GM. This is Milk Road, the heart rate monitor of crypto newsletters (we help you check the market’s pulse).
Here’s what we got for you today:
- ✍️ Why’s the market bleeding?
- ✍️ The AI/crypto hybrid play
- 🎙️ The Milk Road Show: Crypto Is No Longer the Trade & How AI Flipped the Script Forever w/ Kyle Reidhead
- 🍪 Wintermute’s CEO denied plans to sue Binance
Wormhole Portal is a bridging app that rewards you for bridging. 👉 Start earning XP rewards now!
Prices as of 2:00 PM ET. Trade today with Milk Road Swap.
WHY THE MARKET WEAKNESS? 📉
Man, it’s been a rough start to the week…
We think there’s a chance there might be some larger, yet-to-be-revealed issue within the crypto market’s plumbing pushing this sell off, but for now – what we can point to is FUD:
Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt.
Or more specifically: Uncertainty, Doubt, Fear – in that order.
Again – there could still be more to this story than we currently know (or it could simply be the fear of the unknown) – but for now, here’s a broad timeline of events that we’ve pieced together:
1/ Uncertainty: a hawkish Fed
At the Oct 29 Fed presser, Fed Chair Jerome Powell made some hawkish comments (aka: comments suggesting the Fed may not cut rates again in the near-term):
“A further reduction in the policy rate at the December meeting is not a foregone conclusion, far from it.”
This is an overly simplified explanation, but:
Higher rates typically strengthen the US dollar, giving big-dog investors more incentive to stay holding dollars and less incentive to look for returns in risk assets (like crypto).
And guess what’s been climbing in value ever since Powell made this remark?
2/ Doubt: ETF outflows
These comments spurred doubt in institutional investors, pushing them to de-risk their portfolios (and crypto is seen as one of the riskiest assets out there).
From Oct 29 until today, $1.33B has left the BTC ETFs:
Meanwhile, $499.5M has left the ETH ETFs:
3/ Fear: the Balancer exploit
The rotten cherry on top of all of this? Yesterday, a sophisticated exploit drained ~$128M from the Balancer DeFi protocol.
This is a project that has undergone extensive auditing from top security firms.
And when the TradFi world is in the slow process of moving parts of its business onto decentralized rails – this is the kind of thing that will put the fear of God in ‘em.
The result so far?
The total crypto market cap dropped 9.75% (top to bottom) between last Wednesday’s Fed press conference and today:
Now – lemme “get real” with you, like a cool camp counselor sitting backwards on a chair:
This isn’t gospel. It’s one potential chain of events condensed into a short read. The market has WAY more levers pushing on it beyond these three events.
If you want to broaden your understanding of what’s going on, where the market could be heading, and which assets will do well:
Check out today’s episode of The Milk Road Show, where Kyle walks us through his current market framing. 👇
YouTube | Spotify | Apple Podcasts
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TWO COMPANIES MAKING THE AI/CRYPTO HYBRID PLAY 🤖
As the famous hockey player, Dwayne Gretzky, once said…
The key to success is “skating to where the ball is going”.
(To my Canadian friends, am I getting that right?)
The same logic applies in business and investing. If you can see where the market is moving, and move ahead of it – you’re going to find success.
Case in point: IREN and Cipher Mining.
These two Bitcoin mining companies recognized that even with the trillions of dollars of planned investment in AI data center build-outs, it's still not going to be enough to meet future demand.
(Hell, current demand isn’t even being met.)
They each saw the inevitable supply restriction → and made their respective moves.
IREN cozied up to Microsoft:
And Cipher cozied up to Amazon:
As a result…
The lesson here:
Follow the companies/projects that can (and will) move to where the capital is flowing.
Right now, a big chunk of the crypto sector (most projects outside of the major L1s) are blocked from large capital flows.
Institutions can’t pump capital into the vast majority of crypto tokens when there’s no regulatory guidelines allowing them to do so.
The Market Structure Bill and Clarity Act should help clear this up – but these pieces of legislation are moving at the speed of government (and a shutdown government at that).
We believe onchain markets are the future – and that one day, the majority of global capital will live onchain…
But in the near-term, we need to “skate to where the ball is going”. (Yep, pretty sure that’s a perfect quote).
And right now, that is towards fundamentally strong (institutional capital-attracting) assets that do not rely on heavy speculation to move.
P.S. You should read this past weekend’s PRO Report to get a broader view of the current crypto/AI market outlook.
PRO ALL ACCESS PORTFOLIO UPDATES 📊
The Total Crypto Market Cap is up 5.02% so far in 2025.
Meanwhile, the Milk Road PRO All Access Portfolio is up 23.75%. 👇
Wanna know how we’re doing it, and get notified on which projects we’re allocating to, in real-time?
Join Milk Road All Access and read our “How To Build a Crypto Portfolio” report to learn more about our portfolio strategy.
The Milk Road PRO All Access Portfolio is exclusive to PRO All Access members.
GO ALL ACCESS AND UNLOCK:
- The Milk Road PRO All Access Portfolio — See what we’re investing in, how we’re allocating capital, and what actions we’re taking each week (buy, sell, hold, watchlist) ✅
- Weekly “Where Are We In The Cycle?” Indicators — Signals that help you spot the market top before it’s too late 📈
- Weekly Reports Across Crypto, Macro & Degen — Deep dives, token breakdowns, market analysis, and investing frameworks that give you the edge 🧠
- Access to the Milk Road Community — Full Discord access including signals, AMA invites, portfolio update calls, and exclusive All Access channels 💬
- FREE Crypto Investing Masterclass — Included with all annual All Access subscriptions (30% off for monthly) 🎓
PRO REVIEW OF THE WEEK
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The race is heating up: who will be the next Fed Chair?
Rumor dispelled? Wintermute’s CEO has denied they're planning on suing Binance.
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