Global Market Comments
January 16, 2026
Fiat Lux
Featured Trade:
(JANUARY 14 BIWEEKLY STRATEGY WEBINAR Q&A),
(CSCO), (GLD), (MSTR), (JPM), (FXA),
(BTC), (SOFI), (HOOD), (UUP)
"Homo Sapiens, the first truly free species, is about to decommission the natural selection, the force that made us," said E.O. Wilson, a Harvard University biology professor.
The writing has been on the proverbial wall as central banks around the world struggled for years to contain inflation without destabilizing financial systems.
A steady stream of economic data over the past several years has highlighted how fragile the global financial balance became after the pandemic, with inflation emerging as one of the most persistent challenges.
Central banks were slow to tighten policy because moving too aggressively risked triggering recession, asset market stress, or outright financial accidents. For a long time, it was simply easier to keep policy loose than to risk being blamed for breaking the system.
That hesitation reshaped how investors viewed scarce assets.
The appeal of Bitcoin has consistently strengthened during periods when inflation outpaced wages and purchasing power eroded. While Bitcoin is not mechanically linked to inflation data, its narrative as a hedge against monetary debasement gained traction as inflation surged across developed economies between 2021 and 2023.
Canada was an early warning sign. Inflation surged to levels not seen in decades as supply chain disruptions, labor shortages, and rising energy costs collided. Prices for housing, transportation, and food rose sharply, forcing central banks to abandon the idea that inflation was merely transitory.
Similar dynamics played out across Europe and the United States.
Supply chains proved far more fragile than expected, and they did not normalize quickly. Worker shortages, geopolitical disruptions, and energy market volatility repeatedly pushed costs higher, even after headline inflation began to cool.
Governments were forced to step in at times simply to keep essential goods moving. Fuel shortages, transport bottlenecks, and labor constraints became recurring reminders that modern economies are more brittle than they appear.
Inflation acted as a quiet tax on consumers, businesses, and savers. Wage increases often failed to keep pace with rising prices, meaning higher nominal income did not translate into higher real purchasing power. For many households, raises were effectively absorbed by higher rent, food, energy, and insurance costs.
That erosion of purchasing power pushed more people to reconsider where they stored long-term value.
Rising interest in crypto during high inflation periods was not driven by optimism alone, but by frustration with traditional systems that appeared unable to preserve real wealth. For many investors, crypto represented an opt-out mechanism rather than a speculative gamble.
Supply shocks compounded the problem. Energy disruptions, extreme weather, and geopolitical tensions repeatedly slowed logistics and increased costs. Food prices were especially sensitive, with meat, eggs, and dining costs rising sharply during peak inflation periods, even as other categories stabilized later.
These pressures reinforced a broader narrative. When trust in institutions weakens and policy responses lag behind economic reality, alternative systems attract attention.
The rise in crypto adoption has reflected that shift in sentiment. It has been less about chasing rapid gains and more about hedging against policy uncertainty, currency debasement, and institutional fragility.
Crypto price cycles have remained volatile, but the underlying demand story has matured. Participation has broadened, infrastructure has improved, and access through regulated investment products has expanded globally.
The result is an asset class that responds not just to speculation, but to macroeconomic stress.
High inflation did not single-handedly drive crypto adoption, but it accelerated it. And as long as confidence in monetary policy remains imperfect, digital assets will continue to benefit from that uncertainty.
This article is not a joke. This is an article about a parody token that is now a real thing.
There are meme stocks, and there are meme tokens.
There is the argument out there that the flood of liquidity is giving these assets their time in the sun.
I am not saying these assets are great to buy and hold long-term, hardly not, but they do offer the volatility for traders to jump in and out of them for a nice profit.
Shiba Inu Coin (SHIB), a popular meme token based on another alternative coin, Dogecoin (DOGE), is a decentralized cryptocurrency created in August 2020 by an anonymous person or persons known as “Ryoshi.”
SHIB experienced its most explosive run during the 2021 meme-asset cycle and has since settled into a more mature, volatility-driven trading range.
While this dog-inspired cryptocurrency continues to see sharp rallies during periods of market enthusiasm, it remains well below its 2021 all-time high of approximately $0.000088.
Shiba Inu Coin now typically ranks around No. 34 by market capitalization, with a market value fluctuating between roughly $4.7 billion and $5.2 billion, still firmly placing it among the largest meme-based cryptocurrencies, but far from the very top of the market.
Before investing in any altcoins, it’s important to understand that these coins are a great deal riskier than something like Bitcoin (BTC).
It sounds funny just saying that but yes, there are different degrees of risk with different coins.
There has been a lot of hype surrounding the Fear of Missing Out (FOMO) movement, but I would say, only deploy capital in altcoins if you are willing to write off the entire investment.
And I’ll say this, it’s a speculative investment in general, so at least do a little due diligence before you take the plunge.
Shiba Inu Coin is an Ethereum-based ERC-20 token, which means it was developed on the Ethereum blockchain, rather than its own blockchain.
Ryoshi decided to launch SHIB on Ethereum (ETH) because it’s “already secure and well-established,” according to the SHIB white paper, or, as its community calls it, the “woof paper.”
I have gone on record saying that Ethereum will go higher than Bitcoin in the future because it’s that attractive platform that every DeFi developer wants to build on, and SHIB is just one iteration of that.
Developers also choose to roll out their projects using the ETH platform because it’s way cheaper than building a platform from scratch.
SHIB launched with a total supply of 1 quadrillion tokens, though a meaningful portion has since been burned, bringing the circulating supply down to roughly 589 trillion SHIB over time.
Ryoshi is on record saying he doesn’t have any SHIB, and nearly half of its initial supply was locked in a liquidity pool on the decentralized exchange Uniswap.
The rest was sent to Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin.
According to SHIB’s white paper, Ryoshi sent tokens to Buterin with hopes that he’d keep the tokens.
However, Buterin did not.
He donated a significant amount to the India Covid Relief Fund and other charities, which goes to show that not all Covid Relief Funds are created equal.
This is not a joke, and some people might be laughing when they read what this coin is based on.
That is why altcoins may require additional caution due to their differences from something like Bitcoin, including their structure, supply, and utility.
SHIB supporters might point to a comprehensive ecosystem, which now includes smart contract functionality, NFTs, liquidity mining opportunities, and a dedicated Layer-2 network, Shibarium, aimed at lowering transaction costs and expanding real utility beyond pure community hype.
Another juicy piece of news saw rising support for a Change.org petition urging trading platform Robinhood to list SHIB on the broker’s platform.
That effort ultimately succeeded.
SHIB has been listed on Robinhood since 2022, improving accessibility and liquidity, though the listing did not translate into a sustained re-rating of the token’s price.
When asked by analysts, Robinhood CEO Vladimir Tenev had initially been noncommittal, but the listing was later approved as part of a broader expansion of the company’s crypto offerings.
That’s the thing about these altcoins — they can come out of nowhere, and even a “fake it till you make it,” SHIB created real wealth during its peak cycle for early participants.
Now the secret is out about SHIB, I would scale in slowly, but don’t bet the ranch on this speculative bet, and prepare for high volatility.