BOJ Eases Off on Policy Tightening

The Breakdown First Five - Wednesday, August 7, 2024

Welcome back to The Breakdown First Five — the 5 most interesting and/or important stories in bitcoin, crypto, and markets to start your day.

5. Fairshake’s Thumb on the Scale

Cori Bush has been ousted in Missouri Democratic primaries to become the second squad member felled in part by an onslaught of crypto spending. Fairshake spent $1.5M against Bush alongside $9M in spending from pro-Israel PAC the United Democracy Project. Bush will be replaced on the Democrat ticket by local prosecutor Wesley Bell, who has not yet taken a public position on crypto. 

4. Marathon’s Stack Grows

Marathon Digital have announced a $124M increase in their Bitcoin holdings in July after switching into ‘full HODL’ mode. The world’s largest public miner bought $100M in BTC from the open market and gained the rest through retained mining rewards. Bitcoin production was up by 17% for the month as a 5% increase in hashrate came online. The firm said they would continue to mine “aggressively” during price drawdowns to take advantage of any dips in hashrate. 

3. “Something Is Happening”

Whales accumulated a huge amount of Bitcoin during this week’s dip and have been stacking sats harder than ever for the past month. $23B worth of BTC has been added to ‘permanent holder addresses’ as identified by Cryptoquant over the last 30 days. Ki Young Ju’s on-chain senses are tingling, he’s “pretty sure something is happening behind the scenes.”

2. Crypto4Kamala

Kamala Harris has selected Minnesota Governor Tim Walz as her running mate. Walz is largely a blank slate on crypto but comes from the progressive wing of the party. Democrat supporters within the industry are organizing around Harris, launching a new initiative called ‘Crypto Advocates for Harris.’ They will hold a town hall next Wednesday with several Democrat lawmakers. No Harris staff are confirmed. 90 days out from the election the Democrats still have no official crypto platform. 

1. BOJ Backs Down

The Bank of Japan appears to be backing away from policy tightening after triggering a meltdown in global markets this week. A BOJ deputy governor said they wouldn’t hike rates while the markets are unstable and that current policy settings were appropriate given low concerns about runaway inflation. Markets read this as a complete capitulation, dumping the Yen. Most assume the first Japanese hiking cycle in 17 years is already over.