true or not. That blind loyalty to the president is nothing short of dangerous. He’s a sock puppet.”

Stepping back from the politics and philosophical whataboutsm for a sec, the real question is simple. What does this actually mean for us?

From where I’m sitting, it looks pretty bullish, particularly for risk assets like Bitcoin and Crypto, given that he’s pro-Crypto and technology.

It’s plausible that AI is already boosting business productivity in ways we can’t fully see yet. And if that’s the case, the play becomes obvious. Lower rates, backed by the belief that AI-driven efficiency will keep inflation in check.

These are favourable conditions for risk assets.

Trump’s been going after Uncle Jerome for not cutting rates for what feels like forever, while also shining a spotlight on Warsh, a Republican who fits the mould.

And if you want a hint of how this might play out, look back at Warsh’s time during 2008 under Obama. His tone on inflation was very different to what we’re seeing now.

He only seems aggressively hawkish when Democrats are in charge and prepared to print when Republicans are at the helm.

America needs to be first to the productivity-inducing technological shift to enjoy the outsized results it has had.

Warsh believes policymakers should act on common-sense, anecdotal evidence that A.I. will create a deflationary shock faster than people think, because it’s here now, but not showing in the data, because everything we use to measure performance lags.

I agree, maybe from a self-interest point of view, that we need to lower rates, which will lead to the US rolling over its debt, of which about 24% of the $38 trillion is due in 2026.

Whether people in crypto like it or not, rate cuts are the silver bullet. You can argue narratives all day, but when rates come down, liquidity picks up, and risk assets move. It’s that simple.

The last six rate cuts tell the story. Bitcoin went from around $60k to over $110k during that easing cycle.

Lower rates don’t guarantee instant pumps, but over time, they stack the odds heavily in favour of assets like crypto.

My view is simple. A well-connected economist, acting on signals most people can’t see yet, is going to cut rates.

As soon as he steps into office.

If that happens, we go much higher.

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Tay joined us. Founding member, regular on the streams, and a proper NFT collector. He shared his experience in the space, what’s worked, what hasn’t, and what he’s seeing right now.

This episode was a banger. Genuinely packed with value.

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And not just any backup.

Jacob, the co-founder of Chimpers, stepped in and delivered one of the most insightful conversations we’ve had on the podcast so far.

We went deep on the NFT ecosystem, what’s actually happening under the surface of the market, and where things could be heading next.

This episode was a banger. Packed with value.

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As a spear-chucking South African-born Brit, I know better than a celeb in the Epstein files to lecture anyone, especially on American politics.

I have no skin in the game.

But between me and a handful of mates at the bar, we armchair quarterback the US political landscape. I’m sure our friends across the pond do exactly the same when they hear about an 80-year-old grandmother being taken away in cuffs for a social media post.

The punch line here simple.

Trump was voted in by roughly 52% of middle-class Americans. Around 55% of US Bitcoin holders voted for him. For many people, Bitcoin and crypto are a lifeline. They represent hope. So when a candidate says he’ll support that cause, it brings the future expectations of yourself much closer.

As Oliver Anthony eloquently put it, “I’ve been sellin’ my soul, workin’ all day, overtime hours for bullshit pay.” He was singing about America, but he could easily have included the UK. It’s why plenty of Americans, and plenty of people here in Britain too, have turned to Bitcoin as a financial parachute.

Trump has the midterms in November.

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If Republicans lose and Democrats take control of the House, the Senate, or both, Trump becomes a lame duck for the final two years. Congress controls major laws, budgets, and appointments, so if the other party holds it, they can stall his agenda and ramp up investigations.

So, whether you like him or not, the political incentive is obvious.

It’s also worth noting that Trump’s family crypto venture, World Liberty Financial, run by his sons, holds Bitcoin-linked assets on its balance sheet. On-chain data shows the firm holds roughly 267 wrapped Bitcoin (WBTC) worth around $18 million

Famous investor Cathie Wood believes that Donald Trump’s appointment of Kevin Warsh as the next Fed Chair will lead to a scenario where Warsh gets out of Trump’s way, cuts rates, and rolls over the debt, easing financial conditions. It would likely create an optical boost in asset prices, including Bitcoin.

She also thinks there’s a real possibility that Trump will move toward buying Bitcoin instead of promising not to sell seizers.

Cathy Woods:

“2026 is the U.S. The midterm elections. And President Trump does not want to be a lame duck. So I have a feeling that he is going to work with his crypto and AI czar to do a few things. One, make sure we get that de minimis ruling through, make sure grassroots is where a lot of what we’ve been talking about is going to happen.

