Crypto Daybook Americas: All Signs Point Up as Bitcoin Hits Record High

By Francisco Rodrigues (All times ET unless indicated otherwise)

Bitcoin BTC surpassed Wednesday's grounds to scope an all-time precocious of $111,875 successful the aboriginal hours of Thursday, according to the CoinDesk Bitcoin Price Index, arsenic accepted fiscal markets contended with rising enslaved yields and renewed concerns implicit ballooning U.S. debt.

The largest cryptocurrency has gained astir 3.8% successful the past 24 hours portion the broader CoinDesk 20 CD20 scale roseate 4.74%, continuing a inclination of spot driven by mounting organization request and increasing involvement successful crypto exposure.

The rally is unfolding against a backdrop of higher yields connected U.S. and Japanese authorities bonds. The 10-year U.S. Treasury output roseate to 4.6%, portion the 30-year topped 5%, driven by concerns implicit President Donald Trump’s taxation measure that analysts estimation could adhd as overmuch arsenic $5 trillion to the country’s debt, according to Reuters.

In Japan, yields connected 30- and 40-year authorities bonds besides deed grounds highs. The country’s debt-to-GDP ratio stands astatine 234%, QCP Capital said, and increasing scrutiny coupled with anemic request for long-dated JGBs sent yields soaring.

That matters due to the fact that higher yields — and frankincense higher returns — connected investments that are considered comparatively harmless thin to little the entreaty of riskier assets similar stocks, not to notation cryptocurrencies. While BTC, with its past of trading arsenic a risky asset, hasn't shown overmuch motion of ebbing demand, it raises the question of however agelong the rally tin continue.

Still, traders person been building ample agelong positions successful BTC options, with the astir unfastened involvement present concentrated astatine the $110,000, $120,000 and adjacent $300,000 calls for contracts expiring successful precocious June successful a motion of continuing bullish conviction.

U.S.-traded spot bitcoin exchange-traded funds person besides been seeing important demand. Total nett inflows deed $1.6 cardinal implicit the week, and $4.24 cardinal truthful acold successful May, SoSoValue information shows. The inflows, coupled with bitcoin’s terms rise, person seen the ETFs' full nett assets deed a grounds $129 billion.

There are, however, immoderate muted signs of bearish activity.

“The largest artifact travel this week continues to beryllium ETH December telephone spreads, portion overnight BTC butterfly positions hint that immoderate traders are positioning for consolidation astir existent levels,” Wintermute OTC trader Jake O. said.

Note, he's talking astir consolidation, not declines. And accepted participants whitethorn adjacent beryllium excessively bearish. While the U.S. endured a caller recognition downgrade, markets are present pricing successful a 6-level cut each the mode down to BBB+.

On apical of that, per Jake O., a caller equities marketplace sell-off whitethorn not beryllium a effect of repositioning fixed higher enslaved yields, but alternatively profit-taking aft 9 consecutive affirmative sessions. Stay alert!

What to Watch

• Crypto
  • May 22: Bitcoin Pizza Day.
  • May 22: Top 220 TRUMP token holders volition be a gala dinner hosted by the U.S. president astatine the Trump National Golf Club successful Washington.
  • May 30: The second circular of FTX repayments starts.
  • May 31 (TBC): Mezo mainnet launch.
• Macro
  • Day 3 of 3: Canadian Finance Minister François-Philippe Champagne and Bank of Canada Governor Tiff Macklem volition co-host the three-day gathering of G7 concern ministers and cardinal slope governors successful Banff, Alberta.
  • May 22, 8 a.m.: Mexico's National Institute of Statistics and Geography releases (final) Q1 GDP maturation data.
    • GDP Growth Rate QoQ Est. 0.2% vs. Prev. -0.6%
    • GDP Growth Rate YoY Est. 0.8% vs. Prev. 0.5%
  • May 22, 8:30 a.m.: Statistics Canada releases April shaper terms ostentation data.
    • PPI MoM Est. -0.5% vs. Prev. 0.5%.
    • PPI YoY Prev. 4.7%.
  • May 22, 8:30 a.m.: The U.S. Department of Labor releases unemployment security information for the week ended May 17.
    • Initial Jobless Claims Est. 230K vs. Prev. 229K
  • May 23, 8:30 a.m.: Statistics Canada releases (Final) March retail income data.
    • Retail Sales MoM Est. 0.7% vs. Prev. -0.4%
    • Retail Sales YoY Prev. 4.7%
  • May 23, 10 a.m.: The U.S. Census Bureau releases April caller single-family homes data.
    • New Home Sales Est. 0.692M vs. Prev. 0.724M
    • New Home Sales MoM Prev. 7.4%
• Earnings (Estimates based connected FactSet data)
  • May 28: NVIDIA (NVDA), post-market, $0.88

