GM. This is Milk Road, Bitcoin has lost the bull market support band and we’re not panicking yet but we respect your right to panic if you want to. We get it. Vibes are sus.
Here’s what we’ve got for you today:
- ✍️ The economy showed up, markets didn’t.
- ✍️ Is crypto cooked?
- 🎙️ The Milk Road Show: Solana's $657M Stock Trading Boom - When Will SOL Pump?
- 🍪 Solana vs. Wall Street.
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THE ECONOMY SHOWED UP, MARKETS DIDN’T
Real talk bruh, things are wack rn fr.
Jensen is down bad, Bitcoin is losing its grip on the bull market, and our Milk Road Macro Index slipped to -1.08 this week.
Quick refresher so we’re all on the same page, our index combines market momentum, the economy, and a stress gauge into one score, and that score helps us decide if the market is RISK-ON, RISK-OFF, or simply in CAUTION.
It’s still in RISK-OFF mode this week, and it drifted further from the next zone up, CAUTION, which starts at -0.50.
The gap is now 0.59, up from 0.52 last week.
What moved?
The economy side of the index performed well this week. Markets gave back last week’s progress. Overall, the market weakness was stronger. Idk if that makes sense, but if you’ve checked your portfolio recently, you get what I mean.
That pushes the two pillars further apart again. Which has been an on-going story. The economy is showing strength while the market tanks.
Strong jobs numbers and lower oil made the economy stronger, but markets lost the healing that had narrowed the gap to CAUTION briefly last week.
We got a lot of questions answered last week as well:
- The Blue Tsunami: Democrats took both chambers of Congress.
- Oil: prices sold off instead of climbing further (finally).
- Jobs: Friday’s report crushed the soft-hiring scare, with 165,000 jobs added in October (yuge).
- Apple: results showed that even a sales beat can’t protect tech when margins and AI spending are under fire.
The question still open?
After the election, an AI regulatory scare hit the market. In my opinion, it’s still too soon to tell where this goes yet. I do think the market is too bearish about this in the long-term. However, in the short term it’s hard to tell how scared the market could become.
Is it a one-week purge, or the start of a broader risk-off move that keeps financial conditions locked in the red for months?
TBD. Monitoring the situation.
NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang certainly didn’t do the AI bull market any favors this weekend.
The path to CAUTION
The economy can’t do much more for the index right now. It’s already pretty maxed out. Its buffer is at +0.50, near full strength.
So any move toward CAUTION and back to RISK-ON will have to come from markets regaining momentum. A bounce in chip stocks alone won’t get it there. Volatility and credit markets need to calm down and stay calm.
And also important American CEOs will have to stop cheating on their wives with Chinese spies.
So, anyway. Yeah. TBD.
What we’re watching this week
- CPI (Tuesday): the October consumer price report. Cooler inflation would help.
- Chips and high-yield credit: the next few trading days in semiconductor stocks and high-yield (junk) bonds will show whether the selloff is fading or spreading.
Inflation has been steaming like a tea kettle threatening to boil. If it comes in hot again I think a rate hike from the Fed in December is essentially a lock.
Not great.
Bottom line
If inflation cools and credit spreads (the extra yield investors demand to hold riskier corporate debt) hold steady, the path toward CAUTION opens back up. If markets bounce and rally, that could bring some momentum back and maybe lift us back into RISK-ON territory.
However, hot inflation or another broad selloff in risk assets would push the index deeper into RISK-OFF, even with the economy holding up fine
What about Bitcoin?
Welp, I’m afraid Bitcoin has died of dysentery. (I’m jk but the bulls are looking weaker.)
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IS CRYPTO COOKED?
For months, I have been saying that Bitcoin is in a bull market. For months, it has been holding above the range lows of $75.5K.
Bitcoin is around $74,100 this morning. It’s down about 5% on the week and 10% over the past month. This is its lowest price level since late August, after the huge short squeeze, and about 41% below its $126,080 all-time high from October 2025.
I’m not strongly convinced about what happens next for Bitcoin, but my expectation is that it will find a higher low. Once that’s found, I think it begins to move higher into the end of the year. I do not expect Bitcoin to put in a new low below $58K. But either way, I will be watching closely and finding places to accumulate.
The problem facing Bitcoin right now is not too many sellers, it’s buyers needing a reason to step back in with conviction again. Until that happens, I expect mostly chop.
ETH has had it worse recently, down about 8% on the week to around $2,100.
Three things did the damage. The AI selloff in tech hurt risk appetite. Big money pulled back: spot Bitcoin ETFs lost $1.28B last week, the most since June, which flipped their 2026 flows negative. And Sunday’s selloff wiped out more than $1B in leveraged bets.
Looking ahead, history leans bullish, and so do I.
Bitcoin has been higher one year after every midterm election since 2010 (four for four, though that’s a tiny sample). And macro strategist Felix Jauvin told us on the show last week he’s “fundamentally very bullish on the crypto side of things” and that year-end seasonality could bring “a bit of a rip here for the next little while.”
Crypto still needs what the Milk Road Macro Index needs. A cool CPI print Tuesday, calmer credit markets and ETF buyers coming back. Until those show up, expect a bumpy ride.
Actually, either way, expect a bumpy ride.
The main thing is to see this as an opportunity, not a crisis, and make a plan that makes sense for you.
If you want to see what trades I make and how myself and the other Milk Road PRO analysts are navigating this downturn, join Milk Road PRO today for just a buck.
Until next time, stay safe, stay educated, and stay bullish!
BITE-SIZED COOKIES FOR THE ROAD 🍪
Wealthy investors ranked crypto above stocks as the best way to build wealth over 10 years. But only 2% plan to hold it that long. Why though?*
Solana vs. Wall Street: Fidelity says Solana handled ~15% as many trades as 5 major U.S. stock exchanges this year, up from 0.30% in 2022.
Vitalik on ETH: Buterin says Ethereum should treat ETH as a store of value, not a fee-burning token, and that the burn was never as strong as it looked.
South Korea hits snooze (again): The finance ministry wants to push its 22% crypto gains tax to 2029. It was due in January, and this would be delay #4.
*this is sponsored content.
