Power Lunch - Stocks reverse course, Bitcoin dips below $90,000 11/20/25

Episode Date: November 20, 2025

Stocks started off the day rallying after Nvidia earnings but quickly sold off. Bitcoin continues its slide. More on the market here on Power Lunch. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

We'll call it a rally that was not. The Bitcoin and market sell-off deepening. Oh, and a draft peace plan for a possible end of the war in Ukraine. Welcome to Power Lunch, everybody. I am Brian Kelly is back the first week of December. And what a day for stocks and for your money. The markets, they are lower right now, but that is not the entire story. Both Bitcoin and NVIDIA, they are taking hits.

NVIDIA, if you remember, you woke up, the market was higher, B-N-Vidia was higher as well. NVIDIA sort of single-handly pulling the entire market up, but then everything turned around right around 11 a.m. Eastern Time. Invita took a hit. Bitcoin got hit hard, and maybe that is what is pulling stocks lower. I want to show you why we say that. We want to take a look at Bitcoin and the NASDAQ together, okay? The NASDAQ is in blue. Bitcoin is in orange. This is intraday. So it just goes back a couple of hours. And as you can see, we were both up about 2% earlier in the day, and then Bitcoin began to break down about 10 a.m. The stock market, the NASDAQ anyway, shortly after that as well.

Steve Sosnik and Tom Lee both here with critical insight, and they are both here in moments. In fact, right now. So let's kick things off with the big turn in stocks. It is a sell-off, but really that doesn't tell the story because markets were up about 1,000 points. So while you may look at the numbers and say, we're not down that much, why are we seeing all the sell-off graphics is because the turn from the top to where we are has been over three and a half percent. We're joining out to kick things off by the aforementioned Steve Sosnik. He is chief strategist at Interactive Brokers.

Steve, thanks for joining us really on short notice. I know you're very busy today. We'll keep it quick. Invidia and its stock moves certainly getting all the attention. But you flagged to us earlier today that it's possible Bitcoin. and the crypto complex also helps spark this big turn. Why and what specifically did you see? Hi, Brian. To me, it was kind of uncanny. I was on the phone with someone discussing, you know, how good the market was doing. And I said, you know, some Bitcoin is starting here to flirt with 90,000.

If it breaks, I have a feeling that that the S&Ps can follow. And it was uncanny. As soon as we broke 90,000, down went the NASDAQ and the S&P 500. I'm not going to say that Bitcoin is the reason that we had the big intraday reversal. Bitcoin was the proximate trigger because I do think right now algorithmic traders are using Bitcoin as what we would call a lead. Right now, it's being used as a proxy for speculative fever. If I'm noticing it and you're noticing it, algorithms are noticing it. And so money is being allocated on this rationally or not. Well, is money, is Steve, that's where we stand?

Is money also being raised? Is Bitcoin maybe, if not a leader for stocks? Is Bitcoin at least an indicator for something like liquidity, retail liquidity in the market? People have to raise money so they sell what they can? To a certain extent, yes. I mean, you know, many people are up. It depends that the newer travelers are not up because we are down for the year, but we are still well above where we were before the president.

election. And also remember, a lot of the crypto complex carries a lot more leverage than stocks. Stocks, you can't lever up the same way that you can do in crypto. And so as a result, if that starts to break, it's much more, it adds a lot of fragility to the system. This is a critical, as usual, Steve, critical aspect that you are bringing up. And I want all of our audience watching and listening to hear again what you had to say, which is this idea of leverage. It's not that you're buying a Bitcoin or selling a Bitcoin. You can leverage. up 2 to 1, 3 to 1, 5 to 1, 10 to 1, or even more than 10 to 1. Can you not? And that leverage means if things go up, it's very good news. But if things go down, you've got to have that capital,

have that cash and money available for you to raise. And this is the danger. I think today is very indicative of this idea of what leverage can do in the stock market. Exactly. You know, leverage can be. Leverage can be. a great friend when it's going your way, but it could be a very nasty companion when it's not. And what happens particularly in a lot of cases, the idea of waiting for the margin call, you know, for the margin department to call you up and get money from you isn't the case anymore. In very, we, at interactive brokers, you know, we move very quickly and people, and people

