Amidst the dynamic world of cryptocurrencies, Ethereum, the second-largest digital currency, has ignited investor enthusiasm, driven by a bold prediction from Michaël van de Poppe, CEO of MN Trading.

Van de Poppe’s forecast projects a remarkable climb for Ethereum, anticipating a potential surge to the range of $3,800 to $4,500. This optimistic outlook gains momentum as Ethereum’s current valuation hovers around $2,980, showcasing a robust performance while its counterpart, Bitcoin, grapples with market challenges.

Ethereum: Fueling Bullish Momentum

Several factors contribute to Ethereum’s bullish momentum, a sentiment emphasized by Van de Poppe. Ethereum’s recent outperformance relative to Bitcoin, coupled with a noticeable shift in investor sentiment, is evidenced by data illustrating funds flowing from alternative digital assets into Ethereum. These dynamics are pushing Ethereum’s value closer to the psychological barrier of $3,000.

#Ethereum is on its way towards $3,800-4,500. pic.twitter.com/TfoBGloBsH

— Michaël van de Poppe (@CryptoMichNL) February 19, 2024

Noteworthy events on the horizon, such as the DenCun upgrade and a speculated temporary peak in Bitcoin’s price, are identified as potential catalysts for Ethereum’s continued growth. Van de Poppe even raises the intriguing question of whether Ethereum can reclaim a specific ratio against Bitcoin during these events, hinting at the possibility of reaching even loftier heights.

ETH market cap is currently at $351.5 billion. Chart: TradingView.com

Caution In The Futures Market: Navigating Volatility

While optimism surrounds Ether, a balanced perspective is essential. The report acknowledges the volatile nature of the cryptocurrency market, despite the surge in open interest for Ethereum futures contracts across various exchanges.

ETH seven-day price action. Source: Coingecko

Cautionary signals emerge, expressing concerns about potential liquidations leading to short-to-mid-term price dips that could dampen the prevailing optimistic mood.

Emphasizing the unpredictable dynamics of the cryptocurrency market, the report underscores the importance of independent research and thorough risk assessment before making any Ethereum-related investment decisions.

The rotation towards #Ethereum seems to be happening.

It’s up to close to $3,000, while the rest lags behind.

Happily skewed with my portfolio towards $ETH for the coming period.

— Michaël van de Poppe (@CryptoMichNL) February 19, 2024

Navigating Uncertain Terrain

Van de Poppe’s optimistic Ethereum outlook positions the cryptocurrency as a potentially lucrative investment opportunity. However, the report advocates for a measured approach, emphasizing the significance of recognizing the inherent risks and uncertainties associated with Ether and the broader cryptocurrency market.

Featured image from Pixabay, chart from TradingView

Disclaimer: The article is provided for educational purposes only. It does not represent the opinions of NewsBTC on whether to buy, sell or hold any investments and naturally investing carries risks. You are advised to conduct your own research before making any investment decisions. Use information provided on this website entirely at your own risk.

Key Takeaways

• Bitcoin has surged beyond $26,000 as interest rate expectations flip 
• Inflation reading provides further impetus as investors dream of return to lower interest environment and surging crypto prices
• There are reasons to be hesitant here, however, writes our Analyst Dan Ashmore
• Shutdown of three crypto banks will hurt industry, while there has been nothing but bearish developments since the start of the year
• The decoupling from other risk assets is also unusual and has not been seen to the upside since 2021

I don’t really make predictions because what would be the point? I’m just a boy hitting keys on a laptop, and I know better than to fool myself into thinking I know enough to predict the market. 

However, the speed of this Bitcoin run-up surprises me. Not that you should put any weight at all into that – if you’re in the habit of trusting people’s words on the Internet, I suspect your bank wallet is already hurting, anyway – but let me explain what is confusing me. 

What is happening to Bitcoin?

First, let us surmise what has happened in the last week to kick this rally off. 

We saw the startling collapse of Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) last week, followed by Silvergate, which sent shockwaves throughout the market. This had particular implications for crypto for a couple of reasons. 

