Beats Didn't Hold | Bitcoin Lost $70,000 | New Referees, Closed Doors | The Hike Bet Round-Tripped | Half the Ask

Good numbers didn't stop the chip selloff.

The Nasdaq fell about 0.9% late Friday and the S&P 500 about 0.4%. The Dow edged up about 0.1%, and the VIX sat near 19.

Cisco (CSCO) raised its revenue and profit outlook and still fell about 6%. AMD lost about 9% and Broadcom 5%. Applied Materials fell about 3% after guiding above forecasts.

Nvidia (NVDA) slipped about 2%, a day after its co-founder resigned as CEO. Finance chief Colette Kress is interim CEO. HSBC cut the stock to Hold and its price target to $170 from $365. Nvidia reports Tuesday.

Cerebras bucked the tape. It rose about 11% after raising its forecast and adding Microsoft as a customer.

Beats Are Priced Before They Print

Cisco and Applied Materials cleared forecasts and sold off anyway. Investors appear to have paid for the good news before it arrived. Nvidia carries that same bar into Tuesday, now under an interim CEO.

Bitcoin lost $70,000, and the bounce didn't stick.

Bitcoin traded near $68,700 late Friday, down about 4%. It touched about $67,800 on some venues, its lowest since Aug. 19. It briefly climbed back above $70,000 after the producer-price report, then gave it up. Ether fell to near $1,940.

The coin appears to be trading more with rates than with the Nasdaq. About $1.6 billion of leveraged bets were liquidated in a day. Nearly 89% were longs. Spot bitcoin funds posted net outflows of about $284 million Thursday, by SoSoValue's count. That made six straight days of outflows and about $1.7 billion in all.

Strategy (MSTR) fell about 2%. Bitcoin now sits about 9% below Strategy's average cost of $75,456. MSCI drops the company from its flagship indexes on Nov. 30. Coinbase (COIN) lost about 2% and set a new 52-week low.

Treasury companies reported the quarter when bitcoin was still rising. Twenty One Capital earned $1.087 billion. It rested on a $1.093 billion paper gain on its bitcoin. It held 43,514 coins at quarter-end. "A balance sheet is not a business," its CEO wrote. At Friday's price, those coins are worth about $650 million less than their Sept. 30 mark.

Metaplanet posted a ¥27.2 billion nine-month loss. Most of it came from selling 10,000 bitcoin to demonstrate liquidity. It then bought back 11,000 at higher prices. Nakamoto fell about 14% after reporting negative operating revenue.

The Profits Were the Price

Treasury firms booked bitcoin's rise as earnings, and the rise is gone. Funds keep leaving, and leverage just cleared. The buyer this cycle counted on is reporting marks, not cash flow.

Washington filled the referee seats while a state closed the doors.

The White House sent the Senate four SEC and CFTC picks, the first in about a year. Republican Steven Levine would take Hester Peirce's former SEC seat. Democrat Kristin Johnson, a former CFTC commissioner, would fill the other SEC opening.

Nathan Anonick and Matthew Rowland, who both worked on the Clarity Act, were named to the CFTC. Chairman Mike Selig is its only commissioner today. Democrats take the Senate in January, which leaves a short window.

Louisiana won an order barring Kalshi, Polymarket and others from offering event contracts there. The same day, Washington sued Arkansas to protect those markets. Robinhood (HOOD), also named, fell about 4%. The order runs about 10 days, with a hearing Nov. 30.

The Justice Department won court approval to seize or restrain more than $1.2 billion stolen from Binance. The FBI blames North Korean hackers for the Oct. 29 theft of more than $6 billion. More than $2.7 billion is frozen in all.

Federal Rules, State Doors

Washington is staffing the agencies that write crypto's rules. States are closing the doors those rules open. A federal license no longer guarantees a customer in every state. Venue risk now runs state by state.

A softer month couldn't beat a hotter year.

Producer prices rose 0.3% in October, below the 0.4% forecast. The annual rate hit 6.5%, the highest since November 2022. The 10-year yield touched 5.17% and sat near 5.16% late. The dollar index held above 103.

Kalshi's December quarter-point hike contract jumped from 88 cents to 94 within minutes of the release. It slid to 86 cents in early afternoon with no clear trigger, then settled back near 88. The contract still prices a quarter-point hike at the Dec. 8-9 meeting as the likeliest outcome. Gold held near $3,880.

One Print Left, and It Didn't Help

This was the last producer-price report before the Fed meets. Prediction traders bid the hike, sold it, then bought it back. A cooler month didn't reopen the path to a pause.

Buyers set the price, and sellers took less than they asked.

OpenAI reportedly raised $15 billion, half the $30 billion it first sought. The round values it at $1.25 trillion, below the $1.4 trillion it pitched. That is still about 47% above March. vVARDIS priced its offering 14% below its range.

Modine (MOD) rose about 28% on a report that Samsung is in talks to buy it. Neither company has confirmed the report, and no price has been disclosed.

TruGreen said Birch Hill bought it from CD&R, ending a 19-year hold. Terms weren't disclosed. easyJet shareholders backed Apollo's £5.7 billion takeover. About 97% of the scheme shares voted were in favor.

Capital on the Buyer's Terms

OpenAI got half the money at a lower price. vVARDIS cut its price to get done. Only a report of strategic talks lifted a stock 28% today. The money is still there, on the buyer's terms.

Friday sold what was priced for good news.

Chips fell through their beats, and bitcoin fell through its bounce. Nvidia reports Tuesday, and Friday's fund flows post tonight.