unfortunately do find themselves liquidated. That's the model in the crypto world. And what happens is if you do these trades, it's great when it's working, but there's a lot of risk. There is always the balance of risk and reward. In the recent environment, people have been paid for embracing risk. In the current environment, where it's much more balanced, you've got to be much more careful about embracing leverage. Yeah, and we're not, I want to be clear. We are down. We're at session lows right now. I'm not making light of a 1.75% decline in the NASDAQ. That's a pretty steep drop, especially in what's been a solid bull market for the last

couple of years. But the market story is not that we're down 1.75. It's that we were up more than a thousand points of the Dow and that things have certainly turned around. Maybe it wasn't Bitcoin, Steve. If not, is there something else that you saw? Because we woke up to green. We woke up the futures up and video was up more than 2%. We thought, all right, this is by the dip. This is the all clear signal. Clearly not the case, at least not today. I think the other things here are, first of all, this is now becoming a key reversal where you have higher highs and lower lows if we finish at these levels. That's technically pretty nasty. But in general, what's gone on is there's just, part of it is also the market's willingness to chase rallies. So I think what happened

was when we woke up this morning, the S&P futures, NASDAQ futures, were up about a percent, and that was okay, considering Nvidia was where it was. But the need to chase this thing to up 2 percent is what makes it fragile when you lose a little leg of the stool, down you go much faster. Well said. Steve Sosnik, interactive brokers, Steve, appreciate you jumping on. Thank you very much. All right, joining us now is Fund Stratt's head of research. CNBC contributor Tom Lee, also the chairman of Bitmine immersion technologies and ether treasury company. All right, so Tom, you've heard what Steve had to say. This is, by the way, not unusual for Nvidia, is it? Invidia, the good folks at bespoke, your team, you've recognized that Nvidia will often have

these kind of wild swings following earnings, but what is your take right now on these markets? Well, I think I'm going to kind of add to what Steve said. You know, I think the crypto market has been limping along since October 10th because on that date was a negative shock. I mean, today's stock market looks a lot like an echo of what happened on October 10th. But on October 10th, that liquidation was so big, Brian, it really crippled. market makers. And our market makers are critical in crypto because they provide liquidity. I mean, they act almost as the central bank in crypto. And if they've got a hole in their balance sheet that they need to raise capital for, they need to reflexively reduce their balance sheet,

reduce trading. And if prices fall, they've got to then do more selling. So I think that this drip that's been taking place for the last few weeks in crypto reflects this market maker crippling. And so in 2022, it took eight weeks for that to really get flushed out. We're only six weeks into it. So I kind of concur. I think crypto, Bitcoin and Ethereum are in some ways a leading indicator for equities because of that unwind and now this sort of limping and weakened liquidity. Well, that was the point that my very, very smart team behind me, we put together for the top of the show, which was showing that Bitcoin turned down today before the market did. All right, take us back. So October 6th, I think it was October 6th or 7th, Bitcoin hit

125,000. Yeah, a couple days later, it was still around 120,000. Now obviously, Bitcoin's at 86 and changed. So what specifically occurred on or around October 10th that would lead us to where we are now on what, November 20th? Yeah. Well, Steve actually pointed this out. There's a lot of what they call automated processes in crypto. One of them is called ADL, okay, and that's an automatic liquidation feature that would take place if someone's account or their collateral drops in price.

It's essentially like a margin column. On a specific exchange, a stable coin's price varied from other exchanges. actually, stable coin should stay at a dollar. It dropped to 65 cents. But that only happened within the exchange quotes, within this exchange because of liquidity. That triggered an ADL, an automatic liquidation across many accounts. It wiped out as that spread across other exchanges, right, because liquidation's cascade. Almost two million crypto accounts got wiped out, even though minutes before they were actually profitable accounts. So who is behind this? Like, Who's the they in the market makers and they got hit?

Who's the they? Well, you know, Brian, I am aware of names, but because, you know, I'm not someone who wants to name names, I think what you should keep mind is that this error is actually essentially a bug, you know, a code error because they, I think in retrospect, they would have pulled pricing from across exchanges to set the price for that stable coin rather than rely on internal quotes. So, but this has resulted in a lot of market makers and traders having less capital. And as you know, as crypto prices drift lower because trading volumes

drop, they need to then have more capital available, which means they shrink their balance sheet further. So this is then that reflexive weakening. I hate, I want to go back to this point, Tom, I hate the term glitch. I can't stand the term glitch because, you know, things go down at the airport and they say, well, a glitch clause your flight to not take off. That's not a glitch. That's more than a glitch. It's a word that is used to describe pretty serious automation issues, software problems, crashes, for some reason that they try to minimize.