Token Events

• Governance votes & calls
  • Arbitrum DAO is voting connected launching “The Watchdog,” a 400,000-ARB bounty programme to reward assemblage sleuths for uncovering misuse of the hundreds of millions successful grants, incentives and work budgets the DAO has deployed. Voting ends May 23.
  • Lido DAO is voting connected adopting Dual Governance (LIP-28), a protocol upgrade that inserts a dynamic timelock betwixt DAO decisions and execution truthful stETH holders tin escrow tokens to intermission proposals astatine 1% of TVL oregon afloat artifact and “rage-quit” astatine 10%. Voting ends May 28.
  • Arbitrum DAO is voting connected a law AIP to upgrade Arbitrum One and Arbitrum Nova to ArbOS 40 “Callisto,” bringing them successful enactment with Ethereum’s May 7 Pectra upgrade. The connection schedules activation for June 17, and voting ends connected May 29.
  • May 22: Official Trump to announce its “next Era” on the time of the meal for its largest holders.
  • June 10: Ether.fi to host an expert telephone followed by a Q&A session.
• Unlocks
  • May 31: Optimism (OP) to unlock 1.89% of its circulating proviso worthy $24.67 million.
  • June 1: Sui (SUI) to unlock 1.32% of its circulating proviso worthy $182.58 million.
  • June 1: ZetaChain (ZETA) to unlock 5.34% of its circulating proviso worthy $11.99 million.
  • June 12: Ethena (ENA) to unlock 0.7% of its circulating proviso worthy $16.78 million.
  • June 12: Aptos (APT) to unlock 1.79% of its circulating proviso worthy $61.86 million.
• Token Launches
  • June 1: Staking rewards for staking ERC-20 OM connected MANTRA Finance end.
  • June 16: Advised deadline to unstake stMATIC arsenic portion of Lido connected Polygon’s sunsetting process ends.

Conferences

• Day 3 of 7: Dutch Blockchain Week (Amsterdam)
• Day 3 of 3: Avalanche Summit London
• Day 3 of 3: Seamless Middle East Fintech 2025 (Dubai)
• Day 2 of 2: Crypto Expo Dubai
• Day 2 of 2: Cryptoverse Conference (Warsaw)
• May 27-29: Bitcoin 2025 (Las Vegas)
• May 27-30: Web Summit Vancouver
• May 29: Stablecon (New York)
• May 29-30: Litecoin Summit 2025 (Las Vegas)
• May 29-June 1: Balkans Crypto 2025 (Tirana, Albania)
• June 2-7: SXSW London
• June 15-17: G7 2025 Summit (Kananaskis, Alberta, Canada)
• June 19-21: BTC Prague 2025

Token Talk

By Shaurya Malwa

• The HYPE token is successful absorption aft a billion-dollar bitcoin commercialized boosted Hyperliquid's fundamentals.
• Pseudonymous trader James Wynn opened a $1.1 cardinal agelong connected BTC utilizing 40x leverage via Hyperliquid successful 1 of the largest on-chain DEX trades ever recorded.
• The position, tied to wallet "0x507," was entered erstwhile BTC was priced astatine $108K and present sits connected implicit $40 cardinal successful unrealized profit.
• Wynn booked partial profits aboriginal Thursday by closing 540 BTC (~$60 million), to nett $1.5 million.
• His anterior exits were followed by BTC declines, truthful traders are watching closely, as reported.
• Hyperliquid runs connected its customized L1, HyperEVM, utilizing the HyperBFT statement (200K+ TPS) with CEX-level features similar real-time bid books and heavy liquidity — nary KYC required.
• The platform’s permissionless plan and lightning-fast execution are progressively drafting superior from centralized venues to DeFi , and this commercialized could acceptable a precedent for whale activity.
• HYPE jumped 15% successful the past 24 hours connected renewed attraction and usage-driven speculation.

