Trading Moment: Can BTC climb back above $100,000 amid geopolitical shocks? Can copper and aluminum take over from gold and silver?

Daily market data review and trend analysis, produced by PANews.

1. Market Observation

With the start of the second 25 years of the 21st century (Q2), the global macroeconomic situation will encounter a major geopolitical shock in early 2026. The United States launched a military operation codenamed "Absolute Resolve" against Venezuela and arrested President Maduro. This event quickly pushed geopolitical risks to a climax. Although the market is concerned about supply disruptions, given the global oversupply of crude oil and the fact that Venezuela's production accounts for only about 1% of the global total, oil prices reacted relatively mildly. Gold returned to $4,400, and precious metals such as silver and platinum also rose by more than 3%.

Furthermore, CITIC Securities released its 2026 outlook report, pointing out that 2026 is a crucial year for consolidating the foundation and launching a strategic counter-offensive during the 15th Five-Year Plan period. Driven by the "dual easing" of fiscal and monetary policies and the promotion of domestic demand, GDP growth is expected to be around 5%. For the capital market, the A-share bull market is expected to continue, but the rate of increase will slow. Resources (copper and aluminum), driven by "anti-fragility" and a major market trend, are expected to succeed gold and silver, which performed exceptionally well in 2025, as the most attractively priced assets globally in 2026. However, caution is advised regarding a potential periodic correction in the technology sector. It is recommended to focus on new energy, military, and non-ferrous metals. In Hong Kong, driven by the "new four bull markets" and the evolving Fed rate-cutting cycle, market activity will be further stimulated. Globally, although US Treasury yields and inflation are expected to remain high, the US-China rivalry is shifting from tariff confrontation to a technology security competition, making the AI industry chain worthy of long-term monitoring.

Bitcoin has shown strong resilience at the start of 2026, rising for five consecutive days despite geopolitical turmoil and remaining stable above $90,000. ETFs recorded a net inflow of $471.3 million on the first trading day. On-chain analyst Murphy pointed out that the concentration of BTC in the top 5% of the spot price range decreased from 14.9% to 14.5%, with the price rising slowly. URPD data shows that there is effective support at $87,000 with 822,000 BTC, and the expected reasonable fluctuation range is $92,000 to $104,000. Technically, Ted pointed out that the SMA200 is at $106,751, and the probability of breaking through $100,000 in Q1 2026 is extremely high, and there is a gap at $88,200 on the CME. Crypto Auris warned that if it falls below $87,000, it may retrace to the $84,000 range. Although CryptoQuant's research director, Julio Moreno, warned that a bear market may have already begun based on moving averages, with a bottom possibly between $56,000 and $60,000, institutional sentiment is generally optimistic. Charles Schwab is bullish on 2026 performance, Ark Invest's Zach Pandl predicts record highs in the first half of the year, and a Forbes article also indicates that 2026 price forecasts are concentrated between $120,000 and $170,000. Traders Phyrex and Lennart Snyder both believe that market liquidity will recover as institutions return from the holidays.

Regarding Ethereum, ETFs recorded a net inflow of $174.5 million on the first day of the year, with the price remaining around $3,150. Analyst Killa pointed out that ETH is currently in a stable zone, and January and February are more likely to see consolidation or a positive close. Daan Crypto Trades believes that $3,300 is a key resistance level for a bullish reversal, with major support below at $2,600. Man of Bitcoin analysis suggests that ETH faces resistance in the $3,094 to $3,291 range, and its price action will follow Bitcoin's "orange path." Despite market expectations of a recovery, some early optimistic predictions have failed to materialize. Synthetix founder Kain Warwick lost a $50,000 bet because ETH failed to reach $25,000 in 2025 and lowered his 2026 target to $10,000. The $10,000 target previously predicted by Tom Lee and Arthur Hayes also failed to be achieved.

In the cryptocurrency market, the situation in Venezuela has triggered significant volatility and regulatory scrutiny in the prediction market Polymarket. According to Lookonchain, three mysterious wallets heavily bet on Maduro's downfall hours before his arrest, reaping profits exceeding $630,000. One address alone invested only $34,000 and profited nearly $410,000, raising suspicions of insider trading. In response, US Representative Ritchie Torres is proposing the "Public Integrity Act of 2026 for Financial Prediction Markets" to prohibit officials from using non-public information to participate in such transactions. Meanwhile, Bitcoin Treasuries data shows that Venezuela has held 240 Bitcoins since December 31, 2022, currently worth approximately $22.33 million. However, other analysts estimate that Venezuela has approximately $60 billion in "shadow reserves" of Bitcoin and USDT, and with the change of regime, Alex Saab, a key figure who controls the private keys, has become a focal point.

The altcoin market is also active, with most altcoins rising in tandem with Bitcoin. PEPE, in particular, has surged over 70% this year, prompting whale James Wynn to recently open a 10x leveraged long position. Furthermore, older meme coins such as BONK, BOME, FLOKI, WIF, and NEIRO have also followed suit, with Ponke and CZ's Dog rising over 70% in the past 24 hours.