Is this some kind of a software bug that's causing part of this? I'm trying to follow exactly what you're hinting around about. Yeah. I mean, Brian, it is. I mean, for instance, in 1987, portfolio insurance was the, quote, glitch. And that triggered the cascade in 1987. And so the industry learned and then never offered that again. You know, in 2009, it was really that the collateral wasn't secure in real estate and these packaged subprime mortgages. Now, the industry learned, and they read. coded that. I'm talking about Wall Street, but then regulators came in and like overregulated. That's that was the negative effect of that. In crypto, this code of ADL and the way they pull prices is never going to happen again. The good news is we're not going to have overregulation in crypto, but but now we have to deal with that liquidation effect. 2022 was a big liquidation and it took eight weeks. But it, that is not kind of, you're right. It is the nature of DeFi where

there is going to be code and there's going to be an error found. And you said it leverages what's dangerous. And so investors should not be using excess leverage in crypto. But you implied it in 2022, in 2022, we had what you would call a six week washout, maybe because of this, again, not using the word glitch, this software or coding problem or mistake, six, weeks later, we know what happened. If you bought then, you made a lot of money. Do you still think we are in a washout period in an overall bull market? Yeah, I mean, I can tell you a few things. Whether we're talking to macro funds or to crypto funds, they are sitting on piles of cash. People are sitting on their hands because they know there are these plumbing problems and

these crippled market makers, they're not going to try to be heroes and step in here. So when we look at those prior corrections, even Bitcoin in the last few years, Bitcoin last year had some really ugly corrections. Each of them had the recovery, right, the rise from the low was faster than the drip to the bottom. So if we've been suffering through six weeks of Bitcoin falling from 125 to 88, and maybe it goes to 77, right? Maybe that's the low, and Ethereum bottoms at 2,500. The recovery from there to all-time highs will be faster than the decline. That's what happened in every crypto decline, because what you have is all this spool up energy. People are sitting and waiting, and there's panic selling forced sellers, but the buyers

are being patient. That's what will happen. And again, you guys kind of hit it on the head. Microstrategie is probably the most important stock to watch right now, because that is the Bitcoin proxy. It's the most liquid name. It seems to me that when in the crypto world, when they're trying to hedge their longs in Bitcoin and Ethereum, they can't find any other way to hedge it except shorting the liquid stocks. That is a proxy. So that's the microstroids. So that's the microstructure. strategies. This is one of, if not the most important interviews I've done this year. And that's respectfully to every other guest we've had on this fine network and fine show. Because I want to dive in a little bit deeper to what you're saying, that basically there's some kind of a software

coding problem that's causing a lot of this. Let's bring up guys, if we can, MSTR. That is, the company formerly known as Microstrategy, now just known as strategy. The stock's down 50% in three months, Tom, it's down about 65% from its highs in the middle of July. Is micro strategy down because Bitcoin is down? Or is Bitcoin falling in part because the strategies of the world, the Michael sailors of the world, have to sell the crypto because their equity is going down. What's the chicken? What's the egg? Yeah. Well, again, you know, because of my world and research and on BitMine, we are really plugged into all the trading desks and all the clients that trade.

Anybody who has a sizable Bitcoin long position, okay, let's say it's more than a billion, they have very limited ability to hedge it in crypto derivatives, like calls, you know, the max they can do is maybe 5% of their holdings. And then if you go to traditional CME exchanges, they're contract. contract sizes prevent someone from hedging a billion dollar portfolio. However, someone can use micro strategy's options chain, which is so liquid, to hedge all of their crypto. So micro strategy is essentially absorbing all the hedging pressure that the crypto industry is trying to do to protect their Bitcoin longs. So the reason micro strategy is a leading indicator, it's actually

the only convenient way to hedge someone's long is to short micro strategy or buy puts. That's what we're seeing today. This is the kind of stuff, Tom. It's one of the main reasons that we bring you on because you understand what I would consider the engine oil of the stock market, right? We know how the engine works or people think they do, but inside that engine, there are gears, there are pistons, there are things that are occurring that for 99.9% of our audience, they don't do this for a living. We get it. This is a really important interview. I'm going to let you go, Tom. We are watching Micro Strategy or Strategy, watching Bitcoin, and we're watching possibly 77,000, which you think might be kind of a washout period, correct?

