Bitcoin, Ether steady; Coinbase bullish; traders await US jobs report
Bitcoin and Ether remained relatively stable in Friday morning trading in Asia as most other top 10 non-stablecoin cryptocurrencies dropped. Litecoin recorded the biggest losses as unfavorable macroeconomic conditions prevented the coin’s halving event from pushing up its value. Elsewhere, Coinbase Global posted bullish Q2 earnings, with one executive expressing confidence the company can now go on to win its legal battle with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The Forkast 500 NFT Index was down, while U.S. equity futures gained on upbeat earnings reports. Traders are now looking ahead to the release of U.S. jobs data later on Friday.
Summer doldrums
Bitcoin rose 0.16% in the last 24 hours to US$29,208.94 as of 7:00 a.m. in Hong Kong, according to CoinMarketCap data. The world’s largest cryptocurrency briefly fell below the US$29,000 support line to a low of US$28,959.49 overnight. Meanwhile, Ether fell 0.24% to US$1,836.31
Both Bitcoin and Ether held steady for the week, with Bitcoin posting a 0.10% increase and Ether recording a weekly loss of 1.04%.
“The lack of moves probably has to do with the current circumstances of seasonality,” said Michaël van de Poppe, chief executive officer and founder of Amsterdam-based crypto trading company MN Trading.
“Summer usually is relatively boring and combined with the constant flow of fear surrounding the crypto markets — in the regulatory framework with Binance recently and the Department of Justice — isn’t really pushing the markets forward,” Poppe added.
Poppe also said he sees the market remaining range bound for the foreseeable future.
“I think we’ll stay in this relative window unless we get news from the regulatory side of things with potentially an ETF approval or confirmation that altcoins aren’t securities,” he said.
Most top 10 non-stablecoin cryptocurrencies were down Friday morning. Litecoin led losses, falling 4.46% to US$83.39 for a 7.50% weekly decline. The Bitcoin-inspired cryptocurrency completed its halving event on Wednesday, which cut mining rewards in half for the token, increasing its scarcity.
Adrian Wong, the chief executive officer of Hong Kong-based digital asset manager Metalpha said that the Litecoin halving failed to cause an uptick in price due to continuing difficulties in broader markets.
“There wasn’t enough momentum to support a big rally amid the increasingly tough macro environment as [interest] rates rose higher with no short-term sign of relief,” she said.
Ripple XRP also slipped 2.90% to US$0.6666 for a weekly drop of 6.60% as the dispute between Ripple Labs and the U.S. SEC continues to rumble on.
In July, a breakthrough in the case appeared to arrive as a New York district judge ruled that the Ripple-issued XRP token is not a security for individual traders. The ruling provided a timely boost for cryptocurrency prices across the board. However, the ruling also found that sale of XRP to institutional traders does violate securities law.
The sense of legal uncertainty is contributing to the slide in the token’s value.
Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse took to Twitter Wednesday to criticize the SEC for using XRP transparency reports against the company as part of the lawsuit.
The SEC has begun legal proceedings against a number of U.S.-based cryptocurrency firms based on its claim that most tokens other than Bitcoin are unregistered financial securities. One such firm is Coinbase Global, which operates the largest cryptocurrency exchange in the U.S.
After the company’s earnings call Thursday, Coinbase’s chief legal officer Paul Grewal expressed confidence that the company can win the litigation brought against it by the SEC. The Nasdaq-listed exchange exceeded Q2 revenue expectations, with a surge in interest income.
The total crypto market capitalization fell 0.43% in the past 24 hours to US$1.17 trillion, while trading volume also fell 27.34% to US$29.27 billion.