The first was USDC, the second biggest stablecoin on the market. Revealed to have 8.25% of its reserves held in SVB, the market feared for the solvency of the stablecoin. Of course, this fear all settled down when the US administration stepped in to shore up the crisis and guarantee deposits would be made whole. 

This shored up the panic and crypto began rebounding. But that is not all that happened. The fact that the banking sector wobbled so drastically shifted market expectations surrounding the future path of interest rate hikes. 

With such creaking evident, the market has moved to betting that the Fed is more or less done with interest rate hikes. Fed futures currently imply a 72% chance of no hike at next week’s Fed meeting. Just last week, this was 0%, with the baseline expectation (70%) expecting a 50 bps hike.

Looking further out at the long-term trajectory, the prognosis has shifted even more dramatically. There is now only a 1.6% chance of higher rates in July, compared to 100% last week, again looking at futures. There is even a 31% chance that rates will be lower in July than they are today. That is a remarkable flip. 

This has sent Bitcoin aggressively upward, surging beyond $26,000 as I write this, for its highest level since last June. It has also been aided by the CPI reading this afternoon, coming in at 6%, its eighth consecutive decline and the lowest metric since September 2021. 

Has Bitcoin risen too much?

But does this make sense? 

While on the one hand, this is exactly what we would expect given the enormous flip in rate forecasts, I am confused as to the sheer level of the outperformance vs other risk assets. This is a divergence which we have not seen since the heyday of the bull market back in 2021. 

That should provide thought. Of course, Bitcoin is capable of moves that other assets can only dream of matching, so maybe it’s just doing what it likes to do. 

But then there is the implications arising out of losing three crypto-friendly banks – Silvergate, SVB and Signature. The environment in the US is now barren for crypto firms. Whether they can simply move abroad remains to be seen.

But even if so, the fact the world’s biggest economy is pushing these crypto firms out is not a good thing for the industry at large. Is it anything to do with Bitcoin specifically? No. But the market is driven by emotion, and there is also the fact that onramping is much harder now, and Bitcoin is still tied to the crypto industry as a whole. 

The strict regulatory environment, with the clampdown headlined by the shutdown of BUSD last month, had already worsened significantly since the turn of the year. Throw in various bankruptcies that came post-FTX (led by Genesis and the demise of DCG) and there are plenty of bearish variables here regarding the long-term future of the crypto industry. 

This is not to say that these can all be overcome. But for crypto to decouple from other risk assets to this extent, following the shutdown of three vital banks for the industry, does present food for thought. We haven’t seen $26,000 in a long time, and it feels – to my far-from-confident mind – like it is still a bit premature.

Time will tell I guess, but for now, it’s a nice change to see some green on the charts for a change. 

•  DOGE’s price fails to rally high as the price continues to stall in its price movement despite the market looking green across boards. 
•  DOGE’s price continues to trend above key support as the price tries to build more strength to overcome this area of resistance that has held the price from rallying. 
• DOGE’s price remains strong on the daily timeframes as the price trades below the 50 and 200 Exponential Moving Averages (EMA).

The price of Dogecoin (DOGE) showed some good price action to the upside as the price has continued to hold above its key support zones, with upside potential more likely. The crypto market has enjoyed a bit of relief across all assets, with Bitcoin (BTC) showing great traction, rallying and dragging the market. Dogecoin (DOGE) has remained relatively slow in recent days as buy orders have become slow due to the price facing resistance to breaking higher. (Data from Binance)

Dogecoin (DOGE) Price Analysis On The Weekly Chart

The past week has seen many altcoins continue to produce over 200% gains over the past 7 days of breaking out of their range-bound movement, as many believe more hope could be settling into the crypto space once more. 

The new week has looked a bit skeptical, but things are beginning to shape up and looking more promising for some altcoins, like BAND, rallying over 100% in less than 24 hours, showing the price action and volume for buy orders. The price of DOGE has shown little sign of volatility as the price continues to stall in its price movement as the price aims to break out of its shell with a rally imminent.

After dropping from its high of $0.15, rallying from a weekly low of $0.055, the price of DOGE has struggled recently to pull off a rally that has left many in euphoria. 

