Less than 48 hours to go until the Fed meeting, and the probability of a 25bp rate hike has already reached 91.8%. Since the Fed started announcing decisions in real-time in 1994, and later when CME futures implied probabilities became widely used, there has never been a precedent for such a high probability without a rate hike. Historical pricing data from the week before meetings shows: As long as the market prices in at least 16bp (which corresponds to about a 64% probability of a 25bp rate hike), the Fed has always ended up raising rates. If, for some political reason, the Fed absolutely must not raise rates, it would signal this through speeches, leaks, or other means to manage market expectations. Going against market expectations in a big way would cause massive financial turbulence, which is exactly what the Fed tries to avoid. The suspense now isn’t about whether rates will be raised, but about the tone of the post-hike speech—hawkish or dovish. Rate hikes have already been priced into mature financial markets like U.S. stocks, but in crypto, where retail investors dominate, rate hike pricing tends to lag behind the stock market. I can even see some KOLs saying there’s a chance rates won’t be raised— these people can be blocked immediately. Not only do they fail to understand the Fed’s style of decision-making, but they don’t even bother to use AI to check historical data.