Bitcoin Rallied After CPI While Fed Hike Odds Climbed Past 85%

A post from The Market Periodical circulated on Friday with one headline figure above everything else: over $1.45 trillion added to markets in a single session. The date was 11 September, the day August CPI landed. Stocks did rise. Bitcoin did rise. But the six percentage gains listed under that headline do not all survive a check against the outlets covering the same session, and the explanation the post attaches to them runs opposite to what rates traders did that afternoon.

What the session actually delivered

The equity figures come closest. Investrade's mid-morning tally had the S&P 500 up 1.04% at 7,670, the Dow up 1.05% at 52,608 and the Nasdaq up 1.18% at 26,389. TheStreet, writing at midday, put the S&P 500 at plus 1.06%, the Dow at plus 1.15% and the Nasdaq at plus 0.88%. The post's 1.05% for the S&P 500 sits inside that band. Its 1.20% for the Dow runs a little hot. Its 1.43% for the Nasdaq is above anything either outlet recorded, and those two outlets do not reconcile with each other either.

Bitcoin came into Friday soft. It had slipped below $77,000 after Thursday's producer price report. Nexo's Friday snapshot then put BTC at $77,741.27, up 1.03% over 24 hours. Blockonomi described a 3% rally after the data, from roughly $76,000 to near $79,000. CoinDesk, covering the same hours, said bitcoin gave up its early gains, sank to $77,000, and stood down about 1% on the day and 5% on the week. Three accounts, three shapes of one session. None of them produces the post's 4.51%. Ether had the better day, up 5.03% at $2,560.36 on Nexo's numbers.

Gold and silver went the other way

The metals slides claim gold up 2.25% and silver up 2.53%. Neither figure matches the reporting from that session. TheStreet's early table had gold down 0.66% at $4,404.40 an ounce and silver up only 0.37% at $65.17. Investrade's mid-morning figure had gold up 0.33% at $4,422.00. Those two readings disagree on gold's direction outright, and which one held into the close could not be established by publication time. What neither shows is a 2% move in either metal.

The rate story runs backwards

The post's own explanation is that treasury yields are falling and rate hike expectations are dropping. Friday says the opposite on the second count. CME FedWatch odds of a hike at the 15 and 16 September meeting stood near 69% before the CPI release, per CoinDesk, up from 59% a week earlier. After the print, TheStreet put them at 85.6% and Investrade at close to 90%. August CPI rose 0.4% on the month and 3.4% on the year, both in line, while core CPI rose 0.3% against a 0.2% forecast.

"A rate hike next week is all but assured. Consumer prices are going in the wrong direction," said Skyler Weinand, chief investment officer at Regan Capital.

Yields are messier. TheStreet had the 10-year note at 4.959%, up 1.5 basis points, with the two-year at 4.63% and 52-week highs across the curve. Investrade had the 10-year at 4.919% and lower on the day. They do not reconcile. The 30-year settled at 5.309%, its highest since June 2004, which is not the shape of a falling-yield session. The calendar behind all of it was crowded into ten days, from PPI on 10 September to the BOJ.

The trillion nobody else counted

That leaves the headline. The post's lead slide shows a board reading "MARKETS +1.45 TRILLION TODAY'S GAIN", and the caption repeats the number. No outlet checked for this article published a $1.45 trillion figure for 11 September, and the post does not say which markets, which index universe or which currency base it covers. It stands unverified. It is reported here as the author's claim and nothing more.

The FOMC meets on 15 and 16 September. If the odds hold, the open question for bitcoin is not Friday's direction but whether a hike is already in the price near $77,000. Ted Pillows, posting after the CPI print, said the move lacked a spot bid: "Today's pump was also not driven by strong spot demand." QCP Capital made the structural version of the same point, calling elevated treasury yields a headwind. One green session does not settle that.