Powell's Harvard Field Trip: Rate Cuts on the Syllabus?

Fed Chair Jerome Powell is set to speak at Harvard University today, and the crypto market is holding its breath like a degenshitting his pants before a leveraged trade.

The Federal Reserve kept interest rates unchanged at 3.5%-3.75% for the second consecutive meeting, pushing rate cut expectations further down the road. The Fed's dot plot currently shows one rate cut in 2026 and another in 2027, while the CME FedWatch Tool suggests the next cut won't arrive until October 2027. For those keeping score at home, that's roughly the same timeframe as waiting for your mom to finally admit Bitcoin isn't a scam.

Powell will participate in a moderated discussion with Harvard's introductory Principles of Economics class at 10:30 a.m. Eastern time. With no prepared remarks, he'll likely face pointed questions about Fed rate cuts, inflation pressures from surging oil prices, and the broader monetary policy outlook amid US-Iran tensions. Basically, a bunch of 19-year-olds are about to ask the most powerful banker in the world about their student loans while the Middle East does its thing.

Brent crude oil prices jumped to $115 following comments from President Trump about potentially seizing Iranian oil assets. Powell previously acknowledged that rising oil prices could weigh on the US economy, though he dismissed stagflation fears. Nothing says "don't worry about inflation" quite like $115 oil and a president threatening to steal someone's gas station.

The market reaction was mixed. US stock futures climbed nearly 0.50%, and crypto-linked stocks including MSTR, COIN, and CRCL posted gains. Bitcoin rose over 1% in the past 24 hours, currently trading around $67,500 with a range between $64,971 and $67,722. Trading volume surged nearly 64%. Apparently, someone out there is buying the dip, or maybe it's just Michael Saylor's reflection in the Bitcoin ETF data again.

Not everyone is bullish. On-chain analyst Willy Woo predicts a Bitcoin bottom between $46,000 and $54,000, while technical analysts note a bearish triangle pattern forming on the daily chart that could trigger a drop below $50,000. Nothing like a classic TA pattern to remind us that charts are just expensive Rorschach tests for people who got rejected from art school.