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Trade Gap Narrows as Exports Pick Up The September goods and services deficit narrowed to $52.8 billion from $59.3 billion in August, with exports up 3.0% and imports up just 0.6%. Industrial supplies and materials led the export gain, helped by a strong jump in nonmonetary gold, while consumer goods exports got a decent lift from pharmaceuticals. Year-to-date the overall deficit is still wider than in 2024, but the three-month average gap has come in $14 billion from a year earlier. That improvement, even if partly noise, takes a bit of pressure off the dollar bears who have been leaning…

Key Takeaways Crypto investment products recorded nearly $1 billion in net outflows in the third week of December. Ethereum and Bitcoin products led the losses, while Solana and XRP continued to attract selective inflows. Analysts point to prolonged U.S. regulatory uncertainty, particularly delays around the CLARITY Act, as a key driver. Institutional investors are still heading for the exits. Despite a brief stabilization in crypto prices earlier this month, crypto investment products saw another sharp round of outflows in the third week of December. Nearly $990 million left crypto-linked funds last week, according to data compiled by CoinShares, with most…

Cryptocurrency exchange Crypto.com is building an internal market-making team as part of its expansion into prediction markets, a move the company says is fully aligned with federal regulations and intended to improve liquidity, even as market-making in outcome-based trading continues to draw scrutiny.Bloomberg reported Tuesday that the exchange is recruiting for a new role on its market-making desk, citing a job posting for a “quant trader” who would help buy and sell contracts tied to the outcomes of sporting events on Crypto.com’s prediction platform. Source: BloombergThe report has drawn attention to the practice of exchanges facilitating trading against customer orders,…

The dollar index (DXY00) on Monday fell by -0.32%, retreating from last Friday’s 1-week high.  The dollar continues to see underlying weakness as the FOMC is expected to cut interest rates by about -50 bp in 2026, while the BOJ is expected to raise rates by another +25 bp in 2026, and the ECB is expected to leave rates unchanged in 2026. The dollar is also under pressure as the Fed boosts liquidity in the financial system, having begun purchasing $40 billion a month in T-bills in mid-December.  The dollar is also being undercut by concerns that President Trump intends to…

Key Takeaways The market cap of tokenized treasury products has more than doubled in 2025. Different token models have different advantages Yields in the year to Christmas range from 2.3%-4.2%. Various forms of tokenized U.S. Treasury exposure have been around for years, but the concept really took off in 2025. The market capitalization of all yield-bearing, on-chain Treasury products has more than doubled since the start of the year, reaching over nine billion dollars by December. However, not all tokenized Treasury platforms are equal. As investors count up their yields this Christmas, who has Crypto Santa rewarded the most? Mapping…

Bitcoin and select altcoins are attempting to start a recovery, but higher levels are expected to attract strong selling by the bears.

Corn futures posted fractional losses across most contracts to close out the Friday session. March closed the week with a 3 cent gain. The CmdtyView national average Cash Corn price was down ¾ cent to $3.99. We will get another USDA Export Sales report update on Monday, with traders looking for 1.2-2.4 MMT of corn sold in the week ending on 12/4.  Don’t Miss a Day: From crude oil to coffee, sign up free for Barchart’s best-in-class commodity analysis.  CFTC data as of the week ending on 12/9 was released this afternoon, with spec traders in corn futures and options trimming 13,552…

Klarna, a Swedish fintech company known for its “Buy Now, Pay Later” (BNPL) service, has partnered with crypto exchange Coinbase to add stablecoins to its institutional funding toolkit.Under the arrangement, the global payments and digital banking firm plans to raise short-term funding from institutional investors denominated in USDC (USDC), using Coinbase’s crypto-native infrastructure, according to a Friday announcement.“This is an exciting first step into a new way to raise funding,” Klarna chief financial officer Niclas Neglén said. “Stablecoin connects us to an entirely new class of institutional investors, and gives us the potential to diversify our funding sources in ways…

Soybeans are continuing the weaker trade so far on Friday, with contracts 3 to 4 cents lower. The cmdtyView national average Cash Bean price is 3 1/4 cents lower at $9.78 1/4. Soymeal futures are down 50 cents to $1.10, with Soy Oil futures down 31 to 33 points.USDA reported another private export sale of 134,000 MT of soybeans to China this morning. Don’t Miss a Day: From crude oil to coffee, sign up free for Barchart’s best-in-class commodity analysis.  Weekly Export Sales data from Thursday has accumulated sale commitments, both shipped and unshipped are now 21.829 MMT (802 mbu), which is 39.3%…

BlackRock’s spot Bitcoin ETF, iShares Bitcoin Trust (IBIT, has ranked sixth in net inflows despite being the only fund in the top cohort posting a negative return for the year.Data shared by Bloomberg ETF analyst Eric Balchunas shows IBIT pulling in roughly $25 billion in year-to-date inflows, even as its annual performance sits in the red. By comparison, several traditional equity and bond ETFs ahead of IBIT on the leaderboard posted double-digit gains, while gold-backed ETF GLD, which is up more than 60% on the year, attracted less capital than IBIT.Balchunas described the result as a “really good sign” over…