Recession Proximity and Bitcoin’s Relative Resilience

This week we have Sarah Williamson (Coinbase Institutional’s Head of Financing Trading) joining us as a special guest. While optimism remains in short supply due to tariffs, we are seeing improving market structure around bitcoin and other key crypto assets. In this episode, we analyze recent derivatives performance, including sideways perp funding rates and emerging opportunities in options skew as well as the collapse in Mantra’s OM tokens. Meanwhile, the macro environment demands caution amid the current liquidity crunch, even though we see some opportunistic buying from crypto natives at the margin while onchain data has revealed some steady bitcoin accumulation by long-term holders since the end of February. We evaluate the proximity of a recession through the lens of mortgage loan demand, DeFi borrowing rates, and volatility-management strategies. Don’t miss this episode as we look at how crypto and macro markets are shaping up for the month.

Host: David Duong, CFA - Head of Research

Speakers:
Georg Toropov, Senior CES Sales Trader
Sarah Williamson, Head of Financing Trading

Links:
Monthly: How Do You Define a Crypto Bear Market?
The Ultimate Guide to Ethereum’s Pectra Upgrade
Market Technicals: March 2025