Morning Minute: Bitcoin Gets Spooked as ‘Uptober’ Lets Down

Morning Minute is a daily newsletter written by Tyler Warner. The analysis and opinions expressed are his own and do not necessarily reflect those of Decrypt. And check out our daily news show 'FOMO HOUR' covering all of the top stories and market action.

GM!

Today’s top news:

• Crypto majors red but rebound off Monday bottom; BTC at $83.4k
• Alts fall 5-12% in nasty drawdown; only 4 of top 100 coins in green
• ETF outflows continue, now deep red for October for BTC and ETH
• Blur announces shutdown; front end deprecated by Nov 12
• Robinhood Chain leaders continue fall despite Vlad comments; Stonk goes sub-$100M

📉 Bitcoin Gets Spooked as ‘Uptober’ Lets Down

Uptober has been anything but. BTC is sitting at $83K, down 3.2% on the week. It topped out near $87K early last week, then slid to $81K on Monday, a roughly 7% drawdown, before bouncing modestly.

Sentiment followed price. The Crypto Fear & Greed Index fell to 56 (neutral), down from 67 a week ago and well off its August peak of 82, the year’s high. That’s essentially back to where we were before the summer rally that had Tom Lee and CryptoQuant’s Ki Young Ju calling the end of the bear market.

Alts took it worse. Over the last 7 days, SOL is down 11%, HYPE 12%, DOGE 12%, XRP 10% and ETH 8%. Prediction markets have cooled too. Myriad odds of BTC hitting $87.5K in October fell from 55% to 45%, while a dip to $80K is now priced at 56%.

As for the drivers, the common view is that this is a macro problem, not a crypto problem:

• Oil: Brent topped $101 last week on ship attacks around the Strait of Hormuz and is now trading near $110, even after Trump said the U.S. won’t go to war with Iran before the midterms.
• Yields: The 30-year Treasury hit 5.70%, its highest since 2002. It’s now at 5.60%, with the 10-year at 5.24%.
• ETFs: Spot BTC ETFs bled about $680M last week and another $65M yesterday. They’re net -$451M for October. ETH ETFs are even worse, with $720M in net outflows in October.

Analysts are torn on how to interpret this macro backdrop. Capital.com’s Daniela Hathorn summed it up as investors are still treating Bitcoin as a risk asset, not a geopolitical hedge. CoinShares’ James Butterfill offered the bull counterpoint, stating that if yields are rising on fears about U.S. debt rather than strong growth, BTC starts to look less like a risk asset and more like an alternative to government money.

The next catalyst is U.S. inflation data coming out this Wednesday with CPI. A cool print could pull yields lower and give risk assets room to run. A hot one, with oil at $110, reopens the rate-hike conversation, and neutral could slide toward fear quickly. Until then, expect more chop…

🌎 Macro Crypto and Markets

• Crypto majors are red but rebounding after Monday’s selloff; BTC -0.3% at $83.4k; ETH -2% at $2,500; SOL -5% at $106.6; HYPE -6% at $82; ZEC -8% at $1,195
• Top alt movers include STX (+9%), JST (+1%) and TIA (+1%)
• Oil -2% at $92; Gold +0.3% at $4,200
• Stock futures are mixed despite oil and yields falling; DOW +0.16%, Nasdaq -0.6%
• The CFTC moved to define prediction market contracts as swaps while carving out casino-style gambling putting them under federal rather than state authority; Selig said event contracts sit squarely in the CFTC’s remit and casino products are not derivatives
• Ledger said every confirmed case in the $87 million wallet drain involves devices sold by one reseller Southeast Asian distributor CryptoBilis; the company confirmed an unauthorized hardware implant in at least one device, and CryptoBilis has stopped selling
• XRP Ledger developers patched a bug that could have let someone create XRP out of nothing a flaw that sat unnoticed in the payment engine since 2015
• Standard Chartered started holding Ripple’s RLUSD stablecoin for institutions through its Dubai branch; it’s also working with Ripple and LMAX so clients can use RLUSD sitting at the bank as collateral for trades without moving it
• Bitcoin life insurer Meanwhile raised $37.5 million led by Bain Capital Crypto taking total funding past $180 million; the Sam Altman-backed, Bermuda-licensed company sells policies where you pay premiums in Bitcoin and your family gets paid in Bitcoin
• Morgan Stanley now expects to support tokenized equities on its alternative trading system in Q1 2027 rather than the second half of this year

Corporate Treasuries & ETFs

• The Bitcoin ETFs saw $65M in net outflows on Monday; the ETH ETFs saw $85M in outflows and continue their deep outflow streak
• Strategy bought 250 BTC for $21.5 million at an average $86,194 between October 5 and 11 while repurchasing 1.93 million STRC shares for $192.4 million
• Bitmine bought 12,532 ETH for about $32 million and now holds 4.9% of all Ethereum roughly 100,000 coins from its target

Meme Coin Tracker

• Meme leaders were red; DOGE -4%, SHIB -5%, PEPE -4%, PENGU -7%, TRUMP -3%, SPX -5%, BONK -7%
• Robinhood chain leaders were red and continued the downtrend; Pons -15% to $190M; AI -10% at $86M; Cashcat -16% at $100M; Standard +43%, ZZZ +55% and VRAX +40% led top movers
• Solana top movers included Crawlerpad +8100%, Load +3800%, Humph +6000% and Batona +3800%

💰 Token, Airdrop & Protocol Tracker

• Blur announced that its front end will be deprecated on Nov 12, 2026, signaling the final shutdown of the project
• Papertrade led onchain protocols in revenue on Monday with $5.9M, followed by Hyperliquid with $2.36M and Pump.fun with $2.29M
• Pump.fun earned $15.76 million in fees last week, its second straight week above $15 million, and burned $7.30 million of PUMP

🚚 What is happening in NFTs?

• NFT leaders were red as Blur announced its shutdown; Punks even at 31.5 ETH, BAYC -17% at 5.09 ETH, Pudgy -19% at 2.2 ETH
• Quotrons (+26%) and Argonauts (+19%) led top movers; Statements +90%