Last Friday, heading into the weekend, markets were on edge as trade tension with China seemed to hit a boiling point. Major US indices closed on the dead lows of the session down ~3%, the biggest single day selloff since April, at the height of the tariff turmoil. The VIX jumped over 20 as there was a scramble for protection. In fact, it was the heaviest options volume day in history with >100ml contracts trading. The selling didn’t stop at 4:00 though, right around the time futures markets were closing President Trump took to social media announcing that tariffs on China would be increased to 100% starting on November 1st. Without the liquidity in equity markets traders moved to the crypto complex. Around 5:00 there was a mini flash crash with nearly $20B of levered crypto positions liquidated with Bitcoin briefly trading down >15% and other alt coins off well over 20%.

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