By Francisco Rodrigues (All times ET unless indicated otherwise)

President Donald Trump ramped up the trade-war hyperbole, threatening to increase import tariffs levied on the EU and Canada if they keep on working to “do economic harm” to the U.S. after announcing a 25% tariff on vehicles and foreign-made auto parts.

Despite the threat, crypto markets remained stable, with bitcoin holding steady at about $87,500. Over 24 hours the largest cryptocurrency is down about 0.6% and the broader CoinDesk 20 Index some 2%.

The growing threats not only raise concerns about economic growth, but also widen the gap between the U.S. and Europe, whose leaders are meeting with Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky today to work on long-term security guarantees. The summit comes after the U.S. persuaded Ukraine and Russia to agree to a Black Sea ceasefire.

Cryptocurrency prices are being influenced not only by macroeconomic factors, but also by the forthcoming expiry of around $15 billion worth of BTC and ETH options contracts on Friday. The uncertainty has stalled BTC’s price rally, even after video-games retailer GameStop moved to raise $1.3 billion to accumulate the cryptocurrency.

Still, the U.S. House of Representatives has released a bill that’s set to help reduce systemic risks associated with stablecoin usage. Blockchain development is also progressing steadily, with Ethereum’s final Pectra test going live on the Hoodi network.

Looking ahead, the U.S. Senate Banking Committee will today hold a hearing on the nomination of Paul Atkins — who holds up to $6 million in crypto-related assets — as the Chair of the Securities and Exchange Commission. Stay alert!

What to Watch

Crypto:

March 27: Walrus (WAL) mainnet goes live.

April 1: Metaplanet (3350) 10-for-1 stock split becomes effective.

Macro

March 27, 8:30 a.m.: The U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis releases (Final) Q4 GDP data.

GDP Growth Rate QoQ Est. 2.3% vs. Prev. 3.1%

Core PCE Prices QoQ Est. 2.7% vs. Prev. 2.2%

PCE Prices QoQ Est. 2.4% vs. Prev. 1.5%

Real Consumer Spending QoQ Est. 4.2% vs. Prev. 3.7%

March 27, 8:30 a.m.: The U.S. Department of Labor releases unemployment insurance data for the week ended March 22.

Initial Jobless Claims Est. 225K vs. Prev. 223K

March 27, 10:00 a.m.: The U.S. Senate Banking Committee will hold a hearing on the nomination of Paul Atkins to the chair of the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). Livesteam link.

March 27, 3:00 p.m.: Mexico’s central bank announces its interest rate decision.

Target Rate Est. 9% vs. Prev. 9.5%

March 28, 8:00 a.m.: The Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics (IBGE) releases February unemployment rate data.

Unemployment Rate Est. 6.8% vs. Prev. 6.5%

March 28, 8:00 a.m.: Mexico’s National Institute of Statistics and Geography releases February unemployment rate data.

Unemployment Rate Est. 2.6% vs. Prev. 2.7%

March 28, 8:30 a.m.: Statistics Canada releases January GDP data.

GDP MoM Est. 0.3% vs. Prev. 0.2%

March 28, 8:30 a.m.: The U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis releases February consumer income and expenditure data.

Core PCE Price Index MoM Est. 0.3% vs. Prev. 0.3%

Core PCE Price Index YoY Est. 2.7% vs. Prev. 2.6%

PCE Price Index MoM Est. 0.3% vs. Prev. 0.3%

PCE Price Index YoY Est. 2.5% vs. Prev. 2.5%

Personal Income MoM Est. 0.4% vs. Prev. 0.9%

Personal Spending MoM Est. 0.5% vs. Prev. -0.2%

April 2, 12:01 a.m.: The Trump administration’s reciprocal tariffs plan, announced Feb. 13, takes effect alongside a 25% tariff on imported automobiles and certain parts announced March 26.

Earnings (Estimates based on FactSet data)

March 27: KULR Technology Group (KULR), post-market, $-0.02

March 28: Galaxy Digital Holdings (GLXY), pre-market, C$0.38

Token Events

Governance votes & calls

DYdX DAO is discussing the allocation of $10 million to fund the most profitable traders on the platform in a bid to attract talent. The DAO is also voting on creating a new liquidity tier designed for “markets introduced through the Instant Market Listings” feature.

Venus DAO is discussing the potential acquisition of a 33% stake in Thena.fi for $4.5 million to position Venus to “build a comprehensive DeFi SuperApp on the BNB Chain.»

Balancer DAO is discussing the establishment of a Balancer Alliance Program, which would see the protocol share a portion of the revenue it generates with key ecosystem partners in the form of USDC as veBAL.

CoW DAO is discussing updating the score definition for buy orders after a Base network incident revealed that the current definition could lead to an excessive allocation of solver rewards.