The price of DOGE saw its trade at a low of $0.05 on the weekly chart; the price swiftly bounced from this region as the price rebounded to a region of $0.077 as the price found itself trading in a range before breaking out with strong volume to a high of $0.15 as it faces resistance to trend to $0.2. 

Weekly resistance for the price of DOGE – $0.15.

Weekly support for the price of DOGE – $0.12.

Price Analysis Of DOGE On The Daily (1D) Chart

In the daily timeframe, the price of DOGE continues to look strong as the price broke out of its long-range price movement to a high of $0.15, recapturing the key support of $0.12 before facing resistance to breaking higher after pulling gains of over 150% in 7 days. 

The price of DOGE trades at $0.13 above the 50 and 200 EMA, which indicates a good relief sign for DOGE’s price on the daily timeframe could be imminent after facing rejection to trend higher. 

Daily resistance for the DOGE price – $0.15.

Daily support for the DOGE price – $0.0112.

Featured Image From zipmex, Charts From Tradingview

• ETC’s price shows strength as it bounces from a downtrend range with high volume, aiming for a rally to $30.
• ETC faces a major test to trend higher above $30 after the price broke out of its descending triangle price movement.
• ETC’s price remains strong below the 50 and 200 Exponential Moving Averages (EMA) as it attempts to rally past these regions.

Ethereum Classic (ETC) has remained strong after breaking out of its downtrend descending triangle with good volume, with the price aiming to rally to $30. The cryptocurrency market has appeared more stable this week, with significant price movements in Bitcoin (BTC) and Ethereum (ETH). This new relief rally in the cryptocurrency market has benefited smaller coins like Ethereum Classic (ETC), which has shown real strength in breaking out of its long downtrend movement. (Data from Binance)

Ethereum Classic (ETC) Price Analysis On The Weekly Chart

Although many altcoins have struggled to trend in a range market, the price of ETC has seen more of a downtrend move despite showing some price movement to the upside, which was short-lived as the price was rejected.

ETC fell from an all-time high of more than $180 to a region of $41 before rallying to a high of $75; the price of ETC faced further rejection to a range low of $46, where it formed weak Support to hold sell-offs, but this proved futile as price continued to fall.

The price of ETC fell to a weekly low of $24 and immediately bounced, forming a price range in an attempt to break out.

With the market looking more promising, we could see ETC rally to a high of $30 with good volume, where the price has more room to trend higher.

ETC has a favorable overall structure, with a high probability of price retesting the $30 and higher ranges following a successful breakout from the range low. If ETC fails to break and hold above $31, a retest of $24 is possible.

Weekly resistance for the price of ETC – $30-$31.

Weekly Support for the price of ETC – $24.

Price Analysis Of ETC On The Daily (1D) Chart

In the daily timeframe, the price of ETC remains strong and trades below the key resistance levels after breaking out of its downtrend price movement with good volume as it attempts to rally to a high of $30, acting as key resistance to the price. 

The price of ETC needs to break and close above 50 EMA, acting as a strong resistance for the price of ETC. The price of $28 corresponds to the value of 50 EMA, acting as resistance for the price to trend higher to a region of $32. The price of ETC closing above $32 is a good sign, as this is confirmed by the Fibonacci retracement value of 23.6%.

Daily resistance for the ETC price – $32.

Daily Support for the ETC price – $20.5.

Featured Image From zipmex, Charts From Tradingview

They say, birds of a feather flock together. This saying particular HODLs true for a bunch of coin pairs—like Bitcoin, Litecoin; Ethereum, and Ethereum Classic—from the crypto space. On most occasions in the past, these pairs have seen quite a congruent uptrend/downtrend phases. The same has, however, not been the case with Shiba Inu [SHIB] and its ecosystem’s native Bone ShibaSwap [BONE] token.

BONE, primarily, is a governance token of the Shibaswap ecosystem. Meaning, it allows the Shib Inu Army to vote on upcoming proposals. Basically, the more BONE a user HODLs, the more weightage their vote carries in deciding the fate of future endeavors. 