It seems as though there’s been reticence about actually buying Bitcoin for the strategic reserve. So far, it’s confiscated. The original intent was to own 1,000,000 Bitcoin. So I actually think they will start buying because I think this will help Trump in a couple of ways.

Part of the reason he won the presidency, was the crypto community. And another reason is his family is all in on Bitcoin and other crypto assets. So I think he’s got all kinds of reasons to do this, but the most important one is he does not want to be a lame duck.

He wants to have another productive year or two, and I think he sees crypto as a path to the future.”

Mixed Bitcoin signals are making everyone docile.

As soon as I started writing this piece, I intended it to cover the Jane Street saga, but bombs dropping in Iran threw me off like someone in my passenger seat yanking the steering wheel.

I’m not a war correspondent, so I won’t pretend to cover all of that. Instead, it’s worth touching on the latest villain on the Bitcoin timeline: Jane Street price suppression.

They’re a market maker and trading firm now being sued over alleged market manipulation and their role in the Luna collapse, allegedly using filthy insider info. And at the same time, they’re now being accused of manipulating Bitcoin too, because why the hell not.

The accusation goes something like this. JS buys some Bitcoin on the open market. Then they open a much larger short position against it. On the surface, it looks bullish because they’re buying. But the short is several times larger, suggesting the spot purchase isn’t the real bet. It’s the setup.

In other words, the buying is optics, and the short is the actual trade. A short simply means betting that the asset’s price will go down.

They buy spot Bitcoin at $70k, for example, then open very large short positions using options or other derivatives. Once that positioning is in place, large amounts of Bitcoin are sold in minutes through algorithms, often during periods of thin liquidity or alongside negative headlines, which can trigger panic selling and liquidations.

Prices drop, say from $70k to $65k. They close the short positions for large profits while only taking a small loss on the spot holdings.

Then they accumulate again at the lower level, let the market squeeze higher, create a bit of FOMO on the way up, reopen shorts, and repeat the cycle. Rinse and repeat, at least according to the theory doing the rounds.

For months, people have pointed to repeated sell pressure around 10 a.m. just after US markets open. The pattern people highlight is a consistent, sharp downward move, leveraged longs get liquidated, forced selling cascades, and then the price stabilises.

Right after the announcement that Jane Street was being sued, there was NO 10 a.m. dump. Instead, a relief rally. Lol.

Simon, my Carrot Lane Live Co-host, chimmed in with his thoughts:

“I always think: follow the evidence. So if it is factual and true that this is happening consistently over a longer period of time, whether anyone would deem it legal or not becomes the question. And interestingly, would it fall under the Crypto Clarity Act if that were passed? That would be another interesting thing to see. If the facts are the facts, they can’t really be disputed. But I know things are often much more nuanced than that. Still, it’s a good starting point, isn’t it?”

Details below.

The Goldilocks zone for risk assets.

Multiple research firms have concluded that we are in a Goldilocks zone for risk assets.

Meaning it won’t be too hot or too cold.

Philip Saunders, director of the Ninteyone, said:

“After a disorienting period for markets, investors may find that 2026 feels unexpectedly balanced. We expect a Goldilocks environment. Not too hot, not too cold, characterised by firm real growth, falling inflation and improved earnings visibility across regions. But this outcome still requires thoughtful positioning. This is not a year to rely on a single narrative; it’s a year to be selective and diversified.”

A Goldilocks Economy is the sweet spot for markets.

Growth is strong enough that companies are making money and people have jobs, but it’s not so strong that inflation gets out of control. If inflation stays manageable, central banks won’t feel the need to aggressively raise interest rates.

For investors, that combination is almost perfect.

• Businesses keep growing
• Consumers keep spending
• Interest rates stay relatively stable
• Liquidity stays in the system

Felix-Antoine Vezina-Poirier, Chief strategist at BCA Research, said his findings were that:

“Overall, our survey delivered a Goldilocks signal of decent growth and disinflation. Historically, such positive momentum has coincided with equity outperformance versus bonds”.

The economy is stronger than most people think

If the economic outlook is good and people have more money in their pockets, that money eventually finds its way into risk assets.

One of the earliest clues for that is the ISM.

The Institute for Supply Management runs a simple monthly survey that basically takes the pulse of the economy. It asks big-boy purchasing managers at big-wig companies one straightforward question: Are things getting busier or slowing down?

