Bitcoin hovers around $75,000. Traders call it a no-trade zone. Two forces dominate: artificial intelligence devouring white-collar jobs, and Iran’s shadow over the Strait of Hormuz. Arthur Hayes, BitMEX co-founder and Maelstrom CIO, laid it out bluntly in his April 16 essay. His fund “did fuck all trading in the first quarter” of 2026. Why? Risk-reward doesn’t stack up without fresh Federal Reserve liquidity. Hayes points to AI agents as the silent killer. A crypto-gaming entrepreneur swapped his engineering team for Claude AI. Workflow automated. One engineer shipped a six-month product in four days. Result: half the staff axed soon. Knowledge workers—median U.S. earners pulling $85,000 to $90,000 yearly—face oblivion. Unemployment drops them to $28,000, per Bureau of Labor Statistics and St. Louis Fed data. Bills pile up. Consumer credit fills the gap. Defaults loom. “There is no other choice but to fall behind on consumer credit payments to banks,” Hayes wrote.…