Crypto will face years of legal arguments before a cohesive framework is in place
The week in review
with Jason Deane
As usual, too many things going on in the world, not enough words.
A week ago, Agustin Carstens, head of the Bank for International Settlements, confidently announced that “crypto had lost the battle against fiat currency” and then added, with equal confidence, that “a technology doesn’t make for trusted money”.
I’m not even sure where to start with that one to be honest. Our money has always, historically speaking, been the result of our latest technology so why he thinks that will change now is as short sighted as it is bizarre. It also implies that non-technical solutions (does that simply mean “human controlled?”) are, by definition, superior? We already know with absolute certainty this is not true.
There’s no question crypto will face years of legal argument before a cohesive framework is in place and, by extension, Bitcoin will be (and for the most part incorrectly) bought into the process, but even so this claim is a stretch at best.
Even while he was making it, the usual slew of baby steps towards an increasingly digital financial world are easy to spot. In the USA, for example, the state of Montana is close to passing its law to “enshrine the right to mine digital assets” while over in Gibraltar, Xapo Bank announced its full integration into the Lightning Network “to improve its Bitcoin capabilities”.
Speaking of which, the capacity of the Lightning Network continue to increase as shown by this chart from The Block showing a Feb 25 figure of 5,570 Bitcoin. That’s up around 25% just in the very month that Mr Carstens made his comment.
Meanwhile Bitcoin hashrate and difficulty levels continue to rise, routinely peaking at new highs as miners continue to deploy in ever greener formats, as neatly indicated here in this visual released only this morning by Daniel Batten.
This no doubt irritates the “Change the Code” Twitter account authors who do, finally, seem to be losing the will to continue the disinformation campaign they started a year or so ago as their post rates continue to dwindle and the account has continuously failed to make any traction at all.
On the tech front, Ordinals (more or less NFTs on the Bitcoin blockchain) are the key word of the moment as more and more people are exploring the ideas and capabilities of this application and whether there really is something here. I’m not sure how I feel about this at the moment for a myriad reasons, so it’s become my mission over the next week or so to really try and understand the implications, capabilities and limitations.
And as for the markets? Well, last week’s broadly positive sentiment has definitely felt a little more subdued this week, but this is pretty normal as part of the hangover of a prolonged bear market.
So, with that in mind, I’ll leave you with words of wisdom from Cat Stevens… “It’s not time to make a change, just relax, take it easy.”
True dat. Have a great weekend!
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In the markets
The Bitcoin economy
*Data can be found at https://terminal.bytetree.com/
Total crypto market cap
The total capitalisation of the entire cryptocurrency market this morning was $1.025 trillion.
What Bitcoin did yesterday
We closed yesterday, March 2, at a price of $23,475. The daily high yesterday was $23,739, and the daily low was $23,245.
Bitcoin market capitalisation
Bitcoin’s market capitalisation this morning was $432.158 billion. To put it into context, the market cap of gold is $12.207 trillion and Tesla is $604.02 billion.
Bitcoin volume
The total spot trading volume reported by all exchanges over the last 24 hours was $26.198 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 38.39%.
Fear and Greed Index
Market sentiment today is 50, in Neutral.
Bitcoin’s market dominance
Bitcoin’s market dominance today is 43.64. Its lowest ever recorded dominance was 37.09 on January 1 2018.
Relative Strength Index (RSI)
The daily RSI is currently 44. 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 fam: Soundbite of the day
“Decentralised Finance is an abstract buzzword. We should really be talking about new business models. Open data networks (public blockchains) + autonomous compute (smart contracts) + user-controlled data = New Business Models.“
Michael Nadeau, analyst and author of The DeFi report
What they said yesterday
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Greener by the year…
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Crypto AM: Editor’s picks
Sam Bankman-Fried: A tissue of lies soaked with fake tears?
Three-in-four wealth managers are gearing up for more cryptocurrency exposure
Crypto.com granted FCA licence to operate in UK
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 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
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.