Macro strategist Luke Gromen says Bitcoin’s recent inability to break decisively higher may reflect more than weak spot demand — it could be a symptom of “paper” markets absorbing buying pressure, much like derivatives have shaped the gold market for years.
Speaking with Nathalie Brunell on June 6, Gromen said he has not materially rebuilt the BTC position he trimmed earlier. “I nibbled a little bit,” he said, “but I have not really bought back in in any real way.” He argued the price action may be signaling important shifts in liquidity, market structure and the political sensitivity of hard-asset signals.
How “paper Bitcoin” can mute price moves
Gromen’s thesis centers on the growing role of derivatives and synthetic exposures. He isn’t claiming Bitcoin’s supply is being changed; rather, demand that would normally remove coins from circulation can be diverted into non-spot instruments. Instead of buying and self-custodying BTC, an investor can buy calls or other derivatives that express the same bullish view without taking the coin off the market.
“Somebody wants to own Bitcoin, but they’re not buying Bitcoin. They’re buying a call on Bitcoin,” he said. That dynamic, he warned, can “get sloppier, looser” and matters most in the short run — potentially keeping BTC stuck in the $58K–$72K “gang” he quipped about.
Bitcoin as a liquidity “smoke alarm”
Gromen places this derivative-suppression idea inside a broader macro picture. He described Bitcoin as “one of, if not the last functioning smoke alarm of liquidity,” and said its recent weakness is concerning. In his view, liquidity has been channeled into a narrow set of assets — notably AI-related equities — as well as energy and certain commodities after the Iran war.
“AI is sucking all the oxygen out of the room, all the liquidity out of the room,” he said. Because the equity rally is concentrated in a handful of AI-linked names, Bitcoin’s failure to confirm that strength is a relevant divergence for him: a liquidity-sensitive asset not keeping pace with headline indices could indicate the market is less healthy than it appears.
The political and macro angle
Gromen ties the story to U.S. policy choices: running the economy “hot,” a weaker dollar and reshoring production should, in a free market, be supportive for hard assets like gold and Bitcoin. But those outcomes also communicate inflationary pressures to the world, which can create complications for Treasury financing — a message some political actors may prefer to mute.
His base case is not an outright crash but a re-measurement: equities rising in dollar terms while falling when priced in gold or Bitcoin, with hard assets outperforming nominal claims. He expects 10-year Treasury yields to stay roughly in the 4%–4.5% range.
Not permanent, just delayed
Gromen argues that paper markets can delay or blur hard-asset signals, but not eliminate the underlying macro pressure forever. “In the short run, they can manage the optics,” he said. “In the long run, they can’t.”
At press time, BTC traded around $60,966.
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