🤔 Arthur Hayes expects a large-scale expansion of dollar liquidity.

In a new essay "Frowny Cloud", Arthur Hayes analyzes 2025 and explains why BTC was weak, Gold and the Nasdaq rose, and what should give Bitcoin a boost in 2026.

Key arguments:

➤ BTC = monetary technology, not a defensive asset. It only grows when fiat liquidity expands.

➤ Gold rose not because of inflation, but because of fear. Central banks no longer trust US government bonds after 2008 and especially after the freezing of Russia's reserves in 2022.

➤ Gold buyers today are sovereign states, not the general public. There's no bubble.

➤ Gold is again involved in global settlements. Trade imbalances are increasingly being settled not with dollars, but with physical metal.

➤ The Nasdaq has outpaced BTC, as AI technologies have effectively become a state program in the US and China.

➤ AI today is not a market, but a national priority. Capital is being directed into the AI sector regardless of profitability and overall credit dynamics.

➤ As long as the AI sector is important for GDP and geopolitics, the Nasdaq can rise even with weak liquidity.

➤ But political goals will sooner or later begin to dominate shareholders' interests. China has already gone down this path.

➤ Three factors that will boost dollar liquidity in 2026:
• An increase in the Fed's balance sheet after the end of QT.
• Credit expansion by banks in "strategic industries".
• Stimulus through mortgages and the housing market.

➤ Donald Trump will start stimulating the economy, as re-election is more important than financial discipline.

📣 Lighter has announced staking for $LIT

The launch came on the same day as the mobile app release, as expected.

Key mechanics:
➡️ Access to LLP deposits will depend on the amount of staked $LIT
➡️ 1 $LIT gives a deposit limit of $10 in USDC
➡️ Fee discounts for $LIT stakers are planned for a future update, with details still pending

Market reaction was negative. Price dropped below $2 after the announcement.

The main concern is liquidity. Limiting access to LLP through staking may reduce liquidity in the pool, which directly impacts trading depth on the platform. LLP yields are already relatively low, so there is limited incentive to buy or hold $LIT purely for access.

Most likely users of this setup are existing $LIT holders or traders hedging spot exposure with perpetual shorts.

Fee discounts could matter more in the long run, but that depends entirely on how aggressive the final structure turns out to be.

📊Bitcoin is going through a reset phase.

Key theses from the report "The Bitcoin Quarterly: Q4 2025" by Ark Invest:

▪️ -36% correction.
Bitcoin held above the average price of $81k — an important support zone.

▪️ 2025 — the most calm year in BTC's history.
Volatility has decreased to a minimum over time. Ark Invest considers this a fundamental plus for future risk-adjusted returns.

▪️ Long-term holders are capitulating.
Up to 64% of realized losses fell on long-term holders. This is not a confirmation of a bear market, but a sign of a prolonged correction.

▪️ The market is trading at breakeven.
Investors are on average selling "at zero". A steady move into the positive zone will confirm the recovery of the trend movement.

▪️ ETFs are a key support.
The BTC price has returned to the average entry price of US spot ETFs. This is a strong support level and a potential point of new capital inflow.

▪️ Oversoldness in derivatives.
Liquidations of long positions have reached 58% — the market has been cleaned of excessive leverage.

▪️ Corporate BTC treasuries.
The earnings of corporate BTC holders have greatly decreased. Those with debts may need to sell some assets.

▪️ Macro.
⊹ Inflationary pressure is weakening.
⊹ The Fed is shifting its focus to the labor market.
⊹ Historically, gold's growth has often preceded a strong phase of risk assets.

❕ You will always have problems. And that’s not a bad thing.

You’ve probably heard these phrases many times.

Mo money, mo problems.

More money won’t solve your problems, it will solve your money problems.

When you’re healthy, you have many problems. When you’re sick, you have just one.

They may sound worn out, but there is real truth behind them.

It’s common to think that life works like a checklist. Make enough money and everything will be fine. Quit bad habits and everything will be fine. Find the right partner and everything will be fine.

In reality, problems do not disappear. They change.

More money helps, but it brings new pressure. Taxes, structures, legal questions, responsibility. These may be better problems than being broke, but they are still problems. They still create stress and require effort to solve.

Quitting destructive habits can be life-changing, but it also removes the things used to avoid deeper issues. Solving one major problem often reveals several smaller ones underneath.

Relationships work the same way. Being single has its own set of struggles. Being married or committed has a different set. No stage of life is problem-free, it just comes with a new configuration.

The mistake is chasing X with the belief that it will fix everything. X can be worth chasing. Money, health, and relationships matter. They just are not a universal cure.

If someone is overwhelmed and unhappy today, waking up tomorrow with more money or status will not erase that. It only changes the setting in which the same internal problems are lived out.

Life is problems. The real skill is learning to live with them without constant suffering.

There is a Buddhist idea that captures this well. Everyone has problems. Fix one, and another appears. The real problem is wishing life had none.

You will always have problems.
That is not a failure.
It means life is happening.

💸 Bitcoin mining is no longer alpha

After the halving, companies with no revenue outside of hashprice either moved sideways or fell 40–70%, while the winners were those selling AI compute, hosting, or capacity with stable, fixed demand.

🔥 From 70% drawdowns to +150% in one year

Clement Ang didn’t turn things around by finding a new edge. He fixed risk, execution, and discipline. The result was a +150% year after a 60–70% drawdown.

5 actionable lessons from his championship year:

✔️ Cap monthly drawdowns at 5%.
Large losses break compounding. A 10% loss needs an 11% recovery. A 50% loss needs 100%. By cutting bad months early, he kept capital intact and stayed mentally stable enough to keep trading well.

✔️ Risk small until the market proves you right.
He dropped risk per trade to 0.3–0.5% during choppy periods. Size only increased once trades started working. This reduced stress, prevented revenge trading, and allowed him to survive losing streaks.

✔️ Remove bad trades, not good ones.
Out of 1,200+ trades, around 500 had no real setup. FOMO, boredom, and revenge entries quietly destroyed PnL. Simply not taking them would have made the year dramatically better.

✔️ Scale out instead of selling all at once.
He took partial profits on strength and kept a runner. This locked in gains while allowing upside when trends extended. The goal was consistency, not perfect exits.

✔️ Buy strength after corrections.
His best trades came after market pullbacks. He focused on stocks that held up better than the index and bought once selling pressure exhausted. Strength after pain mattered more than chasing momentum.

The takeaway is uncomfortable but clear.
Returns came from defense, not aggression. Once capital was protected, performance followed naturally.

🌍 The end of the liberal world order and the return of power politics

The Atlantic published an essay by political scientist Robert Kagan arguing that US foreign policy under Trump effectively marks the end of the post-WWII liberal international order.

Kagan’s core point is blunt. The American-led order is ending not because the US can’t sustain it, but because it no longer wants to. US power will shift from maintaining global stability to openly pursuing national advantage.

He warns this pushes the world back toward a pre-1945 system of spheres of influence, great power rivalry, and frequent wars. Alliances weaken. Security becomes transactional. States either rearm or cut deals with stronger players.

As a symbol of this shift, Kagan points to US claims on Greenland, where territory is treated as a strategic asset rather than a question of norms or sovereignty.

If defending the old system felt expensive, Kagan’s message is simple.
What comes next will cost much more.