Bitcoin, Ether rise; Toncoin leads crypto rebound
Bitcoin rose on Tuesday morning in Asia to around US$26,700, after briefly breaching the US$27,000 resistance level on Monday evening. Ether also logged gains but remained below US$1,650. Most other top 10 non-stablecoin cryptocurrencies moved higher in the past 24 hours, with Toncoin leading the winners with a jump of more than 5%. The rally coincided with a rebound in crypto trading activities and expectations that the Federal Reserve will pause its interest rate hikes this week. U.S. stock futures traded flat after Wall Street closed near the flatline on Monday.
Bitcoin breached US$27,000 for the first time in September
Bitcoin rose 1.11% in the last 24 hours to US$26,778.93 as of 07:30 a.m. in Hong Kong and added 6.62% for the week, according to CoinMarketCap data. The world’s largest cryptocurrency surged on Monday evening to reach US$27,414.73 — the highest price since August 31, but soon retreated to below US$27,000.
The sudden rally in Bitcoin caught some investors off-guard, who had liquidated over US$44 million in Bitcoin positions in the past 24 hours, with over US$31 million of them in short positions, according to Coinglass data.
“Market activity seems to be growing again, after an abrupt decrease during summer months,” Matteo Greco, research analyst at Canada-based digital asset investment firm Fineqia International, said in an emailed note.
The cumulative daily volume on centralized exchanges from Sept. 10 to Sept. 17 reached US$11.3 billion, marking a 19% increase from the 7 days before, noted Greco.
“With the end of summer and the resumption of normal trading activity, the market is likely to see increased volatility again, after BTC reached the minimum volatility levels ever recorded on a 30-day basis during the first two weeks of August,” Greco said.
Along with Bitcoin, Ether rose 1.20% to US$1,638.41 and moved up 5.90% for the week. The second top cryptocurrency reached US$1,667.93 on Monday evening, which was also the highest price since August 31.
Most other top 10 non-stablecoin cryptocurrencies logged gains in the past 24 hours. Toncoin spearheaded the winners, which surged 5.03% to US$2.41. The native token of the TON Network has jumped 46.96% in the past seven days.
Toncoin received a boost last week from a Thursday announcement that messaging app giant Telegram had partnered with TON to provide a self-custodial digital wallet — TON Space — that is available to the 800 million Telegram users.
Binance’s BNB was the only top 10 token logging a 24-hour loss, which dipped 0.12% to US$216.04 and was still trading 5.03% higher for the week. The world’s largest crypto exchange is facing mounting regulatory challenges in the U.S., with the chief executive officer of Binance U.S. leaving the firm last week.
The total crypto market capitalization gained 1.24% in the past 24 hours to US$1.07 trillion, while trading volume surged 76.96% to US$31.02 billion.
