The Federal Reserve officially began its interest rate cut cycle in September 2025, marking a macro policy turning point that is creating an unprecedented favorable environment for crypto assets. Despite short-term market fluctuations, the cheap liquidity brought by rate cuts, institutional allocation demand, and the global desire for alternatives to traditional finance are laying a new foundation for the crypto market.

In August, the U.S. core PCE remained at 2.7%, significantly above the policy target, but under pressure from a cooling job market, the Federal Reserve initiated a preventive rate cut in September: on September 17, 2025, the Fed made a long-anticipated decision to cut rates by 25 basis points, lowering the federal funds rate target range from 4.25%-4.50% to 4.00%-4.25%, thus officially starting the 2025 rate cut cycle. This follows three rate cuts implemented in 2024, marking another instance of the Fed adopting an accommodative monetary policy.

In the latest statement from the monetary policy meeting, the Fed removed the key phrase "labor market conditions remain strong," instead emphasizing that "job growth has slowed, and the unemployment rate has risen." This shift indicates that, in the dual mission of controlling inflation and supporting employment, the Fed has officially shifted its policy focus to protecting the job market.

Powell candidly stated at a press conference that "there is no risk-free path," highlighting the cautious attitude of this preventive rate cut. The new dot plot shows that Fed officials predict a median interest rate of 3.6% by the end of 2025, implying room for two more rate cuts this year. The market reacted strongly; according to CMEWatch, the probability of a rate cut in October has risen to 91.9%, and the probability of a third rate cut in December exceeds 60%. Although there are slight differences between the dot plot guidance and market expectations, the accommodative tone has been largely established. The market had previously priced in a small number of rate cuts this year, but this pricing has increased further after the meeting.

Additionally, the University of Michigan's final consumer confidence index for September was 55.1, down about 5% from August's 58.2, below the market expectation of 55.4, and significantly down 21.4% from the same period last year, marking the lowest level since May 2025. Recent data shows signs of a cooling labor market (which is also one of the reasons the Fed decided to cut rates in September), and the market is highly focused on the upcoming non-farm payroll data for September, as any signs of weakness could reinforce the Fed's rate cut expectations.

Overall, the current macroeconomic landscape in the U.S. presents a picture of strong economic growth but insufficient consumer confidence, with a policy outlook full of uncertainties. The Fed will continue to cautiously balance the dual goals of supporting employment and controlling inflation within a data-dependent framework, with each interest rate decision akin to walking a tightrope.

Historical data shows that U.S. stocks often perform poorly in September, leading to the notion of a "September curse." However, driven by the news of rate cuts, the Nasdaq, S&P 500, and Dow Jones indices all rose together this September, reaching historical highs. Tech stocks performed particularly well, with Intel (NASDAQ: INTC) seeing a one-day increase of over 22%, and AI-related sectors continuing their leading trend since the beginning of the year.

This round of increases is supported by dual driving forces: on one hand, the opening of the rate cut cycle significantly enhances risk appetite, aligning with the historical pattern where equity assets benefit first during a preventive rate cut cycle; on the other hand, the AI industry is experiencing substantial performance growth, with cases like Nvidia's (NASDAQ: NVDA) $10 billion investment in OpenAI providing solid support for tech stock valuations.

Interestingly, the $10 billion transactions between Nvidia, OpenAI, and Oracle (NASDAQ: ORCL) seem to create a new valuation framework for Silicon Valley: Nvidia's $10 billion investment will gradually be realized with the deployment of OpenAI's 10-gigawatt computing power data center, which requires 400,000 to 500,000 GPUs per gigawatt, with a total of 10 gigawatts equivalent to Nvidia's annual shipment volume — this means that the investment funds will ultimately flow back to Nvidia through OpenAI's GPU procurement orders, while Nvidia can also gain profit sharing from OpenAI through equity; Oracle's involvement further strengthens the closed loop, as it first invested $40 billion to purchase Nvidia chips to build OpenAI's "Stargate" data center, and then provided computing power to OpenAI through a $300 billion cloud service contract, forming a closed-loop funding flow chain of "OpenAI→Oracle→Nvidia→OpenAI."

This model will drive a reconstruction of tech stock valuations, as Nvidia strengthens its pricing power and performance visibility in the AI chip field by binding downstream core customers; Oracle achieves a leapfrog in the cloud service market; and OpenAI secures ongoing funding and computing power for sustainable development. This strong alliance further intensifies the Matthew effect in the AI industry, with resources continuously concentrating on leading enterprises, enhancing the certainty and collaborative efficiency of all parties' businesses, and redefining the competitive paradigm of tech giants in the AI era, providing investors with a new framework for analyzing tech stock value.

