Market Update, 7th July 2022
Bitcoin Tourist Season is Over…Only the Hardest of all HODLers Remain!
As Bitcoin dips below the $20,000 mark yet again and the Fear and Greed Index remains at “Extreme Fear”, the only ones now accumulating BTC seem to be the long term HODLers, those who are Dollar Cost Averaging (DCA’ing) their way into the market after significant losses and the Whales. Oh those Whales! But the Shrimps are still going - not the paper handed ones, but the ones that truly believe in BTC and will get in and stay in the game, no matter what.
According to Glassnode, “the balances of shrimps — those holding less than 1 BTC, and whales — those with 1,000 to 5,000 BTC, were ‘increasing meaningfully.’
Shrimps, in particular, see the current Bitcoin prices as attractive and are accumulating it at a rate of almost 60,500 BTC per month, which Glassnode says is “the most aggressive rate in history,” equivalent to 0.32% of the BTC supply per month. (source, Cointelegraph)
Image Credit: HellHeaven cryptoart.expert
In an asset roundup by the Independent Reserve, the S&P 500 has fallen 20.6% so far in 2022 for the worst start to a year since 1962, Tesla had to write down its AU$2.2B (US$1.5B) Bitcoin purchase by AU$640M (US$440 million) at the end of the quarter, there are now 22 failed stablecoins after FlexUSD collapsed and more than 80,000 Bitcoin millionaires have been wiped out since the ATH in November last year. All this and yet the epic lows have still seen the number of "wholecoiners" (those owning 1 whole BTC) reach up to 860,000.
IR: BlockFi, which had to liquidate a US$1 billion (AU$1.45B) loan to Three Arrows Capital, will live to fight another day. CEO Zac Prince said the platform has a deal with FTX for a US$400M (AU$581M) line of credit, enabling FTX to buy the lending platform for US$240M (AU$349M). Voyager, Vauld and CoinLoan have all suspended withdrawals while Genesis Trading is reportedly facing hundreds of millions in losses. Celsius is busily paying off loans left right and centre in an attempt to avoid bankruptcy and get itself operational again. 3AC itself has been ordered into liquidation by a British Court and filed Chapter 15 bankruptcy in the US. Hilariously, 3AC filed its own application for liquidation and attempted to make founder Su Zhu one of the debtors it owed money to. On the upside, JPMorgan strategist Nikolaos Panigirtzoglou believes the rapid and traumatic wave of deleveraging is coming to an end.
Quick Fire Updates
Peter Schiff’s Puerto Rican bank closure highlights why Bitcoin is crucial for financial freedom, as the nascent asset class has already helped nearly 4 million unbanked in El Salvador to gain banking facilities.
Cardano (ADA) is set to launch its “Vasil” upgrade soon. The doubters are still watching with a keen eye because the smart contracts on Cardano are still functioning poorly.
Ethereum’s Merge is set for September and analysts are bullish on ETH. Gas fees are as low as they were back in December 2020 and there is hope for a surge in ETH’s price, which is $1,050.665 at the time of writing. A twitter thread by odin-free.eth on bullish action, post-merge.
BTC price downside still tipped to continue - ARK Invest’s position echoes those of various market commentators. “Trading below these levels [70% of ATH] s atypical and suggests extremely oversold conditions. Only four times in history has bitcoin traded below price levels relative to these means.”.
As Cointelegraph continues to report, consensus is building around a drop to around $16,000, with the majority of on-chain indicators already at lows seen either rarely or never before.Elon Musk’s tunnel construction firm The Boring Company (TBC) has begun allowing customers to pay for rides on its Las Vegas transit system using Dogecoin (DOGE)
Days after pausing trading, withdrawals and deposits, crypto exchange Voyager Digital is filing for bankruptcy under Chapter 11 in the Southern District Court of New York.
Voyager’s Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing indicated that it is on the hook for anywhere from $1 billion to $10 billion in assets to more than 100,000 creditors.
Celsius still walking the tightrope of insolvency after extreme market conditions triggered historic losses across multiple positions. The firm paused withdrawals in mid-June due to extreme market conditions and later brought on new legal counsel to advise on restructuring. Rewards are still being paid out to customers, although withdrawals of these rewards are currently paused.
“PennyWise”, a crypto-stealing malware spreads through YouTube - read more about that and how to avoid being affected, here.
Circle's USDC on track to topple Tether USDT as the top stablecoin in 2022
New investment opportunity? “Ethereum Name Service registrations surge by 200% amid lower gas fees” - ENS domain registrations went from 11,042 to 29,727, as the domain “000.eth” was bought for 300 ETH (say whaaaat???!!!).