June jobs data unveils a harsh truth for Bitcoin bulls

Bitcoin (BTC) traders got a mixed signal on July 1 after ADP reported that private-sector employment grew by just 98,000 in June. 

It missed the 110,000 Dow Jones consensus and was down from an unrevised 122,000 in May. 

The ADP National Employment Report offers an independent, frequently updated snapshot of private-sector hiring, drawn from anonymized, aggregated payroll data covering more than 26 million U.S. workers.

A soft labor print like this would typically revive Fed rate-cut bets and act as a liquidity tailwind for crypto. This one instead landed with Treasury yields already sharply higher and a hawkish Fed chair on the calendar, so the market reaction has been muted rather than a clean risk-on move.

Related: Bitcoin prices show no correlation with rise of crypto jobs: Barclays report

What ADP actually found

Nearly half of June’s job growth, 48,000 positions, came from education and health services, a consistent leader for payroll growth. 

Trade, transportation and utilities added 15,000, financial activities added 14,000, and other services added 8,000. 

Natural resources and mining lost 5,000 jobs, the only sector in the red, while leisure and hospitality, an industry watched as an indicator of consumer demand, added just 2,000 positions.

Small businesses drove most of the hiring. Establishments with fewer than 50 employees added 53,000 jobs, companies with 500 or more employees added 25,000, and those in between rose by 29,000. Annual pay gains held steady at 4.4% for workers staying in their jobs and edged up to 6.6% for job switchers.

ADP chief economist Dr. Nela Richardson said,

“The pace of hiring is telling a story of both supply and demand. We know it’s taking people longer to find work, but there also are signs of labor supply constraints in certain industries. For now, the overall effect is a slowdown in job creation.”

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Why the Fed isn’t moving on it

The report lands as new Fed Chair Kevin Warsh keeps the central bank in a holding pattern. 

The 10-year Treasury yield ticked up to roughly 4.38% on July 1, and the 2-year rose to about 4.10%, as investors awaited Warsh’s remarks at the European Central Bank’s policy forum in Sintra, Portugal. 

Markets are pricing a 66.3% chance the Fed holds rates steady at its July meeting, and a 33.7% chance of a hike to 375-400 basis points, according to CME’s FedWatch tool.

The backdrop matters for crypto. A cooling labor market usually strengthens the case for easier policy, which tends to support Bitcoin and other risk assets by making non-yielding assets more attractive relative to cash. 

For instance, when the Fed delivered its first rate cut in over four years in September 2024, Bitcoin jumped as much as 5% within a day. It went on to rally from around $61,440 to roughly 72% over the following months, reaching as high as $106,035 by mid-December. Exchange-traded fund (ETF) demand also added fuel to the rally.  

The pattern held again through 2025’s cuts, with Bitcoin climbing to a record near $126,000 in October. 

But with Warsh signaling he isn’t in a hurry to cut, and futures markets now leaning toward a hike rather than a cut later this year, one soft ADP print isn’t enough on its own to flip the liquidity narrative that’s weighed on crypto through June.

At press time, cryptocurrencies were trading flat, showing no signs of reaction to the jobs report. Bitcoin was trading near $58,773, down more than 17% in the past one month. U.S.-listed spot Bitcoin ETFs posted $4.5 billion in net outflows during June, as per SoSo Value, their worst month on record, as institutions unwound bets on near-term easing.

Meanwhile, Ethereum (ETH) was trading near $1,592, while XRP was trading near $1.05.

Related: ‘Rich Dad Poor Dad’ author says AI job cuts could spark next global crash

This story was originally published by TheStreet on Jul 1, 2026, where it first appeared in the MARKETS section. Add TheStreet as a Preferred Source by clicking here.