Crypto markets have been showing weakness in the past few days as concerns around sticky inflation, stock market earnings and looming recession have dragged prices lower, Edward Moya, senior market analyst of foreign exchange market maker Oanda, said Thursday on CoinDesk TV. Source
Ethereum’s highly anticipated tech update, often referred to as the Shanghai or Shapella upgrade, starting April 12 enabled withdrawals of some 18 million tokens, worth $35 billion, previously locked up in staking contracts. After the upgrade, ETH’s price rallied to $2,100, its highest level in 11 months, defying earlier concerns the unlocking could lead to significant selling pressure and a price crash. The token recently has dropped below $1,900, aligning with a broader crypto market decline. Source
Open interest in CME futures has risen to the highest level since March 2022, indicating an influx of institutional traders to the crypto market. Source
Over the course of the marathon hearing, Gensler fended off questions about whether his agency was pushing too hard on proposed rules, providing too little time for public feedback on these rules, how it was approaching crypto companies hoping to operate in the U.S. and a host of non-crypto questions, including proposed disclosure requirements around climate change and audit trails. Source
Patrick McHenry, chair of the United States House Financial Services Committee, jumped right into criticism of the Securities and Exchange Commission and its leadership over digital assets at an oversight hearing. In an April 18 hearing on oversight of the SEC, Representative McHenry used his opening statement to bring up the commission’s “punishing” of digital asset firms through regulation by enforcement without a clear path to compliance. The congressman reiterated calls for U.S. lawmakers to provide “clear rules of the road” for crypto through legislation. In addition, he pressed SEC…
Before the upgrade, some crypto watchers worried that the event would flood the market with millions of unlocked ETH and crash the second largest cryptocurrency’s price, although others predicted little impact or that the price would rise. News of a seamless implementation pushed ETH’s price above $2,100 the day following, its highest level since May 2022. ETH outperformed bitcoin (BTC) in that 24-hour period. ETH was recently trading at about $2,070, down more than 2% over the past 24 hours. Source
On Apr. 17, derivatives marketplace Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME) Group, announced it will broaden its range of cryptocurrency options by adding new options to its standard and micro-sized Bitcoin (BTC) and Ether (ETH) contracts. Pending regulatory review, these new contracts will be available from May 22, and expiries will be available every day of the business week from Monday to Friday. According to the announcement, CME Group’s expanded suite of cryptocurrency options will include new expiry dates for Bitcoin and Ether futures contracts. These options will now expire every day from…
Derivatives marketplace Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME) is adding to its cryptocurrency offerings with daily expirations soon to be available on bitcoin and either futures options contracts, the company said in a press release on Monday. Original
Ethereum has delivered an extremely strong performance by gaining more than 10% since the Shapella upgrade. Ether (ETH) has successfully delivered a very strong performance shooting past $2,100 levels and hitting a new 11-month high. As of press time, ETH is trading at $2,087.83 with a market cap of $249 billion. This strong price performance comes despite more than 1 million ETH being withdrawn from the Ethereum Beacon Chain just within the first four days of the Shanghai hardfork upgrade. Furthermore, all of these withdrawals happened from nearly 477,805 transactions…
In traditional markets, the dollar index, which gauges the greenback’s exchange rate against majors, rose to 101.80, extending Friday’s 0.5% jump from 101.00. The yield on the two-year note gained nearly five basis points to 4.16%, extending the past week’s 15 basis points rise. The yield on the 10-year note rose to its highest level in a month at 3.54%. Bond yields began rising on Friday after Fed Governor Christopher Waller said the central bank hasn’t made much progress in bringing inflation down to its target of 2% and needs…