Weekly Crypto Market Wrap: 14th July 2025

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This is not financial advice. As always, do your own research.

Week in Review

• U.S. lawmakers are preparing for “Crypto Week” to review major crypto bills, including the GENIUS Act for stablecoin regulation and the CLARITY Act to define regulatory authority
• The memecoin ecosystem is evolving rapidly with new platforms like MemeX/MRC20 and the International Meme Fund introducing credit markets for meme assets
• Trump Media’s Truth Social filed for a blue-chip crypto ETF

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Technicals & Macro

BTCUSD

Source: TradingView

Bitcoin has broken into clear air. 

The beast continues to rip higher and higher, now trading at $123k at the time of this writing after printing new all time highs in four of the last five sessions, with price action sharp but remarkably orderly. This move has been driven by a potent combination of real spot demand, structural ETF inflows (IBIT now >700k BTC AUM), treasury accumulation from names like Metaplanet and Strategy, and a renewed push from institutional level buying (evidenced by Saylor’s $4.2bn capital raise and plan to resume BTC buying).  Technically, BTC has cleared major resistance zones at $109k, $112k and now $120k, placing the king firmly in price discovery mode with eyes on $125k-$136k as logical upside magnets. 

Macro-wise the market is entering a pivotal week with US CPI on Tuesday and PPI on Wednesday, both of which are critical for shaping the Fed’s policy amid rising fears of stagflation. The FOMC minutes confirmed a growing split amongst the committee, with some governors open to July cuts if inflation data corporates, even as Powell faces political pressure and questions around job security. 

At the same time, crypto legislation in the U.S. is picking up pace: the House is reviewing the GENIUS Act (stablecoins), the CLARITY Act (SEC/CFTC oversight), and the Anti-CBDC Act, which seeks to ban any Federal Reserve–issued digital currency. While the focus is specific, the broader market read-through is clear, regulatory certainty is materialising, and with it comes institutional confidence.

Basis grinding higher

Importantly, this doesn’t feel like leverage-fueled breakout; exchange reserves are at 14.5% of supply, futures basis has widened materially and implied vols remained anchored in contago, suggesting significant asymmetry still exists in short dated gamma. If CPI undershoots this week, we could see a vol breakout led by front-end strikes.

Gold (still) holding the range

Gold is still the favourite geo/political and inflation shock hedge in this market. Bitcoin leg up is moving in line today here, which does reinforce the macro-hedge narrative to some extent.

ETHUSD

ETH is finally catching a bid, up to the $3000 levels. The move came after breaking out of a multi-week consolidation range and crossing back above key moving averages. Flows are rotating back into ETH off the back of institutional ETF demand and an uptick in DeFi activity. Open interest on ETH options is rising and the options skew is tilting bullish again.

I also can’t forget about Solana. SOL remains one of the strongest majors holding above $160 and gaining about 7% on the week. Continued strength in ecosystem TVL, address growth (now 3.3M +) and ETF product expansion (SOL staking ETF volumes remain solid) have helped it retain momentum.

The market (myself in particular) is watching signs of ‘altseason’ rotation, in this move up we’re seeing Bitcoin dominance materially dropping and correspondingly the ‘altcoin season index’ is grinding higher. Also at the forefront of hyper positive sentiment indicators (memecoins) – we’ve observed PENGU make a run this past week. Should this traction continue and we might just see the long-awaited banana zone with alts. Stay safe out there.

Emir Ibrahim, Analyst

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Spot Desk

With Vol reaching its lowest level since October 2023, it was imminent. Bitcoin takes the spotlight breaking out of what was honestly becoming quite a boring 6 week range around the 105k level, smashing into new all time highs on Wednesday – and as I write, still going. Surging to 119.5k over the weekend, Bitcoin led the way for the alts to follow as ETH, SOL, and the broader crypto market rallies.

The RBA surprised us on Tuesday, holding interest rates at 3.85% after the market was pricing in a 25bps cut resulting in volatile price action on the AUD/USD pair. President Trump unveiled a sweeping 50% Tariff on Brazilian goods, and also announced an increased Tariff on Canadian imports from 25% to 35%  – with further hikes still possible. He also reinforced the 25% Tariff on Japanese and Korean goods plus a 50% levy on copper. FOMC minutes revealed a split with a minority seeing no rate cuts later this year while most policy makers expected cuts in 2025. Treasuries saw a brief rally after the release but quickly dissipated. Major US  indices  S&P 500 and NASDAQ broke out into new all time highs on the back of strong Q2 earnings reports, particularly from the Tech and Communications sectors. Banks also performed well fueled by volatility linked to trade policy shifts.