Yeah, that's right. Tom DeMarc, who is an advisor to Bitmine, has been really giving a lot of insights. Yeah, he's watching that, actually, micro strategy at this level here probably is when you want to ratchet into the longs. And Bitcoin may be just a few thousand dollars lower. So we might be at the bottom for strategy. Yeah. Look at it maybe the DeMarc indicators named after Mr. Tom DeMarc. It's a technical indicator watched by a lot of hitters on Wall Street. Tom Lee, a fun strat.

Appreciate your time. Really super smart interview. As always, Tom. Have a great day. Thank you. Thank you. All right. Out of stocks for a bit.

Let's go now to the bond market because treasury yields, as you might imagine, on a daylight today, they are responding as well. They're not falling as much as Rick Santelli. We might think, though. When I see a market reversal of this magnitude, maybe I think bonds get bought a lot more, and we see a yield right under 4%. Not the case today.

No, and I think that you've nailed one of the reasons why. And I think portfolio insurance that was referenced by Mr. Lee in the old days, well, think about it this way. If it isn't really the economy that's driving store, stock prices lower on a day like today, maybe that explains why treasury yields aren't paying as much attention. That relationship of nasty moves in stocks usually translates into buying in treasuries. And even though there is some, you're exactly right. There doesn't seem to be what many would have guessed would have showed up on a day like today. Let's go quickly and

look at the dynamics. 119,000 jobs you see on that bar chart. You know, we turn the corner to some extent, and that was the good news, but it was a mixed bag. 4.4% unemployment rate. That's a four-year high, as you see on the next chart. If you look at twos and tens, we made the high yield basically right on the number, and that's the top of the closing range for November, basically, for 10-year, right around that 415 to 417 area, and we held the bottom of that closing range, right around 408-ish. We're hovering at 4-10, not huge moves. Finally, what has been moving wildly today are probabilities for the rate cut in December. It was as low as 24%, as high as 41%. That was today. It's certainly sitting now at 36%. That chart you see? Well, yesterday we went

down. That knocked the percentages lower. Today, with the market's moves, we see it coming back a bit up. That price is in a little bit more cut. So 24 to 36%, still well under 50. Brian, back to you. Quickly though, Rick, you're a markets guy, bond guy, but would you make a way? what Tom Lee had to say. I thought that was an incredibly interesting interview because we're talking about these software problems and forced liquidity and hedging against it. I mean, you're a markets guy. That was kind of a rare peak inside the engine, I think. Yeah, the only thing I'm not sure that I agree with is it's not a glitch. It's the way the markets are and the programs are created. Now, just like portfolio insurance,

it wasn't a mistake. It just wasn't the most efficient way to accomplish the goal. And just like the leverage in that system that Mike, Mr. Lee was pointing to, in the end, they will find ways. But you always have to protect the holders, the FCMs, and all the people in this equation that take the risk when value of something used as collateral diminishes in a fast way. Yeah, and it wasn't just portfolio insurance in 1987. It also reminded me at 2007 and early 2008 when the people that were, they were the ones you could push around, got pushed around, and started things selling. Rick Santelli, thank you very much. All right, after the break, we're going to switch gears fully. Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelensky, confirming he received

a draft of a possible peace plan that could end Russia's war in his nation. We'll get more on this potentially big piece of news with Michael Handlin next as markets right in their lows, and we've got full market coverage all day long. Stick around. There is another big piece of news to pay attention to today along with the markets, and that is a possible end to Russia's war in Ukraine. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky confirmed that he has received the draft of a possible peace plan. We don't know many details.

But Zelensky's office said he will review the key points for her. required to achieve peace in the coming days, and he will discuss that with President Trump. This follows earlier reports that the United States and Russia have been secretly working on a separate peace plan, one that reportedly did not include Ukraine's input, and that plan reportedly calls for Ukraine to cede parts of its eastern region called Donbos to Russia. It is early, and to be clear, there is a lot that we do not know, but let's talk about these headlines and what we do know. rejoining us now Michael Hanlon, Director of Foreign Policy Research at Brookings. Michael, we know it's early. What is your initial reaction to this news?

