Cryptos Muted As Markets Guess The Fed's Monetary Policy Outlook

Cryptocurrencies remained subdued over the past 24 hours amidst anxiety over whether the recent inflation update would allow the Federal Reserve to pause on its rate hikes. Hawkish comments from certain Fed officials triggered anxiety over whether the interest rates would remain high for a longer period.

Data released on Thursday by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics showed CPI in the U.S rising to 3.2 percent, from 3 percent in the previous month. Markets had expected inflation to rise to 3.3 percent. Core inflation however declined to 4.7 percent whereas markets had expected it to be steady at 4.8 percent.

Amidst the inflation update, and the hawkish comments from Fed officials, the U.S. dollar remains strong, as implied by the Dollar Index rising to 102.77, versus 102.52 a day earlier.

As indicated by the CME FedWatch tool, expectations of another quarter point rate hike by the Fed in the upcoming review in September increased to 11.5 percent, from 11 percent a day earlier and versus 13 percent a week earlier. The shift in expectations for the November review was more pronounced, increasing to 30.6 percent, from 27.8 percent a day earlier and 25.9 percent a week earlier.

On the macro-economic front, U.K. GDP increased 0.4 percent in the second quarter, while inflation in France eased to 4.3 percent.

Overall crypto market capitalization has decreased to $1.17 trillion, from $1.18 trillion a day earlier.

Bitcoin is currently changing hands at $29,399.99, registering an overnight decline of 0.65 percent. The leading cryptocurrency has however gained half a percent over the past week. Year-to-date gains exceed 76 percent.

Ethereum too has shed half a percent overnight to trade at $1,847.01. The leading alternate coin has gained almost a quarter percent in the past week and more than 53 percent in 2023.

Bitcoin’s crypto market dominance decreased to 48.78 percent, from 48.82 percent a day earlier whereas Ethereum’s share of crypto market stood at 18.93 percent, edging up from 18.92 percent a day earlier.

4th ranked BNB (BNB) declined 0.77 percent overnight. It is yet to recoup the close to 1.5 percent loss made on a year-to-date basis.

5th ranked XRP (XRP) extended losses to trade at $0.6314, having shed 0.43 percent in the past 24 hours. Amidst the legal uncertainty regarding the SEC’s appeal on the recent verdict related to Ripple Labs, weekly losses have touched almost 5 percent.

7th ranked Dogecoin (DOGE) is also trading on a negative note. Overnight losses exceed half a percent. The meme coin has however gained more than 1.5 percent over the past week.

8th ranked Cardano (ADA) has dropped 1.3 percent overnight. Year-to-date gains exceed 18 percent.

9th ranked Solana (SOL) shed 0.87 percent overnight. It has however gained more than 5 percent over the past week and 145 percent in 2023.

10th ranked TRON (TRX) erased 0.7 percent overnight. TRX has gained more than 40 percent in 2023.

93rd ranked THORChain (RUNE) topped the price charts with an overnight rally of more than 3 percent. 68th ranked Rocket Pool (RPL) has also added close to 3 percent in the past week.

88th ranked GMX (GMX) was the biggest laggard, shedding more than 9 percent overnight.

The Securities and Exchange Commission on Thursday announced that crypto asset trading platform Bittrex Inc. and its co-founder and former CEO, William Shihara, have agreed to settle charges that they operated an unregistered national securities exchange, broker, and clearing agency. Bittrex Inc.’s foreign affiliate, Bittrex Global GmbH, also agreed to settle charges that it failed to register as a national securities exchange.

According to the SEC, Bittrex provided services to U.S. investors in connection with crypto assets that were offered and sold as securities. The complaint further alleged that Bittrex and Shihara, who was the company’s CEO from 2014 to 2019, directed issuers who sought to have their crypto assets made available for trading on Bittrex’s platform to first delete from public channels certain “problematic statements” that Shihara believed would lead a regulator, such as the SEC, to investigate whether the crypto asset was offered and sold as a security.

Bittrex and Bittrex Global have agreed to pay, jointly and severally, disgorgement of $14.4 million, prejudgment interest of $4 million, and a civil penalty of $5.6 million, for a total monetary payment of $24 million.

Meanwhile, Argentina has joined a few other nations to investigate the Worldcoin project launched by Sam Altman of Open AI, the company behind ChatGPT. The project which uses iris scan for sign-up has already triggered alarm bells in France, Germany and Kenya. According to its website, the Worldcoin project aims to establish universal access to the global economy regardless of country or background. It claims to be the world’s largest human identity and financial network aiming to build a more human economic system. In select jurisdictions, those signing up were given its Worldcoin (WLD) cryptocurrency.

The WLD cryptocurrency is currently ranked 135th overall and is trading at $1.71, almost 52 percent below the all-time high of $3.58 touched on July, 24 2023. The cryptocurrency touched an all-time low of $1.66 earlier in the day.

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