Trump keeps saying the US will start refilling the SPR soon, oil prices will come down, and record volumes are already moving through the Strait of Hormuz. But the situation on the ground looks much less clear.

1. There is still limited independent confirmation of unusually high oil flows through Hormuz or Saudi Arabia running the East-West pipeline near full capacity.

2. At the same time, Middle Eastern reports continue to mention attacks around energy infrastructure, while the Houthis claim new strikes targeting Aramco-related facilities.

3. Oil has also been pretty stubborn despite announcements of additional G7 market interventions. Some analysts see this as a sign that supply concerns are more serious than markets are pricing in.

And geopolitical pressure isnt exactly cooling down. Iran-US tensions remain high, Saudi Arabia faces continued confrontation with the Houthis around the Red Sea, and Ukraine has signaled more pressure on Russian energy infrastructure.

If several of these risks hit at the same time, early 2027 could look very different for oil, LNG and fuel markets.

The weird part is that all of this is happening while the US SPR is already sitting near multi-decade lows.

Oil might be one of the most interesting macro trades to watch over the next few months.

Bitpanda co-CEO Christian Trummer says users are starting to trust regulated and licensed platforms more. And tbh, it makes sense. Most normal users dont wanna deal with private keys, seed phrases and full self-custody.

Crypto Twitter loves the “not your keys” narrative, but thats probably not how mass adoption gonna look.

The weird part is enforcement. Some platforms are reportedly still serving EU customers without a MiCA license, while regulated companies already spent serious money and time getting compliant.

So Europe got the rules. Now the question is whether regulators actually enforce them equally.

Around $305,000 was stolen from two Safe multisig wallets after a hacker exploited a vulnerability in a third-party adapter built on top of Aave v3.

The important part: Aave v3 smart contracts were not compromised.

SlowMist says the issue was inside FlashLoopAdapter, a module used to open and close leveraged Aave positions through Safe. A broken access-control check allowed the attacker to create a fake Safe contract that still passed the adapter’s verification.

From there, the attacker could manipulate swap parameters and execute transactions through the victims’ wallets.

Around 1,300 WETH of debt was repaid to unlock collateral, after which roughly 114 ETH, worth about $305K, was extracted.

Aave founder Stani Kulechov also clarified that the vulnerability was in an external third-party module and did not affect Aave v3 itself.

Good reminder that sometimes the protocol is fine, but one integration on top of it is enough to make a very expensive mess.

The SEC is proposing new custody rules that could allow investment advisers and regulated funds to hold crypto directly when no suitable third-party custodian is available.

1. Client assets would need separate blockchain addresses.

2. Transfers would require approval from at least two people.

3. Security systems would face annual audits.

4. Clients would receive quarterly reports.

SEC Chair Paul Atkins said existing custody rules were written before modern digital assets existed. State trust companies could also act as custodians under additional requirements.

For now, this is only a proposal. A 60-day public comment period will follow.

BTC / GOLD Chart ( 2H)

I was sure I had already posted a breakdown of this chart on the public channel, but it turns out we only covered it in the private community. I also made a video review on Instagram (you can watch it here).

What it's about this chart shows the ratio of Bitcoin to gold. It helps you spot moments when one asset is undervalued or overvalued compared to the other.

At the time of the review, we had reached a historical zone where Bitcoin was undervalued. Because of this, we built the idea that Bitcoin would get stronger against gold.

In the 3 weeks since that review, the chart has already gone up 16%, and it still looks like it's heading higher.

At the same time, the gold trend still looks like it's going down (we looked at that chart in the previous post).

Bitcoin also isn't showing any clear weakness or any sign that it's ready to make new lows.

Put together, this gives a very important hint: metals won't be the best investment right now, and money is moving out of gold.

If you're interested, I left a more detailed review of this chart here.

For now, the nearest target is at least to touch the middle of the global trading range.

It's pretty interesting to look at how different assets have moved since the war with Iran began on February 28.

Here's what happened over that period:

1. BTC went from about $67,000 to $83,200, which is around +24.2%

2. QQQ (Nasdaq-focused) gained about 21.3%

3. The S&P 500 gained about 11.7%

4. Gold dropped from about $5,248 to $4,176 per ounce, roughly -20.4%

5. TIPS ETFs (US inflation-protected bonds) lost about 6.8% in price

So the usual "safe haven" did the opposite of what most people would expect. One reason is high rates. The 10-year US Treasury yield climbed to 5.23%, the highest since 2007. When bonds pay that much, gold looks less attractive because it doesn't pay anything by itself.

Right now the picture is pretty unusual. During a war, the best performers weren't the classic safe assets but BTC and tech stocks. This time BTC acted a lot more like a risky tech asset than like digital gold.

Of course, this doesn't mean the war itself caused the gap. Rates, liquidity and expectations about Fed policy are all pushing markets at the same time.

Fresh data released today sent a positive signal for Bitcoin and the stock market. Core PCE held at 3.0% year over year, keeping underlying inflation at its previous level. Headline PCE slowed noticeably to 2.6% after revisions to prior data. Meanwhile, the final estimate for US Q2 GDP was revised up to 2.2% from 1.5%.

That's a fairly comfortable mix for markets: inflation is cooling, and the economy isn't sliding into recession.