Greetings. My initial reaction is unfavorable. Let me go through two or three quick reasons. One, giving up any land voluntarily when Russia has stolen 19% of Ukraine already since 2014 just seems completely illegitimate. It's one thing to be pragmatic and to say we're not going to be able to help Ukraine push back Russian gains, and therefore, let's just try to end the killing. It's something else altogether to somehow make Russia's claims look legitimate and therefore concede some of them

when they haven't even been attained on the battlefield. But that's not the worst of it. The worst of it, from what we hear and see at least, is that Ukraine would be sharply circumscribed in what it could do about its own defense going forward. It would have to cut its military at half. It would have to disarm in certain categories of weaponry. Basically, its sovereignty and its ability to make its own military decisions would be denied. I have no problem with President Trump saying that Ukraine should not join NATO. I actually think Trump's right on that. But it's something else altogether to deny Ukraine the ability to build its own self-defense

when, in fact, obviously, Russia's been the aggressor in this war, and Russia could be an aggressor in a future war. Yeah, Russia invaded Ukraine. You are exactly correct. And they invaded that eastern part, which they claim is ethically Russian. Some of the people speak Russian, whatever. Is there any situation, Michael, that you could see where, Zelensky would make a, quote, peace deal that would involve Russia being able to either stay

in some of those regions or even take some of those regions. Would that ever occur? The most I could imagine President Zelensky accepting and the most I could imagine the international community writ large accepting would be in those spaces where there's essentially been devastation and a depopulation already near the front lines, but maybe still on the side that Ukraine holds, you could conceivably imagine Ukraine giving a few kilometers here and there to Russia since Ukrainians aren't living in those regions anyway. But anything that's 10, 20 kilometers back from the front line, I would think it would be not only morally repulsive, but entirely unrealistic and unfair to make Ukraine give that up,

especially because, yes, you're right, these borders have gone back and forth over the centuries, but the entire Russia operation of the last 11 years has been illegitimate and illegal. And, you know, the Russian-speaking Ukrainians who lived in those regions, most of them have either been kidnapped or are now speaking Ukrainian as a matter of pride, because Putin has unified them in their Ukraine character, even in those regions that historically might have leaned a little bit towards Russia in language and culture. Is it good, though, that at least we are all communicating even through back channels, Ukraine, Russia, with the United States, and hopefully, by the way, NATO and Germany and some others

in the middle of that. I'm not aware if they are, but I would hope and assume that they would be. Do you take a positive at all, Michael, that there is that communication, that there are terms that are being put forth, even if they are not the right terms right now? I can't quite go that far, and I was a person who you may recall was willing to support the Alaska summit with the red carpet for Putin. I had to hold my nose like a lot of people, but if President Trump was going to get some kind of positive vibe going and get an negotiation going, I was prepared to see what that could deliver. But not if what that has meant is that Trump concedes to Putin on every substantive point since. And that's what I'm afraid we're

seeing in this peace plan. It'd be one thing if there were three ideas that were favorable to Russia and two that were favorable to Ukraine, you know, something for everybody as a starting point in the conversation. But from what we know so far, this is a pro-Russian peace plan. And I think it sets things back. Michael Hanlon, the Brookings Institution, always a straight shooter. Michael, we appreciate it. Thank you very much. Thank you kindly. All right, coming up, we're going to go back to the markets more in the big market turn. We're looking beyond stocks and bonds. Again, markets down about one and a half percent, but really it's the turn from the top today.

That is the story. We'll talk about that and gold. Coming up next. Here's where we are in the markets right now. not down much. Pros aren't looking there anyway. Look at the NASDAQ. And if you're just joining us or just paying attention to the markets today, that does not tell the story. The NASDAQ is down 1.6%. That is not a good day, but it's not catastrophic. But I will note at one point today, the NASDAQ was up by 2.6%. InVIDIA numbers came in solid. Stock and futures were up this morning. Nasdaq rocketed to

start the day. So we're now down 1.6%. Don't have to be a math whiz to know that's about a 4% top to bottom swing for the NASDAQ. One of the biggest swings that we have seen this year. So again, the numbers themselves, not terrible, but the swing, the 4% move, there is your headline. All right, time now for your market navigator. And let's talk about gold, because not even gold is actually higher on this down day. But it. overall, it certainly has been a golden year. Gold up more than 50 percent. And your next guest says gold can keep going up. Joining us, Phil Strebel, he is chief market strategist at Blue Line Futures. Phil, appreciate you joining us. Obviously, today's kind of an odd day. I want to get your take

