Is This Country The Next Crypto Frontier??

Those of a certain vintage may remember a time when Japan looked set to take over the world. While neighbouring China is now the biggest threat to US hegemony, back in the 1980s Japan’s economy was booming to the extent that the Tokyo stock exchange became the biggest in the world. How times have changed.

While Japan is still a powerhouse in many respects, its glory days are long past. Wages and growth have stagnated since the boom years, while the demographic challenges it faces are among the most serious in the world. Japan badly needs a shot in the arm, in more ways than one.

The question for today is, could this boost possibly come from crypto? You may be surprised to hear that the Japanese government is insanely bullish on Web3 and has had coherent crypto regulations in place for several years now. So, is it about time we started downloading Duolingo and booking flights to Tokyo?

Well, in today’s video, you’ll find out the answer. In it, we look at Japan’s story over the last few decades and examine its trajectory from emerging as a titan of TradFi to becoming crypto-curious. We’ll also dig into the crypto scene there and see how one of the most seismic events in the industry’s history has left scars that run deep.

You can watch that video here.

📈 Crypto Market Forecast 📈

This is going to be a big week for the crypto market. The Fed’s press conference will be front and centre, and it could make or break the recent rally. In case you missed the memo, the press conference will take place this Wednesday, and it’s likely to be the most significant one of the entire year. This is for three reasons.

First, the CPI and PPI numbers we got last week suggest that inflation isn’t going to go much lower than these levels. This can be clearly seen on the handy CPI charts provided by CNBC with each update (scroll down the article). This puts the Fed in a tough spot, particularly when it comes to its projections for future rate hikes.

The second reason relates to the summary of economic projections or SEP, which is updated every other meeting. Naturally, the SEP contains the Fed’s projections for where interest rates and inflation will go, among other things. If they project higher rates than they did previously, the markets could turn red.

The third reason is where things get really interesting. Many macro analysts have pointed out that the Fed can only cut rates in May, June, or July. That’s because, if they cut in September or November, it will be perceived as a political move during an election year - bad optics. This underscores the importance of the upcoming SEP.

Not only that, but many macro analysts have pointed out that the Fed effectively committed to cutting interest rates in December last year. Walking back those projections would likely tank the markets, which would likewise risk creating additional upheaval during an election year. More importantly though, a 180 would erode the Fed’s credibility.

In other words, it looks like the Fed will stick to its plans of cutting interest rates, and it could do this by pointing to all the evidence that suggests inflation is falling. If you watched our previous Fed press conference summaries, you’ll know that Jerome Powell and co once did the same when they were justifying keeping interest rates higher for longer.

However, the Fed may not be in the driver’s seat anymore. Instead, it could be the Treasury Department and all the government spending Jenet Yellen and co are overseeing. This fiscal dominance is something Russell Napier predicted years ago, and the result is that the markets could continue to go up only, regardless of what happens with interest rates.

The catch is that we’re slowly seeing the bodies pile up beneath the surface. Unrealised losses at banks, commercial real estate imploding, supply chains being impacted by geopolitics, the list goes on. As some traders have pointed out though, all of these bearish factors are just like kindling. They won’t cause a fire until there’s some kind of spark (e.g. China’s debt bubble bursting).  

It goes without saying that there are lots of things that could cause such a spark, but it’s safe to say that the powers that be will try and keep the kindling damp. They’ll do anything and everything they can below deck to keep this ship afloat. This includes the government buying back its own debt with more debt, which is what the Treasury plans on doing in the coming months.

And everyone wonders why institutional investors are aping into the spot Bitcoin ETFs…

🐕 Meme Mania 🐕

Tis the season of memes.

For the past month or so, meme coins have been a constant subject of conversation on Crypto X (formerly Twitter). This is hardly surprising considering that in times of euphoria (aka BTC hitting all-time highs), most investors become more tolerant of the idea of placing riskier bets – leading to what we know as the altcoin rotation.

However, what is surprising is that meme coins seem to be outperforming most of the market. Notably, even during periods of correction across the broader crypto market, meme coins seem to remain relatively resilient.

In fact, the action surrounding meme coins seems to have gotten even more intense over the past week. Data from Kaiko reveals that the weekly trade volume for meme coins achieved a multi-year high of nearly $80B last week.

While this is partly a result of the rising interest in meme coins, a few spicy developments seem to have accelerated this progress.

