Bitcoin regained the $91,000 level in the early US afternoon hours on Friday, continued volatile action and threatened to sustainably break out of its tight week-long range of around $88,000-$90,000.
Possibly behind the rapid 2% move from the morning’s lows was suspicion of intervention in the foreign exchange market by Japanese authorities. The Bank of Japan last night left monetary policy unchanged but was somewhat hawkish in its policy statement. That left the yen modestly stronger against the US dollar – a move that quickly intensified just after midday on the US East Coast, where some traders said the action had the hallmarks of currency intervention.
Despite all the talk about President Trump, Greenland, tariffs, precious metals, artificial intelligence and a host of other headline-grabbing topics, there is a sizable group of traders who believe the weakened yen in recent months – and the implications for leveraged carry trades – are behind bitcoin and the wider crypto market’s struggles.
To the extent that weakness reverses, those same traders believe risk assets like crypto could benefit.
Crypto-related stocks rise
Bitcoin miners, including those with increasing exposure to artificial intelligence infrastructure, all reversed their early declines into a strong rally. Iren (IREN), Hut 8 (HUT), TeraWulf (WULF) and CleanSpark (CLSK) rose 5%-10% despite starting the session in the red. Strategy ( MSTR ), the largest corporate bitcoin holder, rose 5% from Friday’s low. Down early Friday, Coinbase (COIN) pared its losses to just 1%.
US stocks have also reversed an early decline, with the Nasdaq now up 0.6%.
Precious metals continue to rise, with silver now higher by more than 5% to $101.44 per ounces and gold ahead 1.5% to just a few dollars short of $5,000. Platinum and palladium are up more than 6% each.