March 27, 9 a.m.: PancakeSwap and EOS Network Foundation to host an Ask Me Anything (AMA) session.

March 27, 12 p.m.: Cardano Foundation to hold a livestream with its CTO breaking down the project’s roadmap.

March 27, 12 p.m.: Header to host a Community Call with support for Post-Quantum Cryptographic Algorithm, sponsored feels ,and AI tools on the agenda.

March 27., 1 p.m.: Alchemy Pay to host a Community AMA session.

March 28, 3 a.m: Ontology to hold a Weekly Community Update via X Spaces.

Unlocks

March 31: Optimism (OP) to unlock 1.93% of its circulating supply worth $28.67 million.

April 1: Sui (SUI) to unlock 2.03% of its circulating supply worth $178.46 million.

April 1: ZetaChain (ZETA) to unlock 6.05% of its circulating supply worth $17.66 million.

April 2: Ethena (ENA) to unlock 0.77% of its circulating supply worth $17.63 million.

April 3: Wormhole (W) to unlock 47.64% of its circulating supply worth $144.79 million.

April 7: Kaspa (KAS) to unlock 0.59% of its circulating supply worth $11.74 million.

April 9: Movement (MOVE) to unlock 2.04% of its circulating supply worth $24.92 million.

Token Listings

March 27: Walrus (WAL) to be listed on Gate.io, KuCoin, Bluefin, MEXC, Bitget, and Bybit.

March 28: Binance to delist Aergo (AERGO).

March 31: Binance to delist USDT, FDUSD, TUSD, USDP, DAI, AEUR, UST, USTC, and PAXG.

Conferences

CoinDesk’s Consensus is taking place in Toronto on May 14-16. Use code DAYBOOK and save 15% on passes.

Day 2 of 3: Real World Crypto Symposium 2025 (Sofia, Bulgaria)

March 27: Building Blocks (Tel Aviv)

March 27: Digital Euro Conference 2025 (Frankfurt)

March 27: Web3 Banking Symposium 2.0 (Lugano, Switzerland)

March 27: WIKI Finance EXPO Hong Kong 2025

Day 1 of 2: Money Motion 2025 (Zagreb, Croatia)

March 28: Solana APEX (Cape Town)

April 2-3: Southeast Asia Blockchain Week 2025 Main Conference (Bangkok)

April 2-5: ETH Bucharest Conference & Hackathon (Bucharest, Romania)

April 3-6: BitBlockBoom (Dallas)

Token Talk

By Shaurya Malwa

A viral AI art trend fueled by OpenAI’s new 4o model sparked a surge in Studio Ghibli-themed memecoins, blending nostalgia with cryptocurrency speculation as fans create Ghibli-style images and traders capitalize on the hype.

The ghiblification (GHIBLI) token, the largest, boasted a $21 million market cap and $70 million in trading volume within 24 hours driven by over 250,000 trades on the Ethereum and Solana blockchains.

The trend, marked by the #GhibliAI hashtag amassing millions of hits on X and Instagram, reflects internet culture’s love for humor and absurdity, attracting speculators with low-cost, high-volatility tokens.

Smaller Ghibli-inspired tokens like Ghilbi Doge, NoFace and Yutaro lag behind GHIBLI in trader interest, while the latter’s liquidity pool holds just over $330,000 in Solana’s SOL.

Derivatives Positioning

While BTC, ETH CME futures yields stopped falling early this month, there has been a noticeable lack of progress, particularly in the wake of continued corporate adoption of bitcoin. The divergence suggests sophisticated market players remain cautious.

BTC, ETH perpetual funding rates on offshore exchanges are barely positive, another sign of cautious sentiment.

TRX, XMR, TON and SUI are the only top 25 coins with positive net cumulative volume deltas for the past 24 hours. The positive value indicates net buying in the perpetual futures market.

BTC and ETH short-end options-based implied volatility indexes continue to drift lower, with investors still pricing bigger swings in ETH relative to bitcoin.

Deribit-listed options continue to show a bias for short duration puts in BTC, ETH, SOL and XRP.