Notably, fans of the Dogwifhat (WIF) memecoin managed to raise over $700,000 to advertise the token’s logo on the Las Vegas Sphere. The fundraising campaign even propelled WIF to become the fourth-largest meme coin by market cap.

The crowdfunding effort called “Sphere Wif Hat” went live on the 10th March and achieved its goal of $650,000 in less than a week. A large part of the campaign’s success came from the support it received from several large players within the Solana ecosystem, including Solana-based wallet Phantom.

Another example of mainstream media attention for meme coins is trillion-dollar asset manager Franklin Templeton’s recent investment note on the correlation of value between meme coins and their native networks.

Notably, this missive stated that meme coins have a strong relationship with their native networks, with the price surges of these meme coins correlating with a rise in the growth of user wallets on the underlying blockchains. Franklin Templeton stated that, while such tokens have no inherent utility, it believes they may provide “investors with opportunities to make quick profits.” No sh*t, Sherlock.

Finally, during a recent public interaction at Tesla’s Berlin Gigafactory, Dogefather Elon Musk jokingly hinted that Tesla cars could “at some point” be bought with Dogecoin. He also called Doge “the people’s crypto.”

However, some believe these developments are indicators of the crypto market rally peaking this cycle. Specifically, X user BoldLeonidas called WIF’s Sphere campaign a ‘top signal.’ While Kaiko research analyst Dessislava Aubert also shares the same view, they noted that the recent surge of meme coins seems to be increasingly driven by idiosyncratic factors and less correlated with Bitcoin. We’re inclined to agree with this view.

While it’s true that meme coin mania has typically indicated cycle tops, we believe it may not be the case this time. Our simple thesis behind this view aligns with the observations made by Franklin Templeton in its recent investment note (as outlined a few paragraphs earlier).

To reiterate, we believe that meme coins have now evolved beyond being ‘just speculative assets.’ They are now an asset category used to denote coins that aid in rallying a community. In fact, even the more “serious” blockchain infrastructure projects have started endorsing certain meme coins in order to bootstrap community growth for the underlying blockchain network.

The most recent example of such an endorsement by a layer-1 chain was Avalanche’s recent announcement about its meme coin holdings. Interestingly, rather than calling them ‘meme coins,’ the Avalanche team calls them ‘community coins.’

Solana Founder Anatoly Yakovenko also recently shared his views on how the success of the BONK meme coin helped the project’s Saga phone sell out after months of low demand for the product.

Another star example of the power of memes in community growth is Berachain – a bear-themed DeFi layer-1 that is set to go live this year. Berachain started as a meme NFT project on Ethereum before evolving to become a DeFi layer-1 chain.

Notably, the project’s meme-like qualities have helped it gather a loyal community, which in turn has set it up for success within the broader crypto ecosystem. The project attained Unicorn status by raising $69 million at a $1.5B valuation, in a funding round led by Brevan Howard Digital and Framework Ventures last week.

All this is to say that you’re likely being left in the dust if you’re still fading the power of memes. Study memes, in other words.

On that note, if you need a guide on how to trade meme coins, we have just the video for you on our main channel. We recommend you check it out.

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🔮 Video Pipeline 🔮

* Post Dencun Update: What you need to know?
* Which Dog Memecoin Is Best? Dogecoin Vs Shiba Inu Vs Dogwifhat
* When Altseason?! This is The Date To watch!
* OKX Review: Ultimate guide to OKX

🏆 What's New at CoinBureau.com This Week? 🏆

* How Spot Bitcoin ETFs Work: A Comprehensive Guide
* Ethereum vs Ethereum Killers: Is ETH at Risk?
* M6 Labs Crypto Market Pulse: Tales Of Lambos And The Moon
* Bybit Card Review 2024: Your Gateway to Crypto Spending!
* The Impact Of Macroeconomic Factors On Bitcoin ETF Performance And Stock Market Linkages

📖 Quote of the Week 📖

No crypto investment will tick every single due diligence box you have laid out. As such, you can never be 100% certain that a particular investment will be successful. But it’s about being mostly right.

“It is better to be roughly right than precisely wrong” - John Maynard Keynes

Team Coin Bureau

Disclosure: Authors may own cryptoassets named in this newsletter. These are unqualified opinions, and a Coin Bureau newsletter, is meant for informational purposes only. It is not meant to serve as investment advice. Please consult with your investment, tax, or legal advisor.