on Bitcoin in a second. Quickly, are you a gold buyer today? It's down. Why not? Why not pick some of it? Well, I mean, we're only down about a dollar on the day. I'll take that than owning that than owning Bitcoin or owning the NASDAQ right now. I mean, gold has just been fantastic. And as we go into the, you know, second half of the fourth quarter begin 2026, it looks like the momentum in gold is going to continue to that bull run. 10% move in September, best monthly performance since 2016, 5% move in October, all-time highs. We're up 55% this year. Look, the global economic outlook, it continues to support gold. Global, we're seeing many countries face declining growth, rising inflation. It creates that inflationary environment that benefits gold. Gold, if you look at

against many different foreign currencies, the Australian dollar, British pound, Euro, Indian Rupee and Japanese yen, all right or near those all-time highs. And there's really three main drivers that are going to keep this going into 2026. I want to pivot. I'd love to get more into those drivers, Phil, but I've got to ask you about Bitcoin because gold, we can talk about gold tomorrow, Monday or Tuesday. It's still going to be around. It's been around for, you know, a couple thousand years. Bitcoin, Bitcoin's down big today. It's about $86,000. It was $125,000 six weeks ago. I don't know if you saw the Tom Lee or heard it interview a couple of minutes ago where he said maybe $77,000. Looks like it could be a bottom for Bitcoin. What's your take on Bitcoin and crypto right now?

Well, okay. When you get to that outlook, you look at the April lows, the tariff lows. It was 75,000. So that seems like the next logical round number bottom on there. Guys like Tom Lee, he's trying to acquire some of these cryptocurrencies like Ethereum. So he likes the lower prices and the way they structure their product. They're issuing debt in order to purchase more to become this Ethereum Treasury. So however you slice it, lower prices works for him in the near term. Now, Bitcoin futures, they just haven't done what they're supposed to do. I mean, we look at central banks. They're not buying Bitcoin. We look at investors. They are de-leveraging themselves of Bitcoin. Yet one of the largest outflows on a Black Rock Bitcoin just a few days ago.

So Bitcoin, as far as a portfolio diversifier, maybe a small slice, but I could tell you I'd rather own gold, even oil, copper, silver, over Bitcoin. I like it, the commodities guy going deep into some of the hardcore commodities because I will say this. I'm not saying I understand everything about Bitcoin, but I do know you've got to have a pretty strong stomach. It's like watching your bears this year with that ball next to you, Phil, you think they're down, then all of a sudden Caleb Williams brings them right back. Phil Strebel, really appreciate it. Thank you very much. Thanks. All right.

Up next, more on the huge reversal on Wall Street today. And what it might mean for the Federal Reserve, you're going to hear from somebody who helps manage more than $1 trillion. NASDAQ down 1.5%. We're back right after this. All right. Let's jump right back into these markets. Again, the numbers on the board don't tell the story.

Yes, He's down 1%. So you say, well, it's not good, but it's not great. What's the big deal? The big deal is that we were up 2%. So it's about a 3% change for the S&P over a 4% shift top to bottom for the NASDAQ. It's just one day. Let's talk about longer trends. Joining us on set is Mr. San Diego himself. Joe Tannius, he is chief investor strategist at Northern Trust asset management. They have a cool trillion dollars with a T under management. Joe, good to have you on. An important date. Listen, I get it. It's one day. There's all kinds of stuff playing under the hood, Fed rate cuts, Bitcoin, Invidia. How do you sort of talk your clients off that proverbial investing ledge and say keep calm and invest on?

Keep calm, invest on. I think that's a great way to summarize it. Put that on a coffee mug, Joe. Put that on a coffee mug. I'll bring it in with me next time I come. I think, look, at the end of the day, there are a lot of headwinds, there are a lot of tailwinds, and trying to navigate all of these headlines. lines has just been a little bit challenging. I mean, I heard you talk a little bit earlier today with Tom Lee about what's going on with Bitcoin. Certainly, we can't ignore that. That might

very well be the catalyst, if you will, that led to this risk off trade we see in the markets. At the end of the day, we also have concerns over the Fed. There's concerns about AI and just valuation in general. You name it. Where do you want to start? Well, I'm not going to lie to you. I'm an honest guy. And I have to say, I'm not sure I fully understood everything Tom was saying about this ADL and the software potential problem with coin. I'm going to go back and rewatch the interview after this show. But I do know this. We asked our audience, smartest audience of the world, what they think is the next big driver for the market over the next couple of months. Did that with a Twitter slash ex-pole.

