By Omkar Godbole (All times ET unless otherwise noted)
Cryptocurrency Market Feels More Slippery After Bitcoin fell 7% last week, its biggest loss in two months. However, hope shines in bullish bets on derivatives, now at bargain prices.
The drop pushed prices below the steady uphill path, an “uptrend line,” as technical analysts call it, that kept the staggered rise from $20,000 in early 2023 to a record high of $126,000 last October.
The pattern reinforces concerns generated by bitcoin’s sharp pullback from its all-time high: we have fallen into a bear market (see TA section). So far, the tracking slide has been tame. Bitcoin prices recovered to nearly $88,000 from the weekend low of around $86,000.
Still, the overall picture looks bleak, with weakening institutional appetite for cryptocurrencies accompanying the bearish message on the charts. U.S.-listed spot ETFs recorded a net outflow of $1.33 billion last week, the most in 11 months, according to SoSoValue data. On Monday, they raised just $6.84 million.
“Sometimes it seems that the capital and attention of speculators is now focused exclusively on precious metals (mainly gold and silver), and there is simply no strength left for cryptocurrencies,” Alex Kuptsikevich, chief market analyst at The FXPro, said in an email.
Some observers believe the money will return once the gold and silver rallies fade. If you share a similar bullish view, BTC call options (derivative contracts that offer huge upside potential for a small upfront cost) offer the best way to bet.
These calls look cheap as everyone is accumulating puts, which offer downside protection, according to Matthew Siegel, head of digital asset research at VanEck.
“Downside protection is officially the busiest trade. While everyone pays a premium for puts, upside exposure [calls] it is being traded cheap. If you have a thesis for a bounce, the vol surface offers a discount,” Siegel said.
In other news, BlackRock’s chief investment officer of global fixed income, Rick Rieder, who manages about $2.4 trillion in client money and favors lower U.S. interest rates, has emerged as a contender for Federal Reserve chair after Jerome Powell, whose term ends in May.
In traditional markets, both gold and silver traded at all-time highs, while the dollar index remained at its lowest level since September last year.
South Korea’s benchmark Kospi stock index continued to rise, bringing the year-to-date gain to 20%, building on last year’s solid 75% gain. This is important because, interestingly, over the years, new Kospi highs have caused bearish swings in bitcoin. Stay alert!
Read more: For an analysis of current activity in altcoins and derivatives, see Crypto Markets Today
What to watch
For a more complete list of this week’s events, check out CoinDesk’s “Crypto Week Ahead.”
- Crypto
- Macro
- January 27: Weekly change in US ADP employment (Previous 8K)
- January 27: US S&P/Case-Shiller House Price YoY in November (previously 1.3%); Monthly (previous -0.3%)
- Earnings (Estimates based on FactSet data)
symbolic events
For a more complete list of this week’s events, check out CoinDesk’s “Crypto Week Ahead.”
- Governance votes and calls
- January 27: Zebec Network, Dash, Houdini Swap, and Cryptic will participate in an X Spaces session on why privacy matters.
- January 27: Brave’s Brendan Eich, Cardano’s Charles Hoskinson, and Mythigal Games’ John Linden will participate in an X Spaces session.
- January 27: PancakeSwap will host an Ask Me Anything (AMA) session with the Venus protocol.
- Unlock
- Token releases
- January 27: Theo Network is expected to make an announcement, possibly related to the release of thGOLD.
Conferences
For a more complete list of this week’s events, check out CoinDesk’s “Crypto Week Ahead.”
Market movements
- BTC is up 0.38% as of 4 pm ET Monday to $88,326.08 (24 hours: -0.18%)
- ETH rose 0.1% to $2,929.56 (24 hours: +0.22%)
- CoinDesk 20 is down 0.58% at 2,683.47 (24 hours: +0.32%)
- Ether CESR compound staking rate rises 4 basis points to 2.85%
- BTC funding rate is 0.0074% (8.068% annualized) on Binance
- DXY remains unchanged at 97.01
- Gold futures unchanged at $5,082.10
- Silver futures down 2.82% to $112.25
- The Nikkei 225 closed up 0.85% at 53,333.54
- Hang Seng closed up 1.35% at 27,126.95
- The FTSE rises 0.4% to 10,189.88
- The Euro Stoxx 50 rises 0.22% to 5,970.72
- The DJIA closed Monday up 0.64% at 49,412.40
- The S&P 500 closed up 0.50% at 6,950.23
- Nasdaq Composite closed up 0.43% at 23,601.36
- S&P/TSX Composite closed down 0.16% at 33,093.32
- The S&P 40 Latin America closed up 0.36% at 3,604.49
- The 10-year US Treasury rate rises 1 bp to 4.221%
- E-mini S&P 500 futures up 0.25% to 6,999.00
- E-mini Nasdaq-100 futures rise 0.56% to 25,994.50
- E-mini Dow Jones Industrial Average index futures unchanged at 49,518.00
Bitcoin Statistics
- BTC dominance: 59.67% (-0.07%)
- Ether-bitcoin ratio: 0.03307 (-0.28%)
- Hashrate (seven-day moving average): 921 EH/s
- Hashprice (spot): $39.22
- Total fees: 2.38 BTC / $208,632
- CME Futures Open Interest: 120,620 BTC
- BTC priced in gold: 17.2 oz.
- BTC market capitalization against gold: 5.87%
Technical analysis
- The chart shows the bitcoin price swing from 2023 onwards.
- Prices fell more than 7% last week, with the large red candle breaking through the trend line representing the staggered rally starting in 2023.
- The so-called collapse confirms concerns about the bear market.
Crypto Stocks
- Coinbase Global (COIN): closed Monday at $213.48 (-1.60%), +0.76% at $215.10 in premarket
- Circle Internet (CRCL): closed at $70.90 (-0.60%), +0.56% at $71.30
- Galaxy Digital (GLXY): closed at $31.28 (-1.94%), +0.38% at $31.40
- Bullish (BLSH): closed at $35.66 (-0.25%), +1.04% to $36.03
- MARA Holdings (MARA): closed at $9.98 (-4.95%), +0.70% at $10.05
- Riot Platforms (RIOT): closed at $16.23 (-6.08%), +1.42% to $16.46
- Core Scientific (CORZ): closed at $19.05 (+1.38%)
- CleanSpark (CLSK): closed at $12.44 (-9.26%), +0.88% at $12.55
- CoinShares Valkyrie Bitcoin Miners ETF (WGMI): closed at $46.58 (-5.21%)
- Exodus Movement (EXOD): closed at $14.72 (-1.80%)
Crypto treasury companies
- Strategy (MSTR): closed at $160.58 (-1.55%), +0.46% at $161.32
- Strive (ASST): Closed at $0.79 (-9.76%), +2.56% at $0.81
- SharpLink Gaming (SBET): closed at $9.38 (-3.79%), unchanged from the previous market
- Upexi (UPXI): closed at $1.89 (-5.50%)
- Lite Strategy (LITS): closed at $1.29 (+1.57%)
ETF Flows
BTC Spot ETF
- Daily net flows: $6.8 million
- Accumulated net flows: $56.48 billion
- Total BTC holdings ~1.29 million
ETH Spot ETF
- Daily net flows: 117 million dollars
- Accumulated net flows: $12.45 billion
- Total ETH holdings ~6.02 million
Source: Farside Investors