As depicted below, the initial few weeks of this year were fairly good for BONE, while Shiba Inu, comparatively, had a rough time. Then again in March, when SHIB registered consecutive green candles on the weekly, BONE slumped in value. Right after, BONE’s recovery phase coincided with SHIB’s correction.

Of late, with the OG token consolidating, BONE has been able to make rapid strides on its chart.

Shiba Inu’s BONE gets a new use case

Well, behind every pump, there’s always a trigger factor. And this time, there’s quite a concrete one. The Shibarium documentation along with the public beta testnet is set to be released next month, and HODLers have been looking forward to the same. Notably, BONE is set to be the gas token to be used in Shibarium Layer-2.

So, with the confirmation that BONE will play a major role in Shibarium, the current sentiment is bullish.

As chalked out in a recent explainer, the Shibarium Layer-2 solution aims to provide faster and more scalable transactions than the current L1 blockchain. The L2 network, which is built on the Ethereum blockchain will still be decentralized and maintain the security of its users.

Read More: Shiba Inu: What Makes Shibarium Special? Explained

What’s next?

BONE’s volumes have massively spiked up of late. On 1 August, the same was at an ATH of $10.6 million, bringing to light the above-par participation of traders. At press time on Tuesday also, the volume was hovering around the highs only.

On 5 August, BONE went on to create a local peak at $1.2 dollars. Since then, it has considerably shed value. Per TA, the same was however expected.

Since the beginning of this year, whenever BONE’s RSI has peaked, the price has slashed down by 45%-64%. Towards the end of last week, this metric flashed an ATH reading of 87.99 on the daily, indicating that the market was highly overbought.

There has already been a slight retracement already and looks like the pullback is likely to continue. Nonetheless, two levels, $0.89 and $0.73, might prove to be crucial in the days to come, for they’ve acted like reasonable supports in the past.

Having said that, it doesn’t mean a rally extension for BONE is completely out of the picture. Time and again, tokens from the Shiba Inu ecosystem have lent their ears to the community. So, if the hype persists and HODLers continue to amass tokens, then BONE can pull off a 32%-33% rally, and re-claim its ATH. In such a case, in the coming weeks, BONE can be expected to put on its price discovery shoes.

Read in the Digest;

• Google Pushes Deeper Into Blockchain and Crypto – Partners with Coinbase (NASDAQ:), Hires Paypal Vet

• Grayscale Fund is Down 30%, Whales Add 40k BTC in Last 2 Days

• Surpasses Visa’s Value Moved in 2021, JPMorgan (NYSE:) Calls High Gas Fee A Big Problem for ETH

• Makes Metaverse Debut with Pavia Launch

• CEO of Crypto.com Admits that 400 Accounts were Exploited in Hack

Google Pushes Deeper Into Blockchain and Crypto – Partners with Coinbase, Hires Paypal Vet

Alphabet (NASDAQ:) Inc.’s Google has ventured deeper into blockchain technology by forming a blockchain and distributed computing division. Led by Shivakumar Venkataraman, the new division will focus on “blockchain and other next-gen distributed computing and data storage technologies.”

Confirming the comment of Bill Ready, Google’s President of Commerce, that the company is paying “a lot of attention” to cryptocurrencies, Google has hired PayPal (NASDAQ:) veteran Arnold Goldberg to lead its payments division. The hire could see Google Pay expand its services to include cryptocurrencies.

Bill Ready explained that the move is part of Alphabet Inc.’s broader plans to partner with a wide range of financial services, including cryptocurrencies. One of such partnerships is with America’s leading crypto exchange, Coinbase.

According to reports, Google’s partnership with Coinbase will see the duo work together to develop a means of storing cryptocurrencies in “digital cards” while still having users pay in traditional currencies.

Flipsider:

• Jack Dorsey has criticized the entrance of megacompanies and venture capital firms to centralize the blockchain industry.

Why You Should Care

According to Bill Ready, crypto is something Google needs to pay a lot of attention to and evolve with it.