Perhaps due to the annual "tech gala" CES, and the speeches by tech veterans such as Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang and AMD CEO Lisa Su, AI tokens have generally risen, with tokens such as VIRTUAL, FET, and RENDER rising by more than 10%.

2. Key Data (as of 13:00 HKT on January 5)

(Data source: CoinAnk, Upbit, SoSoValue, CoinMarketCap)

• Bitcoin: $92,454 (year-to-date +5.5%), daily spot trading volume $38.79 billion.
• Ethereum: $3,152 (year-to-date +6.2%), daily spot trading volume $17.45 billion.
• Fear of Greed Index: 26 (Fear)
• Average GAS: BTC: 1.75 sat/vB, ETH: 0.02 Gwei
• Market share: BTC 58.7%, ETH 12.1%
• Upbit 24-hour trading volume rankings: XRP, BTC, ETH, SOL, BONK
• 24-hour BTC long/short ratio: 50.66% / 49.34%
• Sector Performance: Most crypto stocks rose, with the meme sector up 6.2% and the AI sector up 5.7%.
• 24-hour liquidation data: A total of 76,848 people worldwide were liquidated, with a total liquidation amount of $210 million. Among them, $65.91 million was liquidated in BTC, $40.45 million in ETH, and $9.7 million in SOL.

3. ETF Flows (as of January 2nd)

• Bitcoin ETF: +$471 million, BlackRock IBIT saw the largest net inflow at $287 million.
• Ethereum ETF: +$174 million, with Grayscale's ETHE seeing the largest net inflow at $53.6861 million.
• XRP ETF: +$13.59 million

4. Today's Outlook

• The Zama OG NFT claiming portal opened on January 5th.
• Trump will attend a policy meeting at 4:30 a.m. on January 6.
• Binance Alpha will list Brevis (BREV)
• Hyperliquid co-founder: 1.2 million HYPE tokens will be distributed to team members on January 6th after unlocking.
• South Korean President Lee Jae-myung will visit China from January 4 to 7.
• A US court has confirmed that Maduro will appear in court in New York at 1:00 AM Beijing time on the 6th.
• Nvidia CEO delivers a speech at CES Media Day, dubbed the "Tech Spring Festival Gala" (January 6, 5:00 PM).
• Ethena (ENA) will unlock approximately 171 million tokens at 3 PM Beijing time on January 5th, representing 2.37% of the circulating supply, worth approximately $42 million.
• Hyperliquid (HYPE) will unlock approximately 12.46 million tokens at 8:00 AM Beijing time on January 6th, representing 3.61% of the circulating supply, with a value of approximately $313 million.

The top 100 cryptocurrencies by market capitalization with the largest gains today are: Virtuals Protocol up 18%, ASI Alliance up 14.5%, Render up 13.7%, Pepe up 8.2%, and SPX6900 up 6.4%.

5. Hot News

• Data shows that tokens such as HYPE, ENA, and APT will undergo significant unlocking, with HYPE unlocking value estimated at approximately $313 million.
• This Week's Preview | Solana Ecosystem Crypto Derivatives Exchange Ranger Launches Public Offering; U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics Releases December Employment Data
• Venezuela holds 240 bitcoins, and analysts estimate that its "shadow reserve" of bitcoins may exceed 600,000.
• The market capitalization of the Memecoin sector rose 23% this week, while trading volume surged 300%.
• Spot gold has returned above the $4,400 mark, while silver has broken through $76 per ounce.
• Infinex's public offering has only raised $491,000 so far, leaving 90.17% remaining to reach its target.
• US lawmakers are considering legislation to ban officials from using prediction markets for "insider trading."
• Six contracts in the market betting on Maduro's downfall totaled $56.6 million.
• SpaceX, OpenAI, and Anthropic plan to launch their IPOs in 2026, potentially marking one of the most significant IPO waves in history.
• Bitmine has added over 49,000 ETH to its staked portfolio, bringing the total staked amount to over 590,000 ETH.
• Digital RMB tops Baidu's trending searches: Interest-bearing on current account balances, fundamentally different from WeChat and Alipay wallets.
• James Wynn opens a long position in PEPE with 10x leverage.
• Ethereum treasury company Quantum Solutions disclosed that its ETH holdings have increased to approximately 5,418.
• Helium founder: HNT token buybacks to be halted due to lukewarm market response.
• A whale that has held ETH for four years swapped 14,145 ETH for 492 WBTC.
• Grayscale Research Director: Four Reasons That Could Drive Bitcoin to New Highs in the First Half of 2026
• Binance will add watch tags for ACA, D, DATA, and FLOW.
• Data shows that gold rose approximately 65% throughout 2025, hitting over 50 new highs, while silver rose approximately 150%.