Market update
It hasn’t been a great week, with Bitcoin currently 22.6% down on last Tuesday to trade just above A$55K (US$42.8K). It’s corrected around 30% in a month for its worst performance since Black Thursday (still, there were seven larger corrections between 2015 and 2017.) It wasn’t all bad – while ETH corrected 18.2%, it’s still up 38.4% this month and the market cap topped half a trillion US for the first time this week. XRP was up 4.3%, Polkadot was up 4.7%, AAVE increased 28.7% and Synthetix was up 20.1% apparently on rumours something big is happening this week. Bitcoin Cash lost 22%, Litecoin was down 23.6%, Chainlink -22.4%, Stellar lost 4.8%, EOS lost 4.7%. Last week The Fear and Greed Index was around 68 (greed) but it took a dive to 20 (extreme fear) yesterday, the lowest point since April 2020. It’s since recovered to 27 (fear). Glassnode attributes the dip mainly to 1.1 million noobs panic selling.
Bitcoin is down 2.2% this week to trade at just under A$71,600. But Ethereum has been hogging the spotlight again, peaking at a new all-time high a few hours ago of A$5,359. It’s since pulled back to finish the week up 16.5% at $5,089. The record price came within 24 hours of the highest day of address activity in ETH’s six-year history. “Generally, when active addresses grow, prices will follow,” notes Santiment. New retail interest appears to be flowing to classic, more established names with Bitcoin Cash up 32.3%, Litecoin up 23.5%, Chainlink (12.5%), Stellar (21%), Ethereum Classic (106%) and EOS (38%). XRP lost 9.9%, Polkadot (-1.9%), AAVE (-14.9%) and Synthetix (-12.7%). There are unconfirmed rumours that Synthetix, Chainlink and UniSwap v3 are all set to launch layer 2 scaling within weeks, which if true could help usher in a new DeFi boom.
The two-week bear market is now just a memory, with Bitcoin up 5.5% on last Tuesday to trade above A$73,400 (US$56,850). But it’s Ether that’s been attracting all the attention, up by 12.4% in the past day and more than a third since last week to trade at A$4,360 (US$3,375) at the time of writing. Ether prices have quadrupled this year and appreciated roughly twice as fast as Bitcoin. Everything else was up substantially: Ripple (10.4%), Polkadot (8.2%), Litecoin (16.9%), Bitcoin Cash (19.3%), Chainlink (18.8%), Stellar (12.5%), EOS (17.1%) — which is on the verge of being flipped by AAVE (26.3%) — and Synthetix (14%). Bitcoin dominance has fallen to 46.4% (in the last bull market dominance fell all the way to 32%). The Fear and Greed Index has recovered from 27 (fear) last week to 61 (greed) today.
Bitcoin has been on a wild ride this week falling from almost A$73K to below A$61K, before staging a 13.5% recovery in the past 24 hours. BTC finishes the week down 5.1% and is trading at A$68,800 at the time of writing. Ethereum meanwhile broke into new all-time highs around A$3,386 on April 22 and finished the week up 13.6% at A$3,233. It’s up 50% against BTC in the past month and there’s much speculation it’s poised for an even bigger move — Real Vision CEO Raoul Pal is thinking of selling all his BTC for ETH. Bitcoin’s rocky ride saw a wider pullback with XRP down 4.4%, Polkadot (-8.4%), Litecoin (-9.4%), Bitcoin Cash (-10.1%), Chainlink (-7.4%), Stellar (-7.4%) and Synthetix (-4.4%). Most altcoins are substantially in the green today however and Aave finishes the week up 10.3%.
Bull runs don’t always see the price rise smoothly upwards, and we saw a brutal 16.6% drop in the price on the weekend liquidating around US$10B of positions. Bitcoin finishes the week 7.2% down to trade around A$72,500. Pullbacks of between 20-40% are common during bull markets historically speaking. Despite the fall, many coins are up this week including Litecoin (5.8%), Bitcoin Cash (31.5%), Chainlink (7.1%), EOS (1.7%). Ethereum was flat while others lost ground including Ripple (-5%), Polkadot (-14.5%), Stellar (-12.8%) AAVE (-14%), Synthetix (-18.6%). The Fear and Greed index is at 74, or ‘greed’. Monthly adjusted on chain volume for Bitcoin hit a record US$366.27 billion in March, up 14.7% from the previous ATH in February.
Another historic week for Bitcoin kicks off with the leading cryptocurrency again within sight of breaking the all-time high of A$80,924, set on March 13. It’s currently up 1.8% for the week to trade at just over A$79,000, with Bitcoin dominance at 53.9%. Bitcoin was again the best performing institutional grade asset of the first quarter, gaining 103%, followed by oil which was up 26%. Gold meanwhile lost 10%. Ethereum has just ploughed into a new all time high of A$2,885 and finishes the week up 1.4% at A$2,820. Court victories saw Ripple rediscover its mojo, up 59.3%, Litecoin increased 12.3%, Chainlink (3%), Stellar (10.8%) and Bitcoin Cash (8.8%). Aave was flat, Polkadot fell by 8.1%, EOS dropped 4.6% and SNX lost 5.4%.