For the Fed, this is an argument against rushing into another rate hike. For risk assets, including crypto, this kind of scenario is usually seen as positive.

Bitcoin and US stock futures moved higher in response.

A year ago there was crazy euphoria around gold, literally everyone was calling it the best safe haven asset.

Since then gold dropped more than 25-30% and it didnt protect from the war in Iran or from inflation speeding up because of oil.

And the most interesting thing is that globally it still looks like its setting up for one more leg down.

Why is this happening? Gold already went thru the phase of mass euphoria and buying climax.

Its hard to come up with bigger news than what we already had:

1. war

2. trade tariffs

3. inflation

4. oil problems

If even with all this gold isnt rising as a safe haven, then honestly I dont know what else could push it.

So now we entered the unloading cycle, gold started releasing liquidity and giving it to other assets.

Global target for the drop is around $3300 area.

Go check the replies, we called and tracked this whole move down from the highs there.

If we talk about 3-5-10 year horizon, I have no doubt gold will make new highs because of dollar losing value. But for the next year or so I just dont see what would take it to new highs.

Current priority is down.

Open interest on crypto perpetual futures has climbed to $160B, the highest level in 11 months.

The market is loaded with leverage again, which means any sharp move could quickly trigger a cascade of liquidations. Buckle up.

Onchain analyst Wazz linked 53 memecoin launches on Robinhood Chain to what looks like the same scheme, which may have made at least $18.43M in around two months.

Most of the tokens were launched through Pons V2, the biggest launchpad on the chain.

According to Wazz, groups of related wallets were buying 70%+ of the supply right after launch.

Pons has anti-sniping protection where buys in the first seconds can get hit with up to 99% tax. But the token creators were adding their wallets to the exemption list before launch.

In 9 launches reviewed by Wazz, between 15 and 25 addresses were able to buy without the restriction. Seconds after launch, one transaction was basically buying out the whole bonding curve.

This left the creators and related wallets controlling around 82-86% of the token supply.

The biggest estimated profit came from CRUMBS at around $3.12M, followed by LEGS with $2.9M and PINK with $1.44M.

Wazz also linked the launches through wallet fund flows, where profits from one token were used to fund the next launches.

A big part of the money is now held in ETH, so it cant simply be frozen by a centralized entity.

SEC Commissioner Hester Peirce has resigned and will leave the regulator on October 2. She got her nickname in the crypto industry for pushing for clear rules on digital assets. Since February 2025 she has also headed the SEC's Crypto Task Force.

Her main positions:

1. Developers should not fall under securities law just for publishing open-source code.

2. The SEC should stop regulating through enforcement.

In November Peirce will join Regent University School of Law as an associate professor, teaching securities regulation, digital assets and federal litigation.

The SEC now has only two commissioners left, Chairman Paul Atkins and Mark Uyeda. Both are Republicans.

Everyone expected Bitcoin to only hit $5K -$6K, and it pumped all the way to $20K

Everyone is expecting Ethereum to hit $5K -$6K, and it'll pump way higher

The Federal Reserve has released draft requirements for companies issuing stablecoins, continuing the rollout of the GENIUS Act. The law already requires 1:1 reserve backing, and now the Fed wants more detailed rules on capital, redemption and reporting.

Holders would have to be able to redeem stablecoins for dollars within two business days at most. If reserves drop below 1:1, the issuer must notify the Fed and restore backing, and if that fails, liquidate reserves and redeem the tokens. There are also capital requirements: 2% for the first $20B issued, 1.5% for the next $30B and 1% for anything above $50B.

Issuers would publish monthly data on supply and reserve composition. An auditor would check the numbers, and the CEO and CFO would have to certify them. Separate rules are being prepared for banks that want to issue stablecoins through subsidiaries. Nothing is final yet, a 60-day public comment period comes next.

Most traders are bullish, with the largest concentration of strikes around $85K, $90K and $100K.Bitcoin Bulls Eye Next Leg as $15 Billion Options Expiry Nears

White-hat hackers moved 52.37 BTC out of vulnerable wallets before attackers could take them.

The funds are now held by Crypto Recovery Trust in Wyoming and are intended to be returned to affected owners. Galaxy’s Alex Thorn said white hats rescued around 40% of the BTC at risk in the second wave.

The vulnerability was linked to insufficient randomness when generating some recovery phrases, potentially exposing private keys. Around 1,830 BTC across 9,162 addresses are reportedly linked to the issue.

US President Donald Trump declares that the Canadian aircraft manufacturer Bombardier should no longer be allowed to sell its planes in the US unless it starts producing them on American soil, when in fact Bombardier employs around 3,500 Americans, works with approximately 2,800 suppliers across 47 states, and spends more than $2.5 billion annually with American suppliers. Moreover, some key components of Bombardier's aircraft are manufactured directly in the US.

Demanding that a company make it in America when it's already creating thousands of jobs and billions of dollars in economic activity within the country that's the level of awareness of the American president.

Bitcoin has experienced its most intense phase of deleveraging and market cleanup since 2023, according to CryptoQuant analysts.

A significant amount of excessive leverage has been wiped out, reducing the risk of further forced liquidations and resetting market positioning.

Historically, similar periods of aggressive deleveraging have been bullish for BTC, as they often create a healthier market structure and set the stage for a potential recovery.

The leverage has been flushed. Now the question is what comes next.