Crypto Chaos: Tricks, Silver Squeals & Bitcoin’s Bounce

In a tricksterish twist, Bitcoin gobbles up a marching parade of long bets laid down over the last 30 days, then gives them a sly little swish and a wipeout. The market looked all puffed up with bravado, crowds ready to roar higher. But markets, like a box of unscrupulous secrets in Roald Dahl’s garden, love to surprise you. Big players and glossy exchange lords adore a crowded parade; they poke it, they prod it, they whisper “liquidation!” and off go the crowds, leaving innocent traders to blink as prices jump and jiggle in a jolly, jerky dance.

After twenty years of tip-toeing and titivating talk, India and the European Union finally stamp their seal on a grand Free Trade Deal. Picture it: about a third of all the world’s goods and goblins swapping tariffs as if they were cards in a cheeky game. 97% of goods will be tariff-free or tar-free-ish, a merry-making mischief. Expect Indian exports to burst forth, manufacturers to flourish, jobs to giggle, and foreign money to tiptoe in. The EU even promises a shiny €500 million fund to help India’s green trains chug along, making India a bright, bustling part of the world’s supply chain-like a gleaming golden thread through a very long, twisty tapestry.

Silver prices pogoed up by more than $11 an ounce, hopping over the $114 line in a rally that feels like a dragon waking from a nap. The one-day leap is bigger than the entire price of silver when the grand old investors started hoarding the stuff years ago. Analysts insist this isn’t a bubbly bubble made by bubble-blowers; it’s a proper repricing, long overdue, caused by worries about inflation and a growing appetite for hard assets. The metal looks ready to sparkle and march forward, as if it had borrowed a little fairy-dust from the stars.