Beginning in September 2023, the value of Ethereum and Bitcoin continued to rise for a period of seven months. This run appears to be coming to a close in April. The current state of the American economy is the primary factor. From April 19th through the 26th, the price of Bitcoin increased by less than 1%. The whole seven days went off without a hitch, with four sessions of decline and three of ascent. During the given time frame, the highest price of Bitcoin was $67,241, and the lowest was $62,785.
In the end, the biggest cryptocurrency’s rally had nothing to do with the previous halving. For this reason, macro data started to significantly impact investor mood. U.S. gross domestic product statistics were released this week. Investors received almost no good news from them. A 1.6% increase in GDP was recorded in the first quarter of 2024, whereas 2.5% was predicted and 3.4% was seen in the fourth quarter of 2023. Contrary to expectations, the 3.1% increase in the GDP price index—a measure of inflation in goods and services—came as a surprise. When compared to the 1.6% recorded in Q42023, this is a substantial increase. When these things happen, investors lose faith that the US Federal Reserve will soon lower its key interest rate. That is, interest rates on loans are not going down. From spot Bitcoin ETFs, there is some pessimism as well. Erick Balchunas, a senior analyst at Bloomberg Intelligence, shared some intriguing numbers on X (formerly Twitter):
A model predicting the 25- and 30-day price of Bitcoin has been developed by representatives of the analytical platform CryptoQuant. Technology based on artificial intelligence was used in the experiment. Researchers began downloading 376 on-chain BTC indicators in 2012 for the purpose of analysis. The model’s output indicated that Bitcoin should reclaim $70,000 in 25 days, and then surpass the historical high ($73,794) and hit $78,000 in 30 days. Those from CryptiQuant made it clear that their data in no way serves as a recommendation or roadmap for investments. In May of 2024, we will be able to determine the accuracy of the CryptoQuant model. Bitcoin has not moved from a technical analysis perspective. Also, the price is below the 50-day moving average (orange), and the relative strength index (RSI) is below 50, so it seems like bearish sentiment is the prevailing sentiment. At $67,241, you’ll find support, and at $59,629, you’ll find resistance.
There was a four-point increase from last week to this week on the fear and greed index. It is now worth 70. Unfortunately, this data shows that Bitcoin investors are more motivated by greed than fear. Over the week, the price of Ethereum increased by 2.7%. Simultaneously, the week was obviously split in two: initially, during the first four days, ETH surged to nearly $3,300, and subsequently, it dropped below $3,150. The volatility is still relatively low, with no trading session seeing a price change of more than 3.5 percent.
Although the halving of Bitcoin appears to have occurred, the amount of ether used for staking has started to rise. By April 26, the figure had nearly tripled to 31.9 million ETH from its previous low of slightly under 31.6 million ETH due to the cut in the reward for mining a Bitcoin block. Put another way, in under six days, almost 300,000 ETH were deposited.
This week, the SEC formally delayed a decision on multiple applications simultaneously, indicating that the agency is in no rush to replicate Hong Kong’s experience. Some of the entities that lost out were Franklin Templeton ETFs, Grayscale, and revisions to BlackRock’s initial proposal. The deadlines for the specific decisions regarding all applications have been pushed back. Grayscale is planning to convert the current trust into a spot ETF for ether, while Franklin Templeton will wait at least 60 days, BlackRock 21 days, and at least. According to technical analysis, Ethereum’s price is currently below the 50-day moving average (shown in orange), indicating that the price is likely to continue falling in the near future. The 200-day moving average (grey) is significantly lower than the current price, indicating the inverse is true in the long run. In order to get out of the downtrend, we need to break through the $3,300 resistance level. At $2,845, you can find support.
The Solana Over the last week, the price of the cryptocurrency Solana has hardly budged, remaining at a little over $142.5. The coin’s value dropped by nearly 10% during the previous four trading sessions.
The platform itself demonstrates quite good results, leading in some indicators, even though the price of Solana is not growing. “While Tron and BSC (Binance Smart Chain) lead in active addresses for stablecoin transfers, Ethereum and Solana lead in the volume of stablecoin transfers in dollars.” — Chris Burniske, co-founder of the venture capital firm Placeholder, cited this intriguing statistic in his interview with X.