Alpha Navigator: Quest for Alpha [September 2025]
Equities and Fixed Income increased in September, while Crypto and Real Assets were mixed. Gold led the increase in the month and year-to-date. US and Canada reduced interest rates, UK, Eurozone, Australia, China and Japan left interest rates unchanged.
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Executive Summary
- Equities and Fixed Income increased in September, while Crypto and Real Assets were mixed. Gold led the increase in the month and year-to-date.
- US and Canada reduced interest rates, UK, Eurozone, Australia, China and Japan left interest rates unchanged. The US Federal Reserve’s ‘dot plot’ of individual officials’ expectations pointed to two more rate cuts in 2025, although there was a wide disparity. The US Consumer Price Index (CPI) increased 2.9% year-on-year in August, matching expectations and marking the highest annual increase since January. US retail sales rose 0.6% in August, outpacing forecasts of 0.2% and indicating resilient consumer spending.
- BTC reached a new all-time high (ATH) above US$126,000 on 6 October. This coincided with the US government shut down earlier last week, which some analysts believe has shifted attention towards bitcoin’s store-of-value role. US spot bitcoin ETFs also had the second-largest weekly net inflow in the week of 29 September.
- Key macro events in October include interest rate decisions from the US, Eurozone, Canada, China, and Japan.
- BTC’s 1-month performance correlation was positive with all Equity indices, but mixed with Real Assets and Fixed Income.
- US spot BTC ETFs saw $3.5 billion in net inflows in September, reversing the monthly net outflow of $749 million in August.
- Market-Neutral Pair Trader hunts for strongly correlated tokens and potential market-neutral pair trades. ARB/OP (0.91) showed the strongest price performance correlation, followed by DOT/ATOM (0.89).
- For the BTC vs. ETH pair, the price ratio (BTC price divided by ETH price) swung around the -1 standard deviation (SD) in September.
- Our style-factor screens track momentum, value, growth, and risk for the Layer-1 and Layer-2, DeFi, Gaming, and NFT categories. Below is the screen for selected top crypto tokens by market cap in the Layer-1 and Layer-2 category. L1 and L2 token prices had mixed performances in September, with AVAX (+28%) leading the surge.
- Our events section shows recent and upcoming events for selected tokens, as well as important macroeconomic events.
| Token | 1M Price Change | Events |
| Bitcoin (BTC) | 5.68% | US spot BTC ETFs saw $3.5B in net inflows in Sep, reversing the monthly net outflow of $749M in Aug. |
| Ether (ETH) | -3.61% | US spot ETH ETFs recorded $286M in net inflows in Sep. Ethereum announced that its Fusaka upgrade is scheduled for 3 December while the increase in blob capacity will be around 17 December, followed by another blob capacity hard fork on 7 January 2026. Additionally, Ethereum Foundation launched a new unit, the ‘dAI team’, that will focus on building tools to let AI agents and bots transact. The Foundation also released a roadmap to bring privacy features under ‘Privacy Stewards of Ethereum (PSE)’ to Ethereum L1. |
| Dogecoin (DOGE) | 8.87% | The Rex-Osprey DOJE ETF debuted on 18 September, representing the first ETFs of its kind in the US. Trump family-linked media corporation Thumzup executed agreements to acquire a Dogecoin mining operation. |
| Hyperliquid (HYPE) | 2.12% | Hyperliquid founder announced the HIP-3 infrastructure for mainnet, which will enable builder-deployed perpetuals. Circle launched native USDC on Hyperliquid’s HyperEVM blockchain and plans to integrate HyperCore DEX with HyperEVM for seamless asset bridging. |
| Avalanche (AVAX) | 28.05% | Avalanche Foundation is reportedly raising $1 billion to launch digital asset treasury projects. The proceeds will be used to purchase AVAX at a discounted price from the foundation. |
| Ethena (ENA) | -13.29% | Ethena Labs launched its synthetic stablecoins, USDe and staked USDe (sUSDe), on the Avalanche blockchain, marking a major cross-chain expansion. MegaETH introduced its stablecoin, MegaUSD (USDm), which was built with Ethena Labs using Ethena’s stablecoin-as-a-service stack. |
| Immutable (IMX) | 35.07% | Immutable announced the launch of its Mobile Gaming Division to bring its partner games into the $121 billion mobile market. The division will to accelerate Web3 gaming, invest in mobile studios building on IMX’s platform and launch new products. |
Read the full Alpha Navigator report: Alpha Navigator [September 2025]
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