Bitcoin Prices Slip in ‘No Man’s Land,’ Ether Down and Luna Rises
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Bitcoin and other cryptos have recently come back into focus amid the Russia-Ukraine war.
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Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies were struggling to hold their ground Monday after pushing higher over the weekend.
Bitcoin,
the leading cryptocurrency, was down 1% over the past 24 hours to $41,200 according to data from CoinDesk. It had surged from around $40,000 last Friday to near $42,250 over the weekend, but was giving up gains as the new week began.
Smaller peer
Ether
similarly declined, down 1% to below $2,900. The token underpinning the Ethereum blockchain network popped from below $2,800 on Friday to approach the $3,000 mark over the weekend.
Bitcoin and Ether remain well off all-time highs of $68,990 and $4,865, respectively, reached in early November.
“After so many financial market moving events, Bitcoin still seems to be stuck in no man’s land,” Edward Moya, an analyst at broker Oanda, wrote at the end of last week. “Bitcoin’s key trading range remains the $37,000 and $45,000 zone.”
Luna,
the token underpinning the Terra blockchain network of stablecoins—which are digital tokens pegged to assets like commodities or currencies—was a standout riser, up 3% to just shy of $96. It remains slightly below its all-time high of $104.69, reached earlier this month.
Smaller cryptos or “altcoins,” like
Cardano,
and
Litecoin
exhibited similar price patterns as Bitcoin, up slightly over the past 24 hours—higher than Friday levels but below peaks reached in weekend trading.
“Meme” cryptos
Dogecoin
and
Shiba Inu
—called that because they are mostly based on internet jokes rather than significant blockchain projects—were lower, with Dogecoin down near 1% and Shiba Inu more than 2% in the red.
In theory, Bitcoin and its peers should trade independently from mainstream financial markets. However, cryptos have shown themselves this year to be correlated with other risk-sensitive assets, like stocks, and the largest digital assets were lower on Monday in line with equities. Investors fretted over the latest developments in the Russia-Ukraine war.
Cryptocurrencies have enjoyed a recent surge after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Anonymous assets have come back in the spotlight as Ukrainians and Russians alike turn to Bitcoin and other tokens to navigate the economic turmoil that has hit their countries, rocked by war and sanctions, respectively.
As Barron’s reported, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky signed a law last week to create a legal framework for cryptos, which have flowed into the country amid a wider surge in donations. Meanwhile, demand for cryptocurrencies appears to be rising in Russia on the basis of ruble/Bitcoin trading volumes.
“Crypto traders should be impressed that Bitcoin is still hovering around the $40,000 level despite a surging dollar, declining Bitcoin mining, and falling NFT interest,” Moya added. “Bitcoin’s next major move will depend on if Wall Street is still able to throw billions of dollars at the space, which seemed like a foregone conclusion two months ago.”
Write to Jack Denton at jack.denton@dowjones.com
