Our good friend John Dagostino, he's JD1.
I am JD2, head of strategy at Coinbase Institutional, joins us now.
My man, let me get your take on crypto price action.
Uh, we're looking at the chart here for Bitcoin holding on 77,605.
A little bit of an uptrend.
What are you seeing on resistance for BT?
Well, it's always great to be here with the best closer in the business.
So it's been about two months since we've seen each other.
Uh, pretty exciting two months.
We've seen Bitcoin trading in the low 60s up to the high 70s.
For me, the more interesting story is the market structure and the volatility.
So in that time period we've seen Bitcoin with a fall of about 2% standard deviation.
Compare that to the S&P 500, about 1718, the QQQ about 20, and gold at about 22.
So we're seeing Bitcoin less volatile than the other asset classes, less volatile than New York City weather, and way more downside protection than the Mets.
Oh dude, that's a Mets finally won the game this week.
It took them a long time.
I'd say the S&P 500 rose 8% in between Mets victories.
That's how long it actually took.
It's the better part of two weeks.
ETF inflows, what are you seeing so far relative to previous highs and general interest in the ETF adjacent space?
Again, you're just our lucky our lucky stars for these past two months, about 3.7 to $3.8 billion of net inflows into ETFs, some of that coming from the big players, Black Rock and others, Morgan.
Stanley announced their ETF launch, which is fantastic.
Coinbase is a custodian for that.
We now have this thundering herd of 16,000 new brokers running around being able to sell this asset.
Remember, I've said this before on your show, the Bitcoin ETF was the best performing ETF of all time, and until very recently it was not allowed to be proactively sold.
Had to all be incoming.
That's extraordinary.
What are you seeing in terms of general liquidation, sword squeeze conversations?
Obviously we're well off that kind of now infamous event.
Around October 10th of 2025 or so, but we're not entirely out of the woods maybe on that general conversation.
So, so you don't want to see markets recover based purely on short squeezes, right?
That's sort of an unhealthy market structure.
So for sure, the first couple of weeks that was what happened.
What we're seeing now though is good non-leveraged long only spot buying through the ETFs, through the, uh, we call them the OGs, the old guards who used to hold the the old old bros who used to hold the coin in the beginning.
They're now buying back again, so.
You don't want to see in a market recovery.
You don't want to see sporadic buying fueled by leverage and fear.
It was certainly the case in the first couple of weeks, but now we're seeing very, very solid inflows from the ETFs and from retail.
I mean, Bitcoin itself has been relatively range bound here now for several months.
It kind of came down.
It's been waffling back and forth between support and resistance.
Yes, clarity Act.
Is it that or some other big picture catalysy you think finally moves it out of this range?
It's been kind of stuck in for a bit.
It's a great point.
And look, the price handle means that the Handle, to use technical jargon, right, to get to go from 70 to 80s that move that price handle of 7 to 8.
It's really, really, really important, right?
The, what do, what do price charts and coffee mugs have in common?
Handles matter now.
They handle from a technical point, they matter from a technical point of view.
It's a bad 10, it's a good one.
I love it.
Matter from a technical point of view.
They matter from a psychological point of view.
But JD, what they really matter, uh, is that the average short-term Bitcoin holder is, his, his or her cost basis is about 80,000.
So it's a good psychological uplift if you get above your cost basis, so.
I look, I think clarity is going to pass.
I'm optimistic.
I think we're going to do what's right for this country and right for the consumer, but I don't think Bitcoin actually needs a catalyst.
I think the market structure is there.
I think clarity would be just a rocket ship that you talk about the psychological level of these handles, the high.
For Bitcoin, multi-month high was just yesterday, 79,500.
These things, they always know where to go to and not to cross that threshold a little bit more, but then they pull back.
But I'm very, very optimistic.
The great John Dagostino, come back and see us anytime.
Happy Friday.
Have a good weekend.
Always.
See you again soon.
