Chairman Powell's favorite inflation data continued to cool down. The US Core PCE index MoM recorded 0.2% in June, the smallest increase since November 2022! So far, a series of key data has shown that U.S. inflation has fallen from its post-pandemic high and economic growth has remained stable. The Fed’s new hawk, Minneapolis Fed President Kashkari, said that although the Fed’s efforts to maintain price stability, the series of tightening measures adopted may lead to some unemployment and slower economic growth, but the inflation outlook in the United States is "pretty positive". He thinks the U.S. economy can achieve a soft landing, but he also said: "If we need to raise interest rates, that is, further hikes from now on, we will definitely do it."
In terms of implied volatility, BTC/ETH IV continued to be in a downward trend last week. Without the support of realized volatility, the front-end IV continued to be suppressed by structured product sellers and retail traders, and fell more than 20% in an ultra-short day. Today's front-end IV rebounded significantly with the arrival of the US stock trading day, returning to the level around 30%.
The far end of ETH did not rise with the tide, and the IV fell, which may be related to the saturation of the market's bullish sentiment on ETH: In yesterday's trades, a large number of forward ETH options were sold. Starting from a block trade selling 5,000 2300-C in June next year, push forward to 29MAR24, most of the 2400 wings to 6000 tails are sold by retail investors, and then move forward 29DEC23, except for 1,000 2500-C In addition to block trade buy orders and liquidation orders, calls on wings are still mostly sell orders.
On the contrary, in terms of BTC, benefiting from the recent IV downturn, RR fell, and saw traders buying risky at the end of the year (300BTC 29DEC23 20000/40000 RR). In October 38000, a total of 575 BTC was bought in block trade, which was the biggest OI change point yesterday. In September, there was a Long Call Spread with a total of 500 BTC, which replaced the bullish position of 40000-C to a closer 33000-C.