These are the people who order raw materials, deal with suppliers, and manage production lines. Because they sit right at the centre of supply chains, they often see economic changes before everyone else. If companies start ordering more materials or hiring more workers, it usually means demand is picking up. If orders get cut, it’s often an early signal the economy is cooling.

All those responses get rolled into one number called the ISM index.

• Above 50 means the economy is expanding
• Below 50 means the economy is contracting

Think of it as a speedometer for economic activity.

This matters for asset prices because markets don’t just react to what’s happening now. They move on expectations. If businesses are getting busier, productivity rises, companies make more money, and that eventually feeds into higher stock prices and stronger risk assets.

Macro investors watch the ISM like a hawk-eyed bookie because it helps them gauge where we are, so they can squeeze the lemon juice out of the economic cycle. Once they get that read, the game becomes pretty simple: put their chips on the assets most likely to benefit from that environment.

The ISM helps answer three questions.

• Is the economy speeding up or slowing down?
• Are interest rates more likely to rise or fall?
• Is liquidity about to tighten or expand?

They are the dominant forces in asset prices.

You can see below the two skyscrapers poking their noses out, currently showing a score of 52.4 and finally breaking away from that sideways chop. That’s despite Armageddon all over the timeline.

Final Thoughts.

24.9% of the $38.5 trillion US national debt matures in 2026.

Kevin Warsh, the man in charge of dropping rates, which would result in that debt being rolled over and asset prices essentially going to valhalla said in December 2025 on a podcast:

“This is the most productivity-enhancing wave of our lifetimes—past, present, and future. [...] The technology could prove to be structurally disinflationary [similar to the internet era]. [...] My sense is that the anecdotes will be there before the data,” forcing central bankers to “make a bet” on leaning toward cheaper borrowing costs (i.e., lower interest rates) in anticipation of this effect.”

He’s a Republican.

And he’ll drop rates faster than my diet after walking past the Krispy Kreme aisle. Warsh’s justification really comes down to AI making up for the productivity gap.

It’s my personal opinion that Trump hired him for one very good reason. After publicly chucking Uncle Jerome through the wood chipper for not lowering rates, the reason is to lower rates. Both Trump and his Treasury Secretary, Scott Bessent, are acutely aware of how rolling debt raises asset prices.

Printing casholla is a cheat code for making us all feel like a bunch of Rich Men North of Richmond.

Trump has the midterms in November, and I imagine he’ll do everything in his power to influence voters with a strong economy. It’s already showing signs in the ISM that productivity is picking up, and there's a sweet spot for investors because Bitcoin and Crypto are clearly not overheated, while the economy's backdrop looks much healthier.

If you just keep it completely simple, if the economy is better and people have more money in their pockets for discretionary spending, they’ll likely buy more magical internet money because of how sensitive it is to financial conditions.

If it doesn’t play, this fiasco will have been political suicide for the Republicans.

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We covered what’s happening in Iran and how it’s impacting crypto pricing, took a deep dive into NFTs, and discussed more of what’s going on in the TokenWorks ecosystem.

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In any normal world, if an asset drops 60%, it’s buried six feet under, pushing up daisies through the cracks in the headstone.

Crypto volatility is a rollercoaster on steroids, making your weird uncle look stable.

Unlike traditional productivity-based assets, those drawdowns can recover. In stocks, a crash usually reflects company performance. In crypto, it’s much more closely tied to financial conditions.

Most altcoins are highly correlated to Bitcoin. That means when Bitcoin drops, all alts usually underperform. But when Bitcoin recovers, the right altcoins with strength tend to outperform because they are smaller and less liquid.

It really is that simple.

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I know a lot of my readers got into SUI because of the early price performance, the strong tech promises, or just from reading my research.

Nothing has changed. The technology is still the most profound of the new layer ones. The former Facebook team is still one of the most capable in the space. And among the top-performing chains, it still has one of the lowest token floats on the market, which, in an uptrend, creates supply friction and sharp price moves.

The only thing that has changed is Bitcoin’s price.

Bitcoin plummeted because traders played the four-year cycle narrative, a wave of liquidations hit in October, and then more selling followed in December.

What is interesting is that financial conditions are actually improving. Inflation is down, job growth is up, the dollar, which acts like a tax on the entire system, is down, and oil prices, which are passed through to goods and services, are at pre-pandemic lows.

While the backdrop of financial conditions looks like it’s improving, the memetics of people still playing the four-year cycle is clearly the stronger force right now. As Chris Burniske famously says, “human nature is very hard to change.”