Market Movements:

BTC is up 0.22% from 4 p.m. ET Wednesday at $87,494.70 (24hrs: -0.86%)

ETH is up 0.69% at $2,025.47 (24hrs: -1.90%)

CoinDesk 20 is up 0.48% at 2,757.13 (24hrs: -2.19%)

Ether CESR Composite Staking Rate is up 2 bps at 2.97%

BTC funding rate is at 0.0087% (3.1744% annualized) on Binance

DXY is unchanged at 104.47

Gold is up 0.82% at $3,045.80/oz

Silver is up 1% at $34.37/oz

Nikkei 225 closed -0.6% at 37,799.97

Hang Seng closed +0.41% at 23,578.80

FTSE is down 0.66% at 8,632.24

Euro Stoxx 50 is down 0.7% at 5,373.68

DJIA closed on Wednesday -0.31% at 42,454.79

S&P 500 closed -1.12% at 5,712.20

Nasdaq closed -2.04% at 17,899.02

S&P/TSX Composite Index closed -0.7% at 25,161.10

S&P 40 Latin America closed -0.83% at 2,460.26

U.S. 10-year Treasury rate is up 4 bps at 4.4%

E-mini S&P 500 futures are unchanged at 5,763.25

E-mini Nasdaq-100 futures are unchanged at 20,112.25

E-mini Dow Jones Industrial Average Index futures are up 0.16% at 42,815.00

Bitcoin Stats:

BTC Dominance: 61.69 (-0.14%)

Ethereum to bitcoin ratio: 0.02317 (0.17%)

Hashrate (seven-day moving average): 838 EH/s

Hashprice (spot): $49.19

Total Fees: 9.67 BTC / $846,444x

CME Futures Open Interest: 144,470 BTC

BTC priced in gold: 28.8 oz

BTC vs gold market cap: 8.17%

Technical Analysis

The share price of bitcoin-holder Strategy (MSTR) has risen past $320, confirming a bullish double bottom breakout.

The pattern suggests potential for a rally for the Nasdaq-listed shares to resistance at $410.

Crypto Equities

Strategy (MSTR): closed on Wednesday at $329.31 (-3.66%), up 0.48% at $330.89 in pre-market

Coinbase Global (COIN): closed at $193.95 (-5.03%), up 0.81% at $195.52

Galaxy Digital Holdings (GLXY): closed at C$18.08 (-3.06%)

MARA Holdings (MARA): closed at $13.79 (-3.23%), up 0.51% at $13.86

Riot Platforms (RIOT): closed at $7.9 (-7.17%), up 1.01% at $7.98

Core Scientific (CORZ): closed at $7.63 (-11.89%), up 1.97% at $7.78

CleanSpark (CLSK): closed at $8.12 (-6.99%), up 0.62% at $8.17

CoinShares Valkyrie Bitcoin Miners ETF (WGMI): closed at $14.32 (-8.5%)

Semler Scientific (SMLR): closed at $39.57 (-6.63%)

Exodus Movement (EXOD): closed at $50 (-10.78%), up 0.6% at $50.30

ETF Flows

Spot BTC ETFs:

Daily net flow: $89.6 million

Cumulative net flows: $36.33 billion

Total BTC holdings ~ 1,115 million.

Spot ETH ETFs

Daily net flow: -$5.9 million

Cumulative net flows: $2.43 billion

Total ETH holdings ~ 3.406 million.

Source: Farside Investors

Overnight Flows

Chart of the Day

AI is the worst-performing crypto market sector of the past 24 hours.

The dire performance is consistent with losses in AI-related stocks on Wall Street supposedly triggered by Microsoft abandoning data center projects set to use 2 gigawatts of electricity in the U.S. and Europe.

While You Were Sleeping

Dogecoin Gains, XRP Slumps as Trump Warns of ‘Far Larger’ Tariffs (CoinDesk): President Donald Trump threatened Canada and the EU with higher tariffs if they collaborated and harmed the U.S. economy. His post on Truth Social damped early positive sentiment in crypto markets.

Rattled by Trump, America’s Allies Shift to Defense Mode (The New York Times): Trump’s 25% auto tariff alarmed allies including Canada, Japan and Germany, who see it as a breach of decades-old economic and defense partnerships with the U.S.

BlackRock Expands Digital Asset Team, Adds Four High-Level Roles (CoinDesk): The asset manager advertised for a director of digital assets, director of regulatory affairs, vice president for digital asset and ETF legal counsel, and associate for digital assets.

Robinhood, Moving Beyond Meme Stocks, Now Wants to Be Your Bank (Bloomberg): Later this year in the U.S., Robinhood Gold subscribers will gain access to savings and checking accounts offering high yields, same-day cash delivery and services like estate planning.

Donald Trump’s Cuts to US Government Raise Worries Over Economic Data Quality (Financial Times): Economists say the Department of Government Efficiency could undermine the quality of U.S. economic data by weakening agencies behind key indicators like inflation and jobs reports.

Studio Ghibli Craze Inspires Memecoins on Ethereum, Solana After OpenAI’s 4o Release (CoinDesk): AI-generated art styled after Studio Ghibli films has gone viral, sparking the creation of Ghibli-themed cryptocurrencies, with ghiblification (GHIBLI) reaching a market cap of $21 million.

In the Ether