The Price of Money (USD) Is Going Up — and the Market Is Finally Admitting It
The dollar stopped going down.
Not violently. Not with headlines. Just… stopped. It based. And while that was happening, crypto stalled, bullion struggled to gain traction, and long-dated yields across the U.S., Europe, Japan, and Australia all began to grind higher together.
That combination is not random.
It’s a regime signal.
The world is re-learning something it forgot during a decade of zero rates and QE: money has a price.
And that price is going higher.
A basing DXY alongside rising global yields is the market saying:
“Liquidity is not scarce — but it is no longer free.”
Why Crypto and Gold Are Struggling
Crypto and bullion are often described as “alternatives to fiat,” but structurally they share one trait:
They are zero-carry assets.
When cash yields were suppressed, that didn’t matter.
Optionality was cheap.
Duration was rewarded. Stories traveled faster than discount rates.
But when:
real yields rise
term premiums rise
and holding dollars actually pays
…the opportunity cost of zero-carry assets becomes visible again.
This is why crypto and gold can struggle without a crisis. They’re not being rejected — they’re being repriced relative to cash.
“Most Assets Are Still Below ATHs” Is the Tell
This part matters.
If the system were flush with excess liquidity, you’d expect a broad bid — everything grinding back toward highs together.
Instead, what we see is:
selectivity
rotation
capital discipline
That tells you the marginal dollar is being conservative.
Carry over optionality.
Liquidity over leverage.
The dollar basing while speculative assets struggle isn’t a coincidence.
It’s a reminder.
When the price of money rises, the currency that prices money matters more — not less.
And that says a lot about where we actually are in this cycle.