The biggest cryptocurrencies in the world dipped sharply Thursday after the latest inflation data showed wholesale prices are rising much faster than expected. The price of Bitcoin is down 3.8% on the day ($117,900), Ethereum is down 4% ($4,535), and Ripple is down 6.1% ($3.07) according to CoinMarketCap.
Crypto prices are responding to the Producer Price Index (PPI) for July, which measures the average change in prices from U.S. manufacturers and service providers. It rose by 0.9%, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the largest monthly increase since March 2022, according to the Wall Street Journal.
That 0.9% increase was three times higher than was expected, and that’s a bad sign for Americans worried about high prices because the PPI numbers tend to be a signal of what’s to come for the average consumer. It also means that the Federal Reserve is much less likely to cut interest rates in the short term, something that Wall Street was pretty universally expecting to happen in September. But not anymore.
Experts were surprised
CNBC anchor Rick Santelli, a longtime supporter of President Donald Trump’s economic policies, was shocked in real-time while delivering the news Thursday morning. “Headline number is whoppingly big,” Santelli proclaimed. “Oh my goodness. Up 9/10ths of a percent. Up 9/10ths.”
President Trump has falsely claimed that inflation is no longer a problem, but prices haven’t risen as much or as quickly as most economists seemed to predict after Trump’s so-called “Liberation Day” tariff announcement on April 2. But it seems entirely possible that America is not out of the woods when it comes to tariff-induced inflation, given the surprisingly high number for wholesale prices released on Thursday.
The Consumer Price Index for July, released Tuesday, rose 2.7% on an annual basis, slightly lower than the expected 2.8%. But so-called core inflation, which excludes the infamously volatile food and energy prices, rose 3.1% on the year, the highest in five months. Half of Americans say that the price of groceries is a “major stress” in their life, according to recent polling from the Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research.
Political interference
Jobless claims for Aug. 9 came in at 224,000, just below the expected number of 230,000. But other unemployment numbers in recent months have been revised significantly after enough time has passed. And those wild swings are the kind of thing you see just before a recession. Those revisions have become an issue with the president.
On August 1st, Trump fired the head of the Bureau of Labor Statistics, Erika McEntarfer, because he didn’t like the revisions. The president accused McEntarfer of using “rigged” numbers in one of the most transparently fascist moves Trump has attempted. During normal times, that’s called shooting the messenger.
Trump, who has made himself even richer through crypto, has tried to strong-arm Fed Chairman Jerome Powell into lowering interest rates but has thus far been unsuccessful. And if inflation ticks up, there’s no reason to cut rates since that would theoretically just make inflation worse.
Not just Bitcoin
The Dow dipped on the inflation news but recovered by market close on Thursday. The S&P 500 had also dipped significantly after the PPI numbers were released Thursday morning and closed just two points higher after hitting a record high on Wednesday, which technically puts it at another record, even if it’s something CNBC characterized as a “pause.”
Other cryptocurrencies also fell, though sometimes more modestly than the big players like Bitcoin and Ethereum. BNB is down 0.7%, Solana is down 4%, TRON is down 0.6%, and Dogecoin is down 8.1%. Cardano, the 8th largest cryptocurrency in the world, is up 2.3%.
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