Global money supply is near all time highs. Just from first principles, thinking more money in the system means more capital that can flow into assets.

As you can see below, the global M2 money supply is just under $100 trillion, and the S&P 500 practically mirrors it (with a 3-month lag).

The S&P 500 has averaged about 10.56% a year.

While the global M2 money supply has grown roughly 8%. That 8% is basically your hurdle rate.

At first glance, the S&P looks like a solid bet, but once you factor in another 2.4% for inflation, your real return is close to break-even.

If your investments aren’t beating that benchmark, you’re treading water like Leo while the Titanic sinks, watching your purchasing power slowly slip away even though there’s clearly enough room on the floating door.

Everyone knows now that Crypto is the fastest horse in the race.

Raoul Pal often points out how closely liquidity conditions and asset performance are linked. He believes Scott Bessent, now the Secretary of the Treasury, built his career on understanding and using financial conditions to make investments.

As Raoul Pal put it recently

“It’s not about the politics. Unfortunately, they politicized technology right now. That will change over time and will morph into something different. But the Republicans driven by Scott Bessent will throw absolutely everything at it, which goes back to the beginning of our conversation. They will not allow the ISM to be below 50, because their voter base is middle America, and they have to see prosperity from the Trump administration. They have to appease the crypto overlords who paid them to win the election.
They have to appease the tech overlords who paid to win the election. Because the big game is, you can’t lose to China, and if you stop, pause, do anything, they will win. I think what we are going to see this year is something people aren’t quite prepared for.
It is going to feel like the pandemic in terms of the amount of stimulus coming.”

What most people buying SUI still haven’t realised

Unlike most blockchains that process one transaction at a time (sequential), SUI handles independent ones simultaneously.

It’s like a friggin low-cost, frictionless Flash Gordon of blockchains.

Think of it like a smart highway where transactions (cars) can drive in parallel across multiple lanes without waiting in line or causing traffic jams, enabling near-instant speeds, super-low fees, and massive scale for things like gaming, DeFi, NFTs, and the apps we use daily.

Its design improves speed and keeps costs low when the network is busy.

Web3 and Crypto expert Kyle Chasse said recently:

“SUI is quietly positioning where the next cycle of users actually lives. Fast finality, object-based architecture, and low fees make it easier to build apps that feel like normal consumer software, not crypto experiments. The chains that win the next phase won’t be the loudest. They’ll be the ones users notice because everything just works.”

SUI’s goal is to make blockchain infrastructure feel more like regular internet apps without you noticing it’s on blockchain rails.

Fast responses, low fees, a very easy user interface, and easy login features. System developers can also build on SUI without heavy friction.

One area the team is pushing into is decentralised storage through its Walrus protocol. The decentralised storage will reduce costs compared to traditional cloud providers. Large companies today spend billions annually on cloud infrastructure, so any credible lower-cost alternative naturally attracts attention.

Adeniyi Abiodun, who previously worked on Meta’s Libra project and is now a Sui co-founder, describes the vision like this:

“Our Vision for Sui is to build a global coordination layer for intelligent assets, going beyond traditional blockchains. We’re creating a decentralised web stack that supports everything from smart contracts to decentralised storage with Walrus, a global storage layer that is more distributed and cost-effective than AWS (cloud storage). This infrastructure will underpin a wide range of applications, offering unprecedented security and decentralisation.”

In plain terms, SUI aims to become an infrastructure that enables digital assets and applications to run at scale on the chain.

Supply and performance dynamics.

I’ll be straight as an arrow. I, like plenty of others, got the timing of this cycle wrong.

The goal was never perfect timing, but getting close to probabilistic outcomes, because no one can predict short-term markets.

Right now, the backdrop is messy.

Political noise, especially around tariffs, can hit risk assets out of nowhere. At the same time, this is one of the most crypto-friendly policy environments we’ve seen, which could lock the U.S. in as a leader before the G20 catches up.

So it’s a bag of mixed signals.

As Raoul Pal says, governments want strong economies heading into elections. That usually means liquidity eventually rolls back in through refinancing debt. The delay has been due to rates staying higher for longer than expected, with Fed Chair Powell commenting:

“The economy has once again surprised us with its strength. We still have some tension between employment and inflation, but it’s less than it was. The outlook for economic activity has clearly improved since the last meeting.”

This is the weight holding down the coiled spring.

When rates fall to a level where the debt is rolled over, asset prices rise optically, maybe even to Valhalla.