In light of this, markets showed mixed sentiment, with a risk-on tone reflected in rising US equities and crypto, while gains in gold and bonds pointed to underlying caution. This divergence between falling yields and climbing equities highlighted ongoing concerns about trade tensions and global growth.

The desk saw heightened crypto activity as we noticed individual investors bidding up BTC, while the institutional flow was mixed – most of the offers were relatively small and heavily outweighed by the larger clips on the bid. Altcoin flow was mixed. Clients were offering assets like ETH, TRX and EUL while they were bidding up AVAX and GIZA, highlighting directional uncertainty that continues to surround the altcoin market. On the FX side, USDT/AUD flow was somewhat balanced with a skew towards the offer as clients took advantage of the volatility surrounding the RBA interest rate decision.

We noticed a heavy skew towards offramping activity on both USDT/USD and USDC/USD flow that remained consistent throughout the week, and is likely to continue for the foreseeable future. Subsequent to this, the desk is often axed to sell stables from 6pm – 12am AEST, and we can often offer sharper rates than usual while we are axed. Feel free to hit up the OTC desk through the live chat on the Zerocap portal any time to discuss any enquiries surrounding our axes! 

The OTC desk continues to offer tailored cryptocurrency liquidity solutions, offering competitive pricing across major coins, altcoins, and memecoins, paired with key fiat currencies. With T+0 settlement, we ensure seamless trading and settlement.

Oliver Davis, OTC Trader

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Derivatives Desk

WHOLESALE INVESTORS ONLY*

BTC and ETH basis rates have shot up over the past week. BTC’s 90-day annualised basis now stands at 7.84%, while ETH’s has risen to 6.72%. It will be interesting to watch whether this rally in basis continues to widen as Bitcoin trades near all-time highs. If so, basis traders could stand to earn compelling yields.

Trade Idea:
Buy Dec 2025 150k BTC call options, delta-hedged.

Thesis:
Last week, we highlighted this trade idea, and since then, BTC has rallied approximately 10%. While traders positioned accordingly would have captured some PnL from realised volatility, we’ve yet to see any significant pickup in implied volatility.

In our view, implied vol remains relatively cheap—particularly given that Bitcoin is trading at all-time highs.

Trade:

Buy Dec 2025 150k BTC call options, delta-hedged.

This trade provides convex exposure to upside volatility for relatively low premium, while hedging directional risk.  A sharp risk rally; exogenous volatility repricing; or even a dip back to the lows could favour this trade.

Berkeley Cox, Derivatives Analyst

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What to Watch

Monday 14 July

China Trade Balance: Export growth expected to remain soft, highlighting weak global demand and weighing on commodity-linked currencies like AUD.

Tuesday 15 July

US CPI (June): Core CPI expected at +0.3% m/m. Markets focused on tariff pass-through and signs of disinflation. A soft read could firm up expectations for a July or September Fed cut.

China Q2 GDP, Retail Sales, Industrial Production: Growth likely subdued; any downside surprises could pressure AUD via trade and sentiment channels.

Wednesday 16 July

US PPI (June): Complements CPI print. Markets looking for continued producer disinflation to validate Fed easing bias.

Thursday 17 July

Australia Labour Force Survey (June): Unemployment expected to hold at 4.1%. A soft print could reinforce the RBA’s dovish tilt, particularly if participation drops.

US Weekly Jobless Claims & Philly Fed: Continued rise in claims would support labour market softness narrative. Philly Fed gives a read on regional manufacturing health.

US Export/Import Prices: Tariff-driven impacts in focus, though typically secondary to core CPI/PPI.

Friday 18 July

US UoM Consumer Sentiment (July, prelim): Confidence fragile amid inflation and rates; markets watching for cracks in consumer resilience ahead of Q3.

Emir Ibrahim, Analyst

* Index used:

Bitcoin	Ethereum	Gold	Equities	High Yield Corporate Bonds	Commodities	Treasury Yields
BTC	ETH	PAXG	S&P 500, ASX 200, VT	HYG	SPGSCI	U.S. 10Y

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