Tariff clouds temporarily ease, is the bull market horn sounding again?

Original Title: "Tariff Clouds Temporarily Lifted, Is the Bull Market Coming Back?"
Original Author: Azuma, Odaily

 

With new progress in tariff negotiations between China and the US, sentiment in the crypto market has rapidly heated up.

From last night to this morning, the market saw another significant surge. According to Okx market data (as of 9:30), BTC broke through 115,000 USDT, reaching as high as 115,590 USDT, with a 24-hour increase of 3.02%; ETH approached 4,200 USDT, peaking at 4,194.84 USDT, with a 24-hour increase of 5.88%; SOL reclaimed the 200 USDT mark, reaching a high of 205.09 USDT, with a 24-hour increase of 5.58%.

Besides BTC, ETH, and SOL, the altcoin market finally saw a decent recovery, with some tokens posting impressive gains. For example, the consistently strong ZEC reached 368 USDT, with a 24-hour increase of 30.03%; benefiting from renewed AI concept hype, VIRTUAL hit 1.5761 USDT, with a 24-hour increase of 22.25%; other popular protocols like PUMP, PENDLE, and ENA also performed well, with 24-hour increases of 17.64%, 10.06%, and 9.22%, respectively...

Driven by the overall market uptrend, the total crypto market cap has rebounded sharply. According to CoinGecko data, the current total crypto market cap has returned to 3.984 trillion USD, up 3.5% in 24 hours, just one step away from the 4 trillion USD mark. The panic among crypto users has also clearly subsided, with today's Fear and Greed Index reaching 51, shifting from "Fear" to "Neutral".

In derivatives trading, Coinglass data shows that in the past 24 hours, total liquidations across the network reached 421 million USD, with the vast majority being short liquidations, amounting to 345 million USD. By token, BTC liquidations were 169.7 million USD, and ETH liquidations were 110.7 million USD.

Tariff Clouds Temporarily Lifted

From a news perspective, the most direct reason for the rapid market rebound is undoubtedly the new progress in tariff negotiations between China and the US.

From October 25 to 26, the Chinese lead for China-US economic and trade talks, Vice Premier He Lifeng, met with the US leads, Treasury Secretary Bessent and Trade Representative Greer, in Kuala Lumpur for China-US economic and trade consultations.

After the talks, China's Vice Minister of Commerce and international trade negotiator Li Chenggang told Chinese and foreign media that both sides had reached a preliminary consensus on properly resolving several important economic and trade issues of mutual concern, and the next step would be to go through their respective domestic approval procedures.

After the talks, US Treasury Secretary Bessent told US media that after two days of meetings in Kuala Lumpur, both sides had reached a "very substantive framework agreement," laying the foundation for a meeting between the two countries' leaders, and the US side was "no longer considering" imposing 100% tariffs on China. US Trade Representative Greer also stated at a press conference that the China-US trade talks were productive, covering various topics, and both sides were discussing the final details of a trade agreement proposal, which could soon be submitted to the two countries' leaders for review.

Since Trump suddenly reignited the tariff issue earlier this month, clouds have hung over the crypto market and even the global financial markets. On October 11, the market suffered a historic crash. As related tensions gradually eased, the market naturally warmed up as well—speaking of which, this seems to be another classic Trump "raise high, put down gently" strategy, but in the ups and downs, wealth has already been massively redistributed.

This Week's Focus: Interest Rate Decision

The focus for the rest of this week is undoubtedly the Federal Reserve's interest rate decision in the early hours of Thursday—at 2:00 AM Beijing time on October 30 (Thursday), the Federal Reserve FOMC will announce its interest rate decision and economic outlook summary; at 2:30, Fed Chair Powell will hold a monetary policy press conference.

Last Friday, the US Bureau of Labor Statistics released September's overall and core inflation indicators, both of which were below expectations, paving the way for the Fed to further cut rates—US September unadjusted CPI year-on-year came in at 3%, slightly up from last month's 2.9%, a new high since January 2025, but slightly below the market consensus of 3.1%; September seasonally adjusted CPI month-on-month was 0.3%, lower than both the market expectation and previous value of 0.4%. US September unadjusted core CPI year-on-year was 3%, below the market expectation and previous value of 3.1%; September seasonally adjusted core CPI month-on-month was 0.2%, also lower than the market expectation and previous value of 0.3%.

After the CPI data was released, traders increased their bets that the Fed will cut rates twice more this year. CME "FedWatch" data shows the probability of a 25 basis point rate cut by the Fed in October is currently 97.3%, with only a 2.7% chance of rates remaining unchanged; the probability of a cumulative 50 basis point rate cut by December is 95.5%.

"Insider" Whale Moves: Still Bullish

Putting aside all traditional uncertain factors and abstracting market trends to a minimalist problem, the most influential individual recently is undoubtedly the "100% win rate whale" since the 10.11 crash.

According to HyperBot data, the "100% win rate whale since 10.11" currently holds 13x leveraged BTC long positions and 5x leveraged ETH long positions, with unrealized profits of about 17.54 million USD, and has not yet taken profit. Three hours ago, this whale even added another 1,868 ETH long positions. Currently, the whale's total position value is about 339 million USD, with BTC longs worth about 171 million USD at an entry price of 110,680 USD, and ETH longs worth about 168 million USD at an entry price of 3,929 USD.

Clearly, this whale remains bullish. Whether it's insider information or technicals, closely following this whale's rhythm in the short term may be the optimal strategy for the current market.