I get why people struggle to see value. But nothing that actually matters has changed. My approach stays the same. Back the strongest tech, strongest teams, and assets with the most potential upside relative to size.

SUI has something most people gloss over. Its circulating supply is still relatively low. In crypto terms, that’s called a low float. Translation. A smaller percentage of their total token supply is actually trading right now than compared to more mature chains like XRP, ETH, or Solana.

When supply is tighter, prices tend to move more when demand shows up. That cuts both ways. You can get a sharper upside if adoption grows, but you also carry the risk of more volatile downside moves. And that risk increases as the unlocks add more supply.

Important to note that unlocks don’t mean selling will occur. It just means the token can now be traded, transferred or sold.

Here’s the most recent data:

SUI

• Circulating supply: ~3.85 billion tokens

• Max supply: 10 billion (capped)

• Percentage circulating: ~38-39%

• Over 60% remains locked/vested, releasing gradually at a rate of 0.40% to 1.1% over the coming years via scheduled unlocks.

XRP

• Circulating supply: ~61 billion tokens

• Max supply: 100 billion (capped, with monthly escrow releases)

• Percentage circulating: ~61%

• More than 15x SUI’s circulating supply, which makes XRP more liquid and less sensitive to small buying/selling pressure.

ETH (Ethereum)

• Circulating supply: ~120.69 million tokens

• No hard cap, but 37 million ETH (30%) is staked

• Percentage circulating: ~70%

• The raw circulating supply is small in absolute terms, but Ethereum behaves like a mature, high-liquidity asset due to broad distribution, institutional holdings, and massive on-chain activity.

SOL (Solana)

• Circulating supply: ~568 million tokens

• Total supply: ~620 million (no hard cap; inflationary but rate declining to low levels)

• Percentage circulating: ~91-92%

• High float relative to newer chains like Sui—nearly fully circulating, though staking removes a significant portion from the immediate liquid supply.

SUI stands out with only 38% of its float unlocked, which gives it tighter supply dynamics in the short to medium term than mature, heavily circulated assets like XRP or SOL, and even ETH, given the significant supply tied up in staking.

If the best assets rise in line with Bitcoin, as the ones mentioned above do, the outperformance you get from picking the smaller, less liquid assets can go vertical. But that only works if Bitcoin's price increases.

And for Bitcoin to run up, financial conditions need to ease, rates need to fall, and debt needs room to roll.

You can see ETH, XRP, SOL, and SUI mirror each other on the chart below, but aggressive moves, up or down, are exaggerated, largely based on their size.

Macro experts say this is the final hurdle.

24.9% of the $38.5 trillion national Debt Matures in 2026.

This is what Crypto folks are hanging their hat on, and why I won’t be selling my SUI until this debt rollover is factored into the price of Crypto.

With rates higher, the US has not been able to roll over its debt, which usually has an optical rising effect on assets. Higher interest rates also crowd out spending, which squeezes risk assets.

It’s simple. If people have more money, they’ll invest more in risk assets like Crypto.

Kevin Warsh was announced as the future successor to Jerome Powell as Fed chair, someone who has been openly critical of Powell. Right after the announcement, it triggered a sharp sell-off in gold and silver. It also hit our beloved internet money because of the easier access to capital while traders waited for the market to reopen.

Warsh is known as an inflation “hawk”. In central banking terms, a hawk prioritises fighting inflation, while a dove prioritises growth and jobs. Which, if you think about it, kinda goes against the current adminsttraitons stance on the economy.

Not everyone is convinced.

Some see Warsh as someone whose political stance shifts with the wind depending on who’s in power. Paul Krugman, a professor, former NYT columnist, and someone Trump once called a “deranged bum”, said:

“As I noted, many news reports have characterized Warsh as a monetary hawk, but I argued that he’s more of a political weathervane: He’s for tight money when Democrats are in power, but all for running the printing presses hot when a Republican is in the White House.”

Neil Dutta, another sceptic and investing expert, used AI to map every single one of Kevin Warsh’s speeches and public comments.

He went all the way back to 2006 and scored each of them on a hawkish-to-dovish scale.

On a chart, there is nowhere for it to hide. You see the data, the political lean, and a pretty loud signal that Warsh would likely cut rates quickly once he steps into the Fed Chair seat.

Warsh will likely get out of Trump’s way and drop rates faster than a broken elevator.

When that happens, there’ll be a metric ton of cash freed up.