Derivatives Positioning

• Analyzing the liquidations heatmap of the BTC-USDT brace connected Binance, the largest liquidations clump astir $108.5K and $106.9K with liquidations worthy $143 cardinal and $112.5 million, respectively.
• Meanwhile, BTC the options marketplace swells post-breakout, with unfastened involvement connected Deribit climbing supra $34 billion, conscionable shy of the all-time precocious of $35.9 cardinal acceptable successful December. The bulk of this positioning is centered connected the 30 May expiry, which present holds implicit $9 cardinal successful notional worth to go a cardinal day for imaginable volatility.
• Bullish sentiment is intelligibly successful control, with traders aggressively targeting upside via calls. Strikes astatine $100K, $120K and $150K person attracted peculiarly ample unfastened interest, reflecting increasing condemnation successful a continued rally.
• Put/call ratios underscore this displacement successful sentiment — the 24-hour measurement ratio has dropped to 0.49, portion the unfastened involvement ratio sits astatine 0.60, indicating a meaningful tilt toward bullish vulnerability pursuing BTC’s determination supra $110K.
• Near-term options enactment is besides picking up, with play and monthly contracts seeing notable inflows. Traders look to beryllium positioning for further momentum oregon short-term terms swings successful the aftermath of the breakout.

Market Movements

• BTC is up 1.19% from 4 p.m. ET Wednesday astatine $110,690.36 (24hrs: +4.05%)
• ETH is up 6.19% astatine $2,662.72 (24hrs: +5.23%)
• CoinDesk 20 is up 3.64% astatine 3,348.63 (24hrs: +4.88%)
• Ether CESR Composite Staking Rate is unchanged astatine 3.03%
• BTC backing complaint is astatine 0.03% (10.95% annualized) connected Binance

• DXY is up 0.25% astatine 99.81
• Gold is down 0.26% astatine $3,305.6/oz
• Silver is down 0.83% astatine $33.17/oz
• Nikkei 225 closed -0.84% astatine 36,985.87
• Hang Seng closed -1.19% astatine 23,544.31
• FTSE is down 0.68% astatine 8,726.62
• Euro Stoxx 50 is down 0.96% astatine 5,402.31
• DJIA closed connected Wednesday -0.91% astatine 41,860.44
• S&P 500 closed -1.61% astatine 5,844.61
• Nasdaq closed -1.41% astatine 18,872.64
• S&P/TSX Composite Index closed -0.83% astatine 25,839.17
• S&P 40 Latin America closed -1.31% astatine 2,597.38
• U.S. 10-year Treasury complaint is down 2 bps astatine 4.58%
• E-mini S&P 500 futures are unchanged astatine 5,865.50
• E-mini Nasdaq-100 futures are up 0.15% astatine 21,188.50
• E-mini Dow Jones Industrial Average Index futures are down 0.17% astatine 41,875.00

Bitcoin Stats:

• BTC Dominance: 63.90 (-0.62%)
• Ethereum to bitcoin ratio: 0.02409 (3.52%)
• Hashrate (seven-day moving average): 875 EH/s
• Hashprice (spot): $58.24
• Total Fees: 7.89 BTC / $847,124
• CME Futures Open Interest: 160,740 BTC
• BTC priced successful gold: 33.4 oz
• BTC vs golden marketplace cap: 9.47%

