🥛 The scary part nobody's pricing in 🫣

GM. This is Milk Road, the daily crypto newsletter that helps you see what others miss!

Here’s what we’ve got for you today:

✍️ What we’re watching this week.
🎙️ The Milk Road Show: Michael Saylor Just Bought $2.5B of Bitcoin in a Bear Market… What Does He Know? w/ John Gillen.
🍪 Vitalik laid out Ethereum's 4-year roadmap.

Midnight is a fourth generation blockchain that just launched last week. Check out their launch announcement here.

Prices as of 2:00 p.m. ET. Trade today with Milk Road Swap.

WHAT WE'RE WATCHING THIS WEEK 👀

We just wrapped our Monday morning team huddle and, as always, we’re giving you a glimpse into everything that was covered:

What we're debating.
Where we think this goes.
And how crypto is caught in one of the weirdest setups we've seen in a while.

The headline: Stocks at all-time highs. Bitcoin holding around $75k. And yet we’re all still on edge - why?

(Say it with me now) “Because of U.S.-Iran tensions.”

Friday felt like calm was on the horizon:

Peace talks between the U.S. and Iran were progressing, and the Strait of Hormuz had just reopened to commercial shipping. 👇

Source: @MilkRoad

Then the weekend happened. 👇

Source: @KobeissiLetter

Threats back on. Strait closed again. Talks reversed.

John's read: it's dealmaking theater. Both sides are squeezing for the best deal they can extract.

And Iran knows something important - they can’t pull the ‘Strait of Hormuz card’ with any long-term conviction, because then the whole world would divest from that risk permanently.

So they're posturing hard while they still have some semblance of leverage.

Translation: peace is coming. Just not in a clean straight line.

But there's one part of the story that everyone wants to gloss over, and it's one that's been sticking with us…

DO YOU CARE ABOUT YOUR PRIVACY?

Here’s a fun fact:

90% of people are concerned about the privacy of their data.

Yet privacy hasn’t really been considered for most blockchains.

And that’s why Midnight is doubling down on it.

Midnight is a fourth generation blockchain designed to unlock real-world adoption.

Here’s what they’re building:

A blockchain enabling privacy by default
Infrastructure to bring real-world finance onchain
A dual-component model with the $NIGHT token and $DUST resource

And here’s the cherry on top:

Midnight just launched this week. It’s fresh, live and ready to explore.

Check out their launch announcement here.

WHAT WE'RE WATCHING THIS WEEK (P2) 👀

Everyone's fixated on headline oil prices (currently ~$87) - but John flagged something nastier underneath…

Diesel has hit all-time highs. Jet fuel, too.

Why does that matter? Because your Amazon packages don’t move on gasoline. They move on jet fuel and diesel. Same goes for your groceries, your Shein haul, your new couch - all of it.

When diesel & jet fuel rips, every supply chain in the country gets more expensive, and that lagging inflation hit hasn't fully seeped into the economy just yet.

John's warning: inflation is going to run hotter than the market is currently pricing in. 👇

Source: Polymarket

Which brings us to the weirdest part of this whole setup: the crypto angle.

Consumer sentiment is in the toilet. Inflation risk is brewing. Geopolitics are a coin flip. And yet markets keep moving higher.

It’s the K-shaped economy playing out in real time.

… which is finance-nerd-talk for ‘the rich get richer (as asset prices rise), while the poor get poorer (as cost of living increases)’.

And if you can’t spot it in the charts, you’ll be able to spot it in sentiment. Institutions are blow-your-head-off bullish right now:

Tom Lee just bought $235M of Ethereum last week. Michael Saylor bought $2.5B of Bitcoin.

(Both more than doubling their purchases from the week prior.)

... meanwhile, retail is completely checked out of crypto.

So where does this all shake out?

John's base case: markets grind higher from here. Crypto might lag a bit, but the catalyst to watch is the CLARITY Act. If it passes, Bitcoin likely retests $80k.

From there, it's a coin flip - either it's a "buy the rumor, sell the news" moment and we dump, or it reignites the bull run.

John’s leaning bullish right now. But he’s got bids parked at $60k and $58k, just in case the bear flag printing on the BTC chart decides to play out.