We had rate cuts, macroeconomy, the tariff ruling and AI spending. Got a giant wall right there. We could show off. I was surprised, Joe. Fed rate cuts, 32% said that was the most important thing to the path of equity markets the next few months. Would you agree with that? I'm a little surprised by that as well. Me too. I would have thought AI spending was number one in a big way. It was dead last. Yeah, I actually would have put the SCOTUS tariff rooting ruling, excuse me, dead last.

Look, I think not to be dismissive of what's happening with the Fed rate cut, but let's just take a really big step back here and think about monetary policy in general, right? Nothing has materially changed over the last six weeks. We know that the balance of risks have shifted towards the labor market. And we also know if you just take a look at the feds dot plot and you take it at face value, we are going to get to neutral monetary policy, not restrictive, not accommodative, but neutral monetary policy over the next 12 months. And that tells us you have another 75 basis points of rate cuts to come.

Whether it comes in December or it comes in January, we can debate the merits of what should happen or what shouldn't happen. But by and large, interest rates are moving in that direction. Northern Trust based at 50 South O'Salle in Chicago. I love Chicago. You know that, my friends at the CBOE and CME, and if I talk to my smart bond friends, they will tell me that it doesn't really matter what the Fed does. The bond market's going to do what it wants, and the bond market hasn't really moved.

We're at the same level on the tenure that we were over a year ago, despite rate cuts and talk of more rate cuts. How do we explain that? I think it's recognizing that days like today where you have just a tremendous amount of volatility, it's not always driven by the underlying fundamentals. What do we know is happening? We know that there is a meaningful amount of fiscal stimulus which is expected to hit the system in early 2026. We know that corporate profits look incredibly healthy.

We just wrapped up earnings season as we look ahead into next year. We're expecting another year of double-digit earnings growth. We're expecting profit margins to pick up. And, of course, the third thing is we know that interest rates are likely going to come down, at least as far as policy rates are concerned. Now, when you take all of that together

and you try to synthesize it, what does it mean? It means that, generally speaking, you should see another good year for risk assets. We should see the U.S. economy avoid a recession and begin to see some acceleration, particularly in the back half of next year. And I think that's really what the bond market, at least, is trying to tell us. There are concerns over deficits and debt levels. Make no mistake about that. But generally speaking, as a long-term investor, I think I'm looking at this and I'm seeing some opportunity.

If I go to Gibson's or Sullivan's or Maple and Ash, I'm just throwing out all the Chicago restaurants there, Joe. I see a packed house, I see lines to get in, there's weights for tables, if I can even get one. I'll drop your name next time that'll help me get in. But my point is, I do wonder if we on this side of the desk, this side of the TV screen, worry too much. I've also been in northern Wisconsin many, many times. People are struggling. I'm trying to understand the economy.

I'm not sure I have a full handle on it. I think we are seeing a bifurcated economy. You've heard decay-shaped economy, bifurcated economy. whether we're talking about what's happening with earnings, and you think about things related to the AI trade or power or travel, and then you look at the other side of it, looking at consumer goods, looking at autos, and then certainly you think about the consumer,

the upper income cohort versus the lower income cohort. We are seeing a lot of people struggle, despite the fact that the economy, at least at a headline level, appears to be doing relatively. But like it or not, and this has always been the case, and it probably always will, the people at the top have the money, they're going to control the spending.

I mean, that's the reality. They have extra money. That's what they're spending. Without question. That still seems to be doing very well, and that's probably going like it or not. People can hate what I'm saying, but it probably is going to power earnings. I think it is going to continue to power earnings. It is going to continue to support consumption.

But let's also understand why these individuals are doing relatively well. It's not so much what's happening in the labor market. We talked about that the labor market's in a very, very soft place. It's because of the wealth effect. It's because of asset prices. To the extent you own these assets. You're doing relatively well. And when you think about the stock market, again, everything brings us back to this AI narrative.

That's right. And we're not making too much of today. The NASDAX sell it more than 15% this year. S&P up 13% even with the declines today. Joe Tannius, Northern Trust. Appreciate it. Safe travels, wherever you may be going. Joe, thank you.

