Another crazy week in the world of crypto
The week in review
with Jason Deane
Wow, what a week. Where to even begin? And can I really crowbar such a week into a few hundred words?
Let’s start at home where here in the UK we not only saw record temperatures (40.3C in Coningsby in case you’re wondering) but we also saw a new 40 year high for inflation figures at 9.4 per cent. That’s the headline that grabs all the attention but, quietly, interest rates on government debt also hit a record in June and monthly interest payments hit an eye watering £19.4bn.
Meanwhile, the ECB raised its rates for the first time in 11 years, ending the era of negative rates that has reigned for so long as move I described as “inevitable” in an interview I did with Christine Lee on Coindesk TV last night.
We also discussed Tesla’s announcement that they had sold some 75 per cent of their total Bitcoin holdings for around nine per cent less than their average entry price, although a bit of accounting wizardry allowed them to report an overall gain.
Whether this was a board decision or Musk’s is not entirely clear, but I personally suspect there was pressure from the former to the latter given the issues the company has faced recently with production shutdowns in Shanghai and other supply line problems. Public companies are, after all, under pressure at all times to show positive balance sheet and cash positions for fear of damaging stock prices.
Musk took the brunt of the flack, of course, with my Twitter feed filling up with lettuce based memes. Not that he cares, but I rather suspect he secretly enjoyed announcing that he didn’t sell any of his Dogecoin as his rather bizarre obsession with this joke coin continues. Personally, I think this unfortunate as it clearly does a lot of damage to the space, especially for newbies.
Coinbase made the news for the wrong reasons when it was revealed that one of its former staff, Ishan Wahi, had been happily tipping off his brother (and one other) about upcoming token listings allowing them to trade early and netting them a small profit of around $1.5m between them. In the cold light of day, it doesn’t seem very much for the 20 years they now face in prison for insider trading. Wahi even tried to make a run for it but was arrested at the airport with two passports, several forms of alternative ID and a whole load of suitcases and devices.
Insider trading has been around for years and it’s a human issue rather than a crypto specific one, but there were two significant (and under reported) aspects to this:
First, that he was caught via the blockchain and wallet transactions through some detective work by crypto Twitter’s well known commentators, Cobie, who, quite rightly, pointed out that Coinbase really should have picked this up earlier.
Second, that the SEC implied, quite heavily, that the assets concerned were “securities” rather than cryptocurrencies. To be clear, there has been no such official classification, but in my view anything that isn’t Bitcoin will ultimately be classed as a security anyway. Yes, even Ethereum. So could this be a taste of what’s to come?
We’ll see, but for now have a great weekend. Hasta La Vista, Baby!
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Yesterday’s Crypto AM Daily in association with Luno
In the markets
The Bitcoin economy
*Definitions and insights can be found at https://bytetree.com/research
Total crypto market cap
The total capitalisation of the entire cryptocurrency market at time of writing is currently $1.052 trillion.
What Bitcoin did yesterday
We closed yesterday, July 21 2022, at a price of $23,164.63. The daily high yesterday was $23,388.32 and the daily low was $22,431.15.
Bitcoin market capitalisation
Bitcoin’s market capitalisation at time of writing is $442.14 billion.To put it into context, the market cap of gold is $11.26 trillion and Tesla is $844.78 billion.
Bitcoin volume
The total spot trading volume reported by all exchanges over the last 24 hours was $32,307 billion. High volumes can indicate that a significant price movement has stronger support and is more likely to be sustained.
Volatility
The price volatility of Bitcoin over the last 30 days is 49.39%.
Fear and Greed Index
Market sentiment today is 33, in Fear.
Bitcoin’s market dominance
Bitcoin’s market dominance today is 42.77. Its lowest ever recorded dominance was 37.09 on January 1 2018.
Relative Strength Index (RSI)
The daily RSI is currently 60.72. Values of 70 or above indicate that an asset is becoming overbought and may be primed for a trend reversal or experience a correction in price – an RSI reading of 30 or below indicates an oversold or undervalued condition.
Convince your Nan: Soundbite of the day
“All commodities require energy. Since Bitcoin is a commodity, it can serve as global digital money. The economic function is to provide property rights to 8 billion people as well as a global settlement network that has already cleared $17 trillion dollars so far this year.”
– Michael Saylor, CEO of MicroStrategy
What they said yesterday
Too soon?
Yep…
Singapore gets it…
Crypto AM: Editor’s picks
Q&A with Duncan Coutts, Principal Technical Architect at IO Global
Jamie Bartlett – on the trail of the missing ‘Cryptoqueen’
MPs are falling silent over potential of cryptocurrency
Erica’s ‘Crypto Wars’ handed honours in Business Book Awards
‘Let people invest’: Matt Hancock makes case for liberal crypto rules
Explained: Why the Treasury is so sold on stablecoins
Fears crypto is used to avoid sanctions ‘misplaced,’ says Matt Hancock
The cryptocurrency fundraisers behind Ukraine’s military effort
Crypto crazy couple name baby after favourite digital asset
Peter McCormack: Transforming Bedford FC into a global Bitcoin brand
Crypto AM: Features
Crypto AM: Founders Series
Crypto AM: Industry Voices
Crypto AM: Contributors
Crypto AM: In Conversation with James Bowater
Crypto AM: Tomorrow’s Money with Gavin S Brown
Crypto AM: Mixing in the Metaverse with Dr Chris Kacher
Crypto AM: Visions of the Future, Past & Present with Alex Lightman
Crypto AM: Tiptoe through the Crypto with Monty Munford
Crypto AM: Taking a Byte out of Digital Assets with Jonny Fry
Crypto on the catwalk
Crypto AM: Events
For those of you who missed the Crypto AM DeFi & Digital Inclusion online summit 2021 – you can now watch the event in two parts via YouTube
Part One
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dvqNMNZTIDE
Part Two
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WXhX_-Tr5j0
Cautionary Notes
It’s definitely tempting to get swept up in the excitement, but please heed these words of caution: Do your own research, only invest what you can afford, and make good decisions. The indicators contained in this article will hopefully help in this. Remember though, the content of this article is for information purposes only and is not investment advice or any form of recommendation or invitation. City PM, Crypto AM and Luno always advise you to obtain your own independent financial advice before investing or trading in cryptocurrency.
All information is correct as of 08:00 BST