A huge chunk of U.S. debt matures between now and December 2026, with the midterms in November, so a lot needs to happen before then.

This list shows all maturity dates in one place. Since thousands of individual Treasury securities mature daily, weekly, and monthly, they all hit at different times. What the Treasury does instead is publish a full breakdown of the Public Debt in its Monthly Statement.

Inside that report, there’s a section called “Detail of Marketable Treasury Securities Outstanding,” which lists every security, its maturity date, and the amount.

Approximate monthly maturity amounts (in trillions) and % of total public debt (~$38.5T) are estimated as follows:

• February 2026: $1.5 – 2.0T (heavy bill rollovers + major quarterly notes/bonds on Feb 15)
  → 4 – 5% of total debt

• March 2026: $1.0 – 1.5T (mostly short-term bills)
  → 3 – 4%

• April 2026: $0.5 – 0.8T (lighter month, mainly bills)
  → 1 – 2%

• May 2026: $1.2 – 1.5T (quarterly refunding: notes/bonds on May 15)
  → 3 – 4%

• June 2026: $0.6 – 0.9T (bills + some notes)
  → 1.5 – 2.5%

• July 2026: $0.6 – 0.8T (mostly bills)
  → 1.5 – 2%

• August 2026: $1.0 – 1.3T (quarterly refunding + bonds/notes on Aug 15)
  → 2.5 – 3.5%

• September 2026: $0.4 – 0.7T (lighter, bills dominant)
  → 1 – 2%

• October 2026: $0.5 – 0.8T (bills + minor notes)
  → 1 – 2%

• November 2026: $1.0 – 1.3T (quarterly refunding on Nov 15)
  → 2.5 – 3.5%

• December 2026: $0.5 – 0.8T (end-of-year bills + notes)
  → 1 – 2%

The latest version as of Jan 31, 2026, is here, and most maturities are between now and December 2026.

Final Thoughts.

Legendary investor Stanley Druckenmiller once said:

“Earnings don’t move the overall market; it’s the Federal Reserve Board...focus on the central banks, and focus on the movement of liquidity...most people in the market are looking for earnings and conventional measures. It’s liquidity that moves markets.”

It has already flowed into Gold, Silver, and Tech stocks, but liquidity never sits still.

It has to go somewhere. And in a world that’s getting more digitised by the day, the place with the most explosive upside gravity is crypto.

That’s why we’re here.

Michael Howell, the liquidity maestro, summed up exactly how I see this period in the economy.

“People need to understand that liquidity is the key thing going forward. Liquidity is likely, from a global perspective, to be the main driver of asset markets in the future. One of the reasons I say that is what we’re seeing in the U.S. right now. The Federal Reserve is bailing out the banks. What the Federal Reserve is going to have to do in the next ten years is bail out the government. The U.S. happens to be the cleanest shirt in the global laundry. Other countries are far worse. Ultimately there’s a huge amount of liquidity coming. If you believe QE is dead, forget it. It’s not. It’s coming back, and it’s coming back big time. Investors have got to start adjusting their asset allocation methodologies to take this into account.”

That’s what everyone sitting in risk assets is really waiting for.

That one fast, powerful event where financial conditions loosen over a few months and suddenly prices catapult. The numbers stack up: 2026 is the year.

If Kevin Warsh steps in as Fed Chair around May, that gives roughly six months before the midterms. That window could be extremely strong for asset prices, as we’ll likely start seeing clear signals on interest rates. Warsh has already said, “We can lower interest rates a lot, and in so doing get 30-year fixed-rate mortgages so they're affordable, so we can get the housing market to get going again.”

So there is a lot to play for this year.

SUI still stands out to me for its technology, team, and the fact it’s one of the newest and smallest layer ones. It gets hit harder in downturns, but that same dynamic is why it can outperform in an uptrend. And that uptrend is coming. It’s just taking longer than people expected. Including yours truly.

I usually avoid politics, but the reality is the backdrop right now is tied to it, whether we like it or not.

The next phase, once this SUI trade plays out, will be deciding when to sell. Right now, we’re not there yet.

We also have the CLARITY Act discussion, where the President’s Council of Advisors for Digital Assets at the White House, Patrick Witt, said:

“There are trillions of dollars in institutional capital on the sidelines waiting to get into this (crypto) space.”

This is the last stretch now, folks.

Hang on tight.

We’re nearly there.

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This article is for informational purposes only and should not be considered financial, tax, or legal advice. You should consult a financial professional before making any significant financial decisions.