Global Financial Markets Closed Early Today

December 31: Precious metals saw a sharp intraday sell-off after the Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME) again raised margin requirements for precious metals futures. Silver futures on the New York Mercantile Exchange (NYMEX) plummeted over 9%, breaking below $71 per ounce. Spot silver fell $5 intraday, last trading at $71.14/oz. Spot gold pulled back $50 from its daily high, last at $4,323/oz. Spot palladium dropped 7%, last at $1,507/oz. Spot platinum fell more than 12% at one point, last at $1,962/oz. (FX168)

On December 31, spot gold sank sharply, falling below the key $4,300 per ounce level. It marked the metal’s first drop since December 16, with an intraday decline of 0.8%. (Golden Ten)

December 31 – Per the Financial Times, Trump Mobile (the mobile firm launched by the Trump Group) has delayed shipping a gold smartphone originally set to launch by the end of this year. The company initially promised to roll out a $499 U.S.-made smartphone this year to compete with mainstream devices like Apple’s and Samsung’s, but has since revised its target. Trump Mobile’s customer service team noted the prior U.S. government shutdown caused the delivery delay, adding the device is “highly likely” to not ship this month. The “T1” device – announced in June alongside a $47.45 monthly talk-and-text plan – is one of several initiatives the Trump family business launched leveraging his return to the White House. (FXStreet)

**Binance Exposes Staged Scam Targeting Users, Warns of Year-End Fraud Surge** As year-end approaches (Dec 31), fraud activity spikes — and Binance is alerting users to a new, staged scam uncovered this week. Binance customer service rep Sisi revealed the case Tuesday: A user filed a complaint claiming they were scammed by a **purported Binance executive** who promised to resolve their issue but vanished after receiving payment. During its investigation, Binance flagged four critical red flags: - **Simplistic chat**: The alleged Telegram conversation with the "exec" spanned just one page — no details verified, yet the user transferred funds based on "high trust." - **Abnormal transfers**: The initial "scam address" the user provided was **their own wallet** (likely a self-initiated transfer); related records traced to an escrow platform. - **Missing key chats**: The user claimed chats were deleted due to the other party’s privacy mode, only providing screenshots of post-

**December 31 – Per Coinglass data:** If Ethereum drops below $2900, cumulative long liquidation intensity across major centralized exchanges (CEXs) will hit $850 million. Conversely, if Ethereum surpasses $3050, cumulative short liquidation intensity across major CEXs will reach $951 million. **BlockBeats Note:** Liquidation charts do not display the exact number of contracts or precise value of contracts at risk of liquidation. Instead, the bars on these charts represent the relative importance of each liquidation cluster compared to adjacent clusters—i.e., "intensity." As such, the chart indicates how significantly the underlying asset’s price will react when it hits a specific level. A taller "liquidation bar" means the price, once reached, will trigger a more intense response driven by a liquidity cascade.

As of December 31, the "Die-Hard Bull" crypto whale has closed long positions in ETH, SOL, UNI and PUMP, per monitoring from Hyperinsight (link: https://t.me/HyperInsight). The whale currently holds high-leverage long positions with unrealized losses as follows: - FARTCOIN: $5.82M notional in 10x leverage, entry price $0.2945, unrealized loss $65k; - BTC: $29.64M notional in 40x leverage, entry price $89,013.1, unrealized loss $88k.