Luke Gromen says Bitcoin’s failure to rally decisively may reflect more than weak spot demand, arguing that paper instruments could temporarily absorb buying pressure in the same way derivatives have shaped the gold market for years.
Speaking with Nathalie Brunel in an interview on June 6, the macro analyst said that he had not meaningfully rebuilt the Bitcoin position he had previously reduced. “I bit off a little bit of money,” Gromen said, but added that he “didn’t buy back in any real way.” The reason, he suggested, is that Bitcoin’s recent price action may signal something important about liquidity, market structure and political sensitivity to hard asset signals.
Bitcoin fiat and frustration zone between $58k and $72k
Brunel asked Gromen about his previous observation that Bitcoin could remain stuck in what she described as a “$58,000 to $72,000 band for a while,” and whether Bitcoin and gold prices could be suppressed. Gromen explained that the comment was partly “sarcastically tongue-in-cheek,” but said there was a serious mechanism behind the idea.
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“I think the way they will do that is to expand into derivatives, as they have done with gold historically,” he said. “I think you can do it in the long term. I don’t think you can do it with bitcoin, but to the extent you can scale derivatives, it could be of interest in the short term.”
Gromin’s argument is not that the supply of Bitcoin can be transformed, but rather that demand can be transformed. A buyer who would need to purchase spot BTC could instead purchase a call option or other synthetic instrument. This still expresses bullish exposure, but it does not necessarily remove coins from the market in the same way that spot accumulation might.
“Someone wants to own bitcoin, but they’re not buying bitcoin. They’re buying through bitcoin,” Gromen said. “If you don’t have those derivatives there, if you want to own bitcoin, you have to own bitcoin. Now, you can buy a derivative of bitcoin, and it starts to become more confusing and more flexible.”
For Gromen, this distinction matters more than shorter windows. He said policymakers are capable of handling “a lot of things” in the near term, even if they cannot do so indefinitely.
Luke Gromen on why Bitcoin is still stuck at $58K-$72K: Big players can meet demand through fiat bets instead of buying real coins #Bitcoinwhich brings the price back.
It’s been worked on #gold For years, but he doesn’t think it will last forever with Bitcoin… https://t.co/yPAuJA3dKI pic.twitter.com/CwZ2cGwwW6
– Natalie Brunell ⚡️ (@natbrunell) June 9, 2026
Bitcoin serves as a liquidity smoke alarm
The derivative suppression thesis falls within a broader holistic framework. Gromen described Bitcoin as “one of, if not the last working liquidity smoke alarm,” and said its recent weakness “tells us things that are not good.” In his view, liquidity is being absorbed elsewhere, most obviously through AI-related stocks, energy and post-crisis commodities. It was Iran.
“The AI sucks all the oxygen out of the room, all the fluid out of the room, all in one area,” Gromen said. “And I think this is happening to Bitcoin as well. And I think it is a victim of that as well.”
He said the stock rally is narrower than the major indices suggest, with names associated with artificial intelligence carrying a lot of movement. This makes Bitcoin’s lag all the more important for him: If Bitcoin is a liquidity-sensitive asset that does not confirm the strength of stocks, the market may be less healthy than the index level suggests.
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Gromin linked this issue to American efforts aimed at stimulating the economy, weakening the dollar, and bringing production back at home. He said these forces should be positive for gold and bitcoin in a freer market. But they also risk sending an uncomfortable message.
“There are elements in the United States that don’t want to see that, because these things will communicate with the world, you’re just amplifying,” he said. “Hey, you’re just inflating it. That creates some problems on the financing side of the Treasury market.”
Its basic condition is not a traditional accident, but a shift in the measuring stick. It is expected that stocks will rise in dollars while falling when priced in gold and Bitcoin. In this scenario, hard assets outperform nominal claims, while 10-year Treasury yields remain broadly limited in the 4% to 4.5% region.
That’s why Gromin doesn’t see anything Potential repression of Bitcoin permanently. Paper markets could delay this move. They can blur the signal. But within its framework, they cannot remove the underlying macro pressures.
“In the short term, they can manage the optics,” he said. “In the long run, they won’t be able to.”
At press time, Bitcoin was trading at $60,966.
Featured image created with DALL.E, a chart from TradingView.com