Grayscale Bitcoin Fund is Down 30%, Whales Add 40k BTC in Last 2 Days

The world’s largest institutional Bitcoin fund – Grayscale Bitcoin Trust’s (GBTC) – has seen its discount relative to the underlying cryptocurrency widen. The drop, which spans over the past two months, has seen GBTC hit a discount of 26.5%.

With Bitcoin hovering around $42,000, the GBTC would be priced at equivalent to $30,870. In 2022 alone, the $27 billion GBTC Fund has dropped by almost 17%, outpacing Bitcoin’s nearly 9% decline.

Flipsider:

• Despite the two months-long price drop, whales have continued to increase their Bitcoin holdings

• According to whale tracker Santiment, large Bitcoin wallets have added almost 40,000 BTCs (worth around $1.68 billion at Bitcoin’s current price of $42k) in the last 48 hours.

Why You Should Care

Despite the bears applying pressure, bulls have taken a stance to hold their stake – increasing the argument that bitcoin can be used as a store of value.

Ethereum Surpasses Visa’s Value Moved in 2021, JPMorgan Calls High Gas Fee A Big Problem for ETH

While Ethereum’s ongoing network migration was one of the project’s most talked about milestones in 2021, the smart contracts platform achieved even more. Moving more value than Visa (NYSE:) in 2021 is one of many unsaid milestones for Ethereum.

According to new reports, Ethereum moved approximately $11.6 trillion, outperforming the payment giant Visa, which moved $10.4 trillion in 2021. On the other hand, Bitcoin managed to move just $4.6 trillion in the same period.

Ethereum total transaction volume in 2021. Source: Josh Stark

Flipsider:

• Although Ethereum has made significant advances, JP Morgan has opined that the platform’s high gas fee and network congestion are a big problem.

• These led to a drop in Ethereum’s NFT market share from 95% to 80% – at the beginning and end of 2021, with being one of the growing NFT hubs.
• According to JP Morgan, if Ethereum continues losing its NFT and DeFi dominance, it could pose a big problem to Ether’s valuation.

Why You Should Care

According to Pantera Capital, improving its scalability with its PoS migration, Ethereum could be in line to facilitate 50% of all global transactions in ten years.

Cardano Makes Metaverse Debut with Pavia Launch

Pacesetting proof-of-stake network, Cardano, has made its metaverse debut with the launch of Pavia on its blockchain. Play-to-earn gaming and non-fungible token (NFT) project – Pavia – calls itself the “first Cardano metaverse.”

Cardano’s metaverse project has been touted to be the next Decentraland, only that it uses the eco-friendly Cardano blockchain instead of Ethereum. Pavia launched with an in-game currency – PAVIA – used for utility inside its metaverse ecosystem.

The project has issued around 100,000 “land parcels,” each being minted as a uniquely numbered Cardano NFT (CNFT) based on coordinates. The asking prices for plots of land in Pavia going for more than $1,000 apiece.

Pavia has announced that it would add liquidity to Cardano decentralized exchanges [DEXs] and explore cross-chain liquidity in the first quarter of 2022.

Flipsider:

• Cardano makes a late entry into the metaverse and looks to compete with already established projects like The Sandbox and Decentraland.

Why You Should Care

Despite the slow start to life on smart contracts, Pavia could be the first of many big projects launching on the Cardano blockchain.

CEO of Crypto.com Admits that 400 Accounts were Exploited in Hack

After shutting down withdrawals for around 14 hours due to unauthorized activities, Singapore-based cryptocurrency exchange – Crypto.com, announced that all funds were safe and accounted for, despite reports of up to $15 million in ETH missing.

Contradicting their earlier reports, the exchange’s CEO, Kris Marszalek, stated in an interview that 400 accounts were breached as a result of the hack. According to Mr. Marszalek, all affected customers have been reimbursed.

Marszalek explained that the exchange is still working on a post-mortem which would be made public “in the next couple of days.” The exchange has asked customers to reset their two-factor authentication out of “an abundance of caution.”

Flipsider:

• While PeckShield put the losses at $15 million, OXT Research speculates that the hack may actually have cost the exchange $33 million.

Why You Should Care

The hack serves as a reminder for exchanges to constantly improve their security architecture to keep their users’ funds safe.

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