On Aug. 19, US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said the Treasury would double long-dated bond buybacks after the 30-year Treasury yield hit a 19-year high. While the increase from $2 billion to $4 billion per operation isn’t huge, several market participants read the move as a step toward yield curve control and quantitative easing-like policy.
Bessent’s statement shifted a narrative-driven crypto market into the age-old framework anchored on the belief that sticky inflation and easy-money government policies are great for Bitcoin (BTC) and hard assets. This perception of balance-sheet manipulation fits into the monetary-debasement trade framework that Bitcoiners love. A quick flip through BloombergTV or X (formerly known to traders as Crypto Twitter) will reveal multiple discussions of the “debasement trade” being in full effect.
Markets began shifting weeks before talk of an Operation Twist-style intervention. On July 31, the US and Japan jointly intervened in currency markets to support the Japanese yen, which had hit a 40-year low.

As a result, DXY dropped and gold rallied. Meanwhile, Secretary Bessent’s follow-up decision to double long-bond buybacks kicked off a hard-asset rally in Bitcoin, gold and several crypto-adjacent stocks. Strategy’s Stretch (STRC) traded within dollars of its $100 peg, while COIN, CRCL, and other crypto-related stocks saw double-digit gains.

Will Operation Twist Again Press Fed Credibility and Independence?
Federal Reserve credibility remains an issue, and its response function under Chair Kevin Warsh remains unclear to markets. Warsh threw out the convention of issuing forward guidance in his first FOMC presser and prior to his Aug. 28 Jackson Hole speech. Markets viewed him as vague about the Fed’s renewed objectives beyond a handful of task forces aimed at reviewing the Fed’s mandate and modernizing its policies.

The Treasury’s effort to push long-bond yields lower may intensify concerns about Fed independence, particularly if markets begin to expect coordinated action from the central bank. This has been a concern among analysts ever since President Trump began heavily criticizing former chair Jerome Powell and looking for candidates who would "immediately lower interest rates.”