Jul 15, 2026, 11:46 a.m.
3 min read
Summary
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Bitcoin’s BTC$64,647.40 rally on Tuesday petered out as investors considered a weaker-than-forecast U.S. inflation figure wasn’t enough to prompt a Federal Reserve interest-rate cut.
While it’s still 3% higher over 24 hours, the largest cryptocurrency has dropped 0.5% since midnight. Ether (ETH), up 4.7% in 24 hours, has also pulled back by 0.5%.
On Polymarket, the perceived odds of a rate increase plunged from 34% to 6.7% after the data came out. Bettors now weigh a 93% chance the Federal Reserve will leave rates unchanged this month, and the CME’s FedWatch shows 30-day fed funds futures prices indicating just a 14.4% chance of an increase.
“Crypto's reaction to the latest CPI report shows the market is becoming more selective in how it interprets macro signals,” Markus Levin, co-founder of XYO, told CoinDesk. “While falling inflation reduces pressure on markets and improves the outlook for risk assets, traders are no longer assuming that every favourable inflation print will automatically lead to rate cuts or new all-time highs.”
Fed Chair Kevin Warsh has said one favorable inflation report was not enough to declare victory, and kept the central bank’s next move tied to incoming data. A July rate cut from the European Central Bank is also effectively off the table, even as Brent crude now above $85 a barrel keeps inflation risks elevated.
More guidance will come from U.S. producer prices, due later today, and PCE data near the end of the month.
“The focus has shifted toward whether inflation can continue to cool without showing signs of a rebound,” Levin said.
That leaves bitcoin’s next move tied less to the July decision than to whether inflation keeps cooling as oil prices rise. Geopolitical developments will remain key as well, given their current impact on oil and gas flows. Stay alert!
Read more: For analysis of today's activity in altcoins and derivatives, see Crypto Markets Today . For a comprehensive list of events this week, see CoinDesk's "Crypto Week Ahead."
What’s trending
- Stripe, Advent offer to buy PayPal for more than $53 billion, sources say (Reuters): Payments giant Stripe offered to buy PayPal in a deal worth $53 billion. The San Francisco-based firm made the $60.50-a-share offer in tandem with private equity firm Advent International.
- UK plans first G7 digital sovereign bond by early 2027 (CoinDesk): The U.K. plans to issue a digital sovereign bond by early 2027, becoming the first of the seven leading industrialized nations to place government debt on a distributed-ledger infrastructure.
- AI agentic payments enter mainstream as Visa, Mastercard, Ripple back x402 standard (CoinDesk): Every major card network has signed on to a payment standard built so that software can pay software without human involvement, bringing closer an era of high-volume, low-value payments between AI agents.
- World shares are mixed and oil prices climb as Iran threatens to block Middle East energy exports (AP): Global equity markets were mixed on Wednesday and oil prices climbed after Iran threatened to block Middle East energy exports now that the U.S. has resumed its blockade of Iranian ports.
Today’s signal
The chart shows the price of Hyperliquid’s HYPE in terms of bitcoin in weekly candles, highlighting the bearish divergence in RSI that is still playing out and indicating further relative downside.
The debut today of perpetual futures on pre-IPO shares of CXMT, or ChangXin Memory Technologies, may change the dynamic. The perps in China’s biggest maker of DRAM memory chips will trade on Trade.xyz, a HIP-3 market. That means the trading volume directly benefits HYPE.
CXMT stock is due to start trading after an $8.6 billion IPO in Shanghai toward the end of the month.
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