Last week saw a strong outperformance of Cryptocurrencies over the major US Equity markets. The NASDAQ index closed higher by (NASDAQ⬆️4.8%) at $11.079 and S&P 500 higher by (S&P500⬆️2.7%) at $3.999, while The Ethereum cryptocurrency closed the week more than (ETH⬆️20%), closing at 1.552 USDT on Sunday. Bitcoin pathed a similar way as Ether and ended the week at 20.881 USDT, higher by more than (BTC⬆️20%). The rally in both markets came because of a confirmed drop in US inflation for December 2022, dropping to 6.5%, with core US CPI dropping to 5.7% (see chart below).
The US consumer inflation continued cooling in December 2022 and the reading came exactly as top economists expected. It dropped from 7.1% p.a. and 6.0%, respectively, from the previous month. Regardless of the lower US CPI, the Fed is expected to raise fund rates again in early February. However, the market is now pricing a lower hike of 0.25% instead of 0.50%. We forecast the YoY US CPI for January 2023 dropped further to 6.3%, with core CPI dropping only slightly to 5.6%.