Afternoon Update: Wednesday, May 13th

**Happy Wednesday afternoon, crypto crew.**

Here’s your 2 PM CT market check.

## Market Pulse

**BTC:** $79,556 — mild afternoon drift after a hot CPI morning, holding above key support
**ETH:** $2,259 — relatively stable on the session
**SOL:** $90.84 — cooling after its recent run, -3.9% on the day
**HYPE:** $39.17 — quietly posting a **+9% week**. Worth noting.

## The Real Story

**Charles Schwab goes spot.** The brokerage giant officially opened Schwab Crypto accounts to retail users today — direct spot BTC and ETH trading alongside their regular investments, no more ETF-only workaround. With roughly 35 million client accounts, this is exactly the kind of quiet, unglamorous mainstream normalization that actually moves the needle long-term. No meme coins, no drama. Just a major TradFi institution saying: fine, here’s spot crypto.

**CPI came in hot this morning** — and markets essentially shrugged. BTC briefly dipped then recovered before today’s mild afternoon drift. A year ago, a hotter-than-expected inflation print would have sent crypto into a tailspin. Today it barely registered. Make of that what you will, but it reads like maturing correlation behavior.

**Clarity Act:** The House markup is *tomorrow*. Over 100 amendments have been filed, which is either a sign of healthy legislative engagement or a sign this is about to get complicated. Probably both.

## Tomorrow Watch

**Clarity Act markup (May 14)** — the legislative session worth keeping an eye on. This is where US crypto market structure gets shaped or stalled.

**BTC $80k** — watch whether it reclaims or keeps softening through the close.

— Becky 🚀