Many are bracing for "ugly" numbers for inflation in the United States in this week's Consumer Price Index report - as high as 8.4%.
Inflation was, of course, the result of the US Treasury having printed record amounts of money in recent years - highly accelerated in the last few years due to COVID spending; further made worse by lockdown procedures that caused disruptions in the supply chain that inflated prices even further.
White House officials are attempting to peg it to Putin's action against Ukraine but that's only a small part of the picture and may not make a difference as consumers and voters start to feel inflation pressures directly in their day to day lives. As poll numbers and approval ratings continue to turn against the incumbency a tones of desperation can be seen in the way the current administration talks about economic issues at hand. (Massive upsets in political races are already happening and is expected to continue into Nov 22' and beyond.)
In the short-term, both crypto and stock markets (including Russia's MOEX) has taken a downturn after the news of high inflation numbers began to hit. Fears of inflation have spooked off part of the investor community - however, being that Bitcoin (and most crypto coins) have branded themselves as being a "hedge" against inflationary woes, the real trend is yet to come. Crypto investors are banking on there being a massive loss of confidence in the USD and have much of that money flow into the crypto ecosystem for outsized gains. Either way, a "moment of truth" seem to be well on its way in 2022 as these trends continue unabated.
(As talked about in "Is Dogecoin Crypto's New Stablecoin?" and "The 'People's Coin' - Why Dogecoin is Forever", DOGE has shown relative resilience against today's downturn - the upside to its focus on utility over speculation.)