Last week in the news
Latest data show that the inflation in the US is slowing down. This news brought some relief to financial markets through the perception that further FED's monetary tightening might slow down. This was a long-awaited boost for both equities and the crypto market. Bitcoin ended the week nearing the $25K resistance; Ether reached psychological $2K.
Figures posted on Thursday show that the inflation in the US is finally peaking, with 8.5% on a yearly basis in July. The US producer price index reached 9.8% y/y in July, which was by 0.5% lower from the previous month. This decrease is a consequence of a drop in energy prices. Still, some analysts are pointing that strong jobs figures might impact FED's decision to further increase benchmark rates by additional 50bps in September.
During the previous week Ethereum successfully conducted a dry run for its forthcoming fork popularly called “merge”. Final release of the “merge” fork is expected to occur in September. As news is reporting, there are few potential dates for the release, mentioning the period between 15th up to 20th September. This fork is supposed to make this network more proof-efficient, which supported a strong surge in ETH`s price during the previous period. As of Saturday`s trading, the price of ETH reached a level of $2.0K.
One of the largest asset management companies, BlackRock, announced that it will offer to its international clients, based in the US, direct exposure to the spot Bitcoin. As announced by the company, despite the latest drop in value of the coin, there is still interest from institutional clients to invest in this asset.
A new bidder for Celsius Network assets is Ripple Labs. As Celsius applied for bankruptcy due to the latest downturn on the crypto market, several crypto companies expressed interest for purchase of the company's assets, through the court filing.
One of the largest US credit rating companies, Standards&Poor, downgraded Coinbase for one notch to BB as it sees high risks in the company`s weak earnings and also raising competition. The S&P also noted that further downgrades are possible in the coming period.
During the previous week, two main US regulators, the Securities Exchange Commission and Commodity Futures Trading Commission voted on amendments by which large hedge funds will be obliged to disclose holdings in cryptocurrencies. Amendments are currently open for a public view for the next 60 days.
Crypto market cap
Latest macro figures are showing that the inflation in the US is peaking, which increases expectations that it might slow down in the future period. At the same time, markets are expecting that the FED will slow down its monetary tightening, which brought some relief to the markets, in line with increased optimism. During the previous week total crypto market capitalization was increased by 7% on a weekly basis, adding $75B in market value. Majority of these funds were added by BTC and ETH, as leading coins. It is interesting that daily trading volumes remained relatively flat, moving around $110B on a daily basis. Total funds outflow from the beginning of this year has been modestly decreased to the level of $1.032B, which is a drop of 47%.
Positive week on the crypto market was led by major coins. Ethereum continues to be supported by the forthcoming “merge” fork, gaining additional $32B in market cap which is an increase of 15% on a weekly basis. ETH is followed by BTC, whose market cap surged by $25B or more than 5%. Binance coin continues to gain in strength, by an increase in market value of $2B or 4%, and this week is followed by Solana, which gained $2B or more than 15%. LINK was also one of the significant winners during the week, with an increase in market cap by 15%. Few altcoins lost in value during the week, like Filecoin, whose market cap was down by almost 6%, and Maker, with a decrease of almost 3%. During the week XRP increased its coins in circulation by 1.6%.
Crypto futures market
Price increase on the spot market, made an impact for crypto futures to trade higher. As per CryptoCompare, the turnover of traded crypto derivative contracts increased by more than 13% in June compared to the previous month. Increased trading volume is evident on the future market at least based on short term prices.
Both BTC and ETH futures were closed on Friday higher from the week before. BTC short term futures were up by 6%, while longer term futures surged by some 7%. Maturities as of the end of this year are still holding modestly above $24K.
As for ETH futures, the situation since last week is interesting from the analysis perspective. Namely, prices of short term futures were higher from the long ones. This inverted slope indicates that investors are still not certain about the future price of the ETH, despite the current surge in price. ETH`s short term futures were up by some 14% on average, while December this year was traded above $1.8K, same as futures maturing in December next year.
