Bitcoin loses $80,000 as inflation data surprise
Bitcoin fell below $80,000 on Thursday after US producer price data came in above forecasts. TradingView data showed BTC/USD touching its lowest level since Sept. 18, down as much as 1.8% on the day, before recovering to around $81,000.
The September PPI rose 6.3%, a full percentage point above the expected level. Core PPI came in at 5% versus 4.4% expected, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. The release said the September increase was the largest advance since March 2022. On a 12-month unadjusted basis, final demand climbed 6.3%, the biggest annual increase since late 2022.
The report followed a hotter-than-expected CPI print on Wednesday. That also pushed crypto and risk assets lower. Stocks were already under pressure from a tech sell-off in South Korea, where the KOSPI Composite Index fell 7.5% on Thursday.
Yields move away from macro data
Economist Mohamed El-Erian said the PPI result was even more striking than CPI. Still, US bond yields did not rise after the inflation numbers. The 10-year Treasury yield was down almost 3% at the time of writing and sat at its lowest level since Sept. 23. That is a bit odd, perhaps, but it fits a wider shift in market attention.
Robin Brooks, former chief FX strategist at Goldman Sachs, has argued that yields have decoupled from US macro data. He compared the 30-day correlation between upside data surprises and daily moves in the 10-year yield. It dropped from near 0.6 earlier this year to just below zero by the end of August. In his view, markets are more focused on the path of the federal deficit, so longer-term yields can stay elevated even when data surprises change.
Support levels back in focus
For Bitcoin, the move brought two support trend lines back into view. The 21-week and 50-week exponential moving averages sit at $76,144 and about $78,459. Trader and analyst Rekt Capital said BTC/USD could retest both levels and still keep its broader bullish trend. He noted that similar deviations have happened in early-stage bull markets, though those moves came after a bullish crossover of the two EMAs. Bitcoin has not reached that crossover yet.
Bitcoin also stayed below the $82,500 to $82,800 area, which has been a key support zone in recent weeks. Analyst Aksel Kibar said the latest weekly close around $83,700 lacked strength as a breakout. He said a weekly close inside the range could resume wide consolidation between $60,000 and $82,800, with $75,000 as the negation level for the rectangle bottom reversal pattern.
