Aiming to tame galloping inflation in 2022, the U.S. Federal Reserve early last year embarked on a string of rate hikes, taking its fed funds target range from a range of 0% to 0.25% to the current 5.25%-5.50% range. That historic pace of monetary tightening was at least in part responsible for the big decline in the price of bitcoin, which has dropped from above $69,000 late in 2021 to close out 2022 around the $16,000 level.