Latest data show that the inflation in the US is slowing down. This news brought some relief to financial markets through the perception that further FED's monetary tightening might slow down. This was a long-awaited boost for both equities and the crypto market. Bitcoin ended the week nearing the $25K resistance; Ether reached psychological $2K.
Figures posted on Thursday show that the inflation in the US is finally peaking, with 8.5% on a yearly basis in July. The US producer price index reached 9.8% y/y in July, which was by 0.5% lower from the previous month. This decrease is a consequence of a drop in energy prices. Still, some analysts are pointing that strong jobs figures might impact FED's decision to further increase benchmark rates by additional 50bps in September.
During the previous week Ethereum successfully conducted a dry run for its forthcoming fork popularly called “merge”. Final release of the “merge” fork is expected to occur in September. As news is reporting, there are few potential dates for the release, mentioning the period between 15th up to 20th September. This fork is supposed to make this network more proof-efficient, which supported a strong surge in ETH`s price during the previous period. As of Saturday`s trading, the price of ETH reached a level of $2.0K.
One of the largest asset management companies, BlackRock, announced that it will offer to its international clients, based in the US, direct exposure to the spot Bitcoin. As announced by the company, despite the latest drop in value of the coin, there is still interest from institutional clients to invest in this asset.
A new bidder for Celsius Network assets is Ripple Labs. As Celsius applied for bankruptcy due to the latest downturn on the crypto market, several crypto companies expressed interest for purchase of the company's assets, through the court filing.
One of the largest US credit rating companies, Standards&Poor, downgraded Coinbase for one notch to BB as it sees high risks in the company`s weak earnings and also raising competition. The S&P also noted that further downgrades are possible in the coming period.
During the previous week, two main US regulators, the Securities Exchange Commission and Commodity Futures Trading Commission voted on amendments by which large hedge funds will be obliged to disclose holdings in cryptocurrencies. Amendments are currently open for a public view for the next 60 days.
Crypto market cap
Latest macro figures are showing that the inflation in the US is peaking, which increases expectations that it might slow down in the future period. At the same time, markets are expecting that the FED will slow down its monetary tightening, which brought some relief to the markets, in line with increased optimism. During the previous week total crypto market capitalization was increased by 7% on a weekly basis, adding $75B in market value. Majority of these funds were added by BTC and ETH, as leading coins. It is interesting that daily trading volumes remained relatively flat, moving around $110B on a daily basis. Total funds outflow from the beginning of this year has been modestly decreased to the level of $1.032B, which is a drop of 47%.
Positive week on the crypto market was led by major coins. Ethereum continues to be supported by the forthcoming “merge” fork, gaining additional $32B in market cap which is an increase of 15% on a weekly basis. ETH is followed by BTC, whose market cap surged by $25B or more than 5%. Binance coin continues to gain in strength, by an increase in market value of $2B or 4%, and this week is followed by Solana, which gained $2B or more than 15%. LINK was also one of the significant winners during the week, with an increase in market cap by 15%. Few altcoins lost in value during the week, like Filecoin, whose market cap was down by almost 6%, and Maker, with a decrease of almost 3%. During the week XRP increased its coins in circulation by 1.6%.
Crypto futures market
Price increase on the spot market, made an impact for crypto futures to trade higher. As per CryptoCompare, the turnover of traded crypto derivative contracts increased by more than 13% in June compared to the previous month. Increased trading volume is evident on the future market at least based on short term prices.
Both BTC and ETH futures were closed on Friday higher from the week before. BTC short term futures were up by 6%, while longer term futures surged by some 7%. Maturities as of the end of this year are still holding modestly above $24K.
As for ETH futures, the situation since last week is interesting from the analysis perspective. Namely, prices of short term futures were higher from the long ones. This inverted slope indicates that investors are still not certain about the future price of the ETH, despite the current surge in price. ETH`s short term futures were up by some 14% on average, while December this year was traded above $1.8K, same as futures maturing in December next year.
