SEC Finally Approved Spot Bitcoin ETF, Here’s What Happened to BTC’s Price (Market Watch)

After a decade-long struggle, the US Securities and Exchange Commission finally greenlighted a spot Bitcoin ETF, which, expectedly, resulted in enhanced price movements for the underlying asset.

At the same time, some assets, such as ETH, have performed quite impressively, registering a 20-month peak.

BTC’s Rollercoaster

Ever since the start of the year, all eyes in the cryptocurrency industry have been on the SEC and the anticipated approval of a spot Bitcoin ETF. After years of rejecting or delaying countless applications, the securities regulator was expected to allow such a product to reach the US markets at the start of 2024.

The speculations about it brought its own set of volatility last week. However, January 10 was expected to be even more eventful.

Despite the confusion, deleted posts, which were later reinstated, and cryptic comments, the SEC indeed greenlighted numerous spot Bitcoin ETFs yesterday evening. This resulted in BTC dumping to $44,200, shooting up to almost $48,000, and then slipping back down to under $46,000.

As of now, the cryptocurrency has calmed at just over $46,000. Its market capitalization has soared past $900 billion, but its dominance over the alts is down by 2% in days to just over 51% on CMC.

Alts Doing Better

Although the biggest news yesterday surrounded Bitcoin, most altcoins have outperformed the primary digital asset. ETH is among those, charting an 8% increase that has pushed it to a 20-month peak of over $2,600.

Ripple, Dogecoin, Polygon, and Chainlink have seen similar increases. Cardano, Polkadot, and Avalanche have soared by double digits within the same timeframe, pushing their prices to $0.58, $8.3, and $39, respectively.

Most lower- and mid-cap alts have produced similar gains, led by ENS (43%), ETC (31%), SUI (25%), and MNT (25%).

As such, the total crypto market cap has added over $50 billion overnight and stands at $1.770 trillion.