All right, let's get out of Bertha Coombs for a CNBC News update. Brian, Democratic leaders say they have contacted law enforcement to ensure the safety of the six lawmakers. who President Trump suggested today should be arrested. He wrote on social media that a video that they made advising U.S. service members to refuse illegal orders was, quote, seditious behavior at the highest level punishable by death. All six lawmakers are veterans and former intelligence officers. A federal appeals court paused a Chicago judge's order to release and bond hundreds of immigrants detained during an enforcement surge. The ruling would have facilitated the release of roughly 400 people as soon as Friday. The appeals court says it will hear arguments in early December. And Cracker Barrel shareholders voted to keep the company's CEO in place despite the restaurant change's disastrous attempted rebrand earlier this year. The chain simplified its logo in August and redesigned its restaurants, but quickly reversed course following backlash.

Company warned in September the fallout could still lead to weaker sales and lower customer traffic next year. Brian, they did, however, part with the consultant that had put them onto that rebrand. Always, when in doubt, blame the consultant. Bertha Coops, thank you very much. All right, folks, we are following the sell-off in the markets and in Bitcoin. Bitcoin is down again. It's off about 3%.

Bitcoin's at 86,000 in change. Bitcoin was at $125,000 per coin six weeks ago. Break out the drama meet. We'll talk more about Bitcoin and Crypto right after this. All right. We've got to talk about what may be leading this market lower, and that's not Nvidia. It's Bitcoin. Bitcoin continues to fall. It's down more than 2%. In fact, the brief broke below 87,000. Now, if you missed the top of the show, by the way, go back and watch it if you can, but Funstratt's Tom Lee came on. He made some rather eye-opening and ear-opening comments suggesting a potential software problem may be contributing to or even driving the crypto

sell-off. Listen. There's a lot of what they call automated processes in crypto. One of them is called ADL, okay, and that's an automatic liquidation feature that would take place if someone's account or their collateral drops in price. It's essentially like a margin column. On a specific exchange, a stable coin's price varied from other exchanges. It actually, stable coins should stay at a dollar. It dropped to 65 cents. But that only happened within the exchange quotes, within this exchange because of liquidity. That triggered an ADL, an automatic liquidation across many accounts, it wiped out as that spread across other exchanges, right? Because liquidation's cascade, almost two million crypto accounts got wiped out,

even though minutes before they were actually profitable accounts. Let's try to understand this a little bit more. McKenzie, I know just enough to be dangerous. ADL is not anti-deformation league. It is auto-de-leveraging or automatic de-leveraging, kind of a forced selling. What is really Tom Lee kind of getting into? who are discussing in that answer? So there are really three things happening here and that ADL cascade is just one symptom of a much deeper problem.

So first, the crypto market has been limping along ever since that October 10th liquidation event. It was so severe that it actually crippled major market makers. And that really matters because they're the ones who provide liquidity and they've been compared to the central banks of crypto. So when they take a hit, they have to pull back,

they shrink their balance sheets, and they reduced trading, and that's why we've seen this slow motion drip lower over the last six weeks, very much an echo of what we saw in 2022, and we're not through it yet. Second big thing happening here, Brian, this isn't just isolated to crypto, because as soon as Bitcoin flipped south and broke below 90K, that's when the SMP 500 rolled over two. Now, I have not independently confirmed this, but what analysts are saying is that algorithmic traders are now using Bitcoin as a proxy for speculative risk. They are allocating money based on it. So when Bitcoin breaks down, it's not just a crypto story. It's becoming a broader signal that

retail liquidity and risk appetite are drying up. And let's not forget, in 2022, Bitcoin fell over 50% in a matter of weeks. And Tom Lee kind of alluded to that and basically suggests that 77 may be a bottom. This is one of many declines we have seen in Bitcoin. This is an asset that is volatile to the extreme. And because the crypto complex carries more leverage than the stock market, Once it starts it on wine, it really adds real fragility to the whole system. And that's been this nasty feedback loop that we're watching play out right now. And it's a textbook example of what leverage can do when things head south. They call it Hodel.

Hold on for dear life for a reason. McKinsey Sagalos, appreciate it. More power lunch right after this. We're going to say goodbye, but one stock to watch before we do that is Robin Hood. That stock down 8%, maybe kind of a tell. Could be a wild hour of trading. Closing bells got. Got it right now.