However, Fed Chair Powell has also clearly warned that the U.S. stock market is currently "fairly valued," a statement that is particularly critical in the context of hitting new highs. Currently, both the S&P 500 and Nasdaq have risen over 20% this year, and the valuations of AI concept stocks have partially priced in future performance, with any hawkish signals potentially triggering profit-taking. Notably, Powell emphasized that this rate cut "does not mark the beginning of an aggressive easing cycle," which means that the release of liquidity will maintain a gradual pace.

Looking ahead, the U.S. stock market still faces multiple tests. The resilience of inflation is the main constraint, with the August core PCE year-on-year at 2.7%, still significantly above the policy target. If subsequent data rebounds, it may force the Fed to slow down its rate cut pace. Additionally, there are some internal disagreements within the Fed regarding the policy path, and the risk of a government shutdown could delay the release of key data, all of which will exacerbate market volatility.

Although Bitcoin experienced a pullback in September, briefly falling below $110,000, it formed strong support in the $90,000 to $105,000 range, once again validating the "buy on expectation, hold on volatility" institutional behavior model. For example, on September 25-26, due to some investors' macro risk aversion sentiment regarding the potential "shutdown" of the U.S. federal government due to budget issues, coupled with long-term Bitcoin holders taking profits and market declines triggering high-leverage liquidations, funds flowed out of risk assets like Bitcoin. However, institutional investors viewed this as a buying opportunity. On the day of the price drop on September 25, the U.S. spot Bitcoin ETF recorded a net inflow of $241 million. Among them, BlackRock's IBIT single fund alone saw an inflow of nearly $129 million, bringing total holdings to 768,000 BTC (approximately $85.2 billion).

Historical data also shows that after the Fed initiated "preventive rate cuts" in 2019, Bitcoin experienced nearly six months of initial volatility. As the long-term effects of the low-interest-rate environment gradually became apparent, Bitcoin stabilized at $7,000 by the end of 2019 and continued its upward trend in 2020, breaking through $29,000 by the end of 2020, representing a more than 200% increase compared to the $10,000 peak at the beginning of the rate cuts in July 2019; if calculated from the $7,000 low at the end of 2019, the increase exceeds 300%.

The initiation of the rate cut cycle means a decline in interest rates in traditional financial markets. In a low financing cost environment, companies are naturally more willing to invest funds in assets with high growth potential, and the actions of institutional investors will also become clearer. However, unlike the rate cut situation in 2019, the current cycle has introduced a significant new variable: the crypto treasury allocation of publicly listed companies.

Moreover, these companies' treasury allocations to crypto assets are moving away from early marginal experiments and tentative holdings, shifting towards long-term, strategic allocations. In September, the board of directors of Nasdaq-listed Jiuzhi New Energy (Jiuzhi Holdings) (NASDAQ: JZXN) approved a crypto asset investment plan of up to $1 billion, with management emphasizing that they "do not pursue short-term trading profits," but view crypto assets as "a long-term store of value to hedge against macroeconomic uncertainties," highlighting the long-term and strategic nature of the allocation behavior. On the regulatory front, in September, the U.S. SEC and FINRA announced investigations into over 200 publicly listed companies that announced crypto treasury plans, focusing on unusual stock price fluctuations before their announcements. This move poses challenges in the short term, but in the long run, clearing out those "pseudo-treasury" companies attempting to manipulate market capitalization through "crypto narratives" is a way for the market to distinguish between genuine and false, establishing a healthier development environment for truly strategic treasury allocation models. For market participants, the dynamics of treasury allocations will become another reliable "window" for understanding industry direction.

In short, the evolution of crypto treasury allocation reflects the overall trajectory of the crypto market from the margins to the mainstream, from speculation to practicality, and from individual to institutional involvement. As the rate cut cycle continues, the dual drivers of a low-interest-rate environment and technological innovation are expected to further deepen and diversify corporate treasury allocations to crypto. Companies that write crypto assets into their balance sheets express their confidence in the future of crypto assets in the most direct way possible, with real money. This confidence, under the backdrop of ample ammunition provided by rate cuts, is likely to become a key force driving the next round of growth.

Looking ahead, at least three factors are creating a favorable environment for crypto assets, making them a more attractive choice:

Macro "fuel" — there will be 2-3 more rate cuts within the year;

Political cycle reinforcement — the pro-crypto policies of the Trump administration and challenges to the independence of the Federal Reserve highlight the hedging properties of decentralized assets;

Global economic "real-virtual linkage" — the rise in gold prices suggests recession concerns, while crypto assets combine the value storage properties of gold with the growth potential of technology, making them a superior allocation choice during the rate cut cycle.

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