Technical Analysis

• Bitcoin reached a caller all-time precocious of $111,875 this morning, breaking decisively supra the erstwhile highest conscionable supra $109,000 acceptable successful January.
• With a confirmed adjacent supra that level and nary motion of a plaything nonaccomplishment pattern, the bias remains firmly tilted toward continued upside. In the adjacent term, BTC whitethorn brushwood absorption astir the $112,000–$113,000 range, aligning with a trendline drawn from the anterior highs successful December and January.
• However, past week’s consolidation supra $100,000 — and the palmy reclaim of the erstwhile all-time precocious — suggest this country is present acting arsenic short-term support.
• A pullback beneath $100,000, particularly into the play bid block, would apt correspond a steadfast correction wrong the broader uptrend and could connection a compelling reentry accidental if further downside is seen.

Crypto Equities

• Strategy (MSTR): closed connected Wednesday astatine $402.69 (-3.41%), up 1.73% astatine $409.67 successful pre-market
• Coinbase Global (COIN): closed astatine $258.99 (-0.91%), up 2.78% astatine $266.20
• Galaxy Digital Holdings (GLXY): closed astatine C$31 (+1.57%)
• MARA Holdings (MARA): closed astatine $15.84 (-2.16%), up 4.42% astatine $16.54
• Riot Platforms (RIOT): closed astatine $8.84 (-1.01%), up 3.39% astatine $9.14
• Core Scientific (CORZ): closed astatine $10.78 (-1.28%), up 1.48% astatine $10.94
• CleanSpark (CLSK): closed astatine $10.11 (+4.23%), up 4.65% astatine $10.58
• CoinShares Valkyrie Bitcoin Miners ETF (WGMI): closed astatine $17.75 (-1.33%)
• Semler Scientific (SMLR): closed astatine $44.89 (+7.19%), up 6.01% astatine $47.59
• Exodus Movement (EXOD): closed astatine $32.76 (-5.07%), unchanged successful pre-market

ETF Flows

Spot BTC ETFs:

• Daily nett flow: $607.1 million
• Cumulative nett flows: $43.35 billion
• Total BTC holdings ~ 1.19 million

Spot ETH ETFs

• Daily nett flow: $0.6 million
• Cumulative nett flows: $2.61 billion
• Total ETH holdings ~ 3.49 million

Source: Farside Investors

Overnight Flows

Chart of the Day

• The illustration shows bitcoin unfastened involvement has deed a caller all-time high.
• Most OI is concentrated connected large centralized exchanges, with Hyperliquid showing coagulated growth.

While You Were Sleeping

• Bitcoin Smashes Past $111K, Setting New Record Highs, connected Institutional Fervor (CoinDesk): Bitcoin deed an all-time precocious supra $111,800 Thursday, surpassing Wednesday's record.
• Bitcoin's Rally to Record Highs Puts Focus connected $115K Where an 'Invisible Hand' May Slow Bull Run (CoinDesk): The rally whitethorn look absorption adjacent $115,000 arsenic options dealers with affirmative gamma vulnerability hedge by selling into terms strength, creating contrarian flows that could bounds further upside.
• King Dollar Falls, Bitcoin Marches Toward Sound Money Highs (CoinDesk): Despite soaring 50% from April lows and outperforming tech stocks and Treasuries, bitcoin has yet to reclaim its all-time highs against accepted harmless havens specified arsenic golden and silver.
• GOP Leaders Make Last-Minute Changes to Trump Tax Bill (The Wall Street Journal): Republicans purpose to widen and grow Trump’s 2017 taxation cuts portion covering lone portion of the cost, raising concerns implicit delayed spending curbs and worsening fund deficits.
• Japan’s Possible Response to Rise successful Super-Long Bond Yields (Reuters): Yields connected these bonds are spiking amid concerns astir ample taxation cuts and accrued authorities spending. The cardinal slope is apt to see method tweaks portion avoiding broader intervention.
• Russia’s Struggling War Economy Might Be What Finally Drives Moscow to the Negotiating Table (CNBC): Mounting unit from inflation, falling lipid revenues and depleted subject reserves whitethorn yet unit Moscow into existent bid talks.

In the Ether