📣 September 2024 Weekly Update #2

September 2nd to 8th Recap:

▫️ SEC charged crypto advisory firm Galois Capital for custody failures & FTX loses
▫️ BTC ETFs saw $287M record capital outflow on Tuesday
▫️ ZKB the 4th largest bank in Switzerland launched a BTC & ETH trading service
▫️ VanEck announced plan to close down ETH Futures ETF
▫️ WisdomTree requested SEC to withdraw spot ETH ETF S-1 registration filing
▫️ NYAG subpoenaed a16z & Union Square Ventures over UNI investments
▫️ CFTC hit Uniswap with $175k penalty for offering illegal leveraged/margined txs
▫️ Penpie hacked & Pendle paused contracts to secure funds
▫️ EigenLayer revealed Season 2 Stakedrop & 86M EIGEN token distribution plan
▫️ Travala partnered with Skyscanner bringing crypto payments to over 2.2M hotels & 110M monthly users

🔼 Bitcoin Weekly High: $59,655
🔽 Bitcoin Weekly Low: $52,720

🔼 Ethereum Weekly High: $2,549
🔽 Ethereum Weekly Low: $2,174

September 9th to 15th Upcoming Events:

▪️ September 9 - XAI, $6M token unlock
▪️ September 11 - APT, $66M token unlock
▪️ September 11- US Consumer Price Index announcement
▪️ September 15 - STRK, $27M token unlock

*Nota Bene:

September is historically a difficult month for traditional markets and approximately $2.2T of market cap was erased from the S&P 500 across the week. At the same time digital asset investment funds saw around $700M of outflows, the second largest on record, while BTC ETFs saw outflows worth $287M on Tuesday alone, the largest day of outflows since May 1st.

As a result, BTC currently struggles to maintain a price of $55k while the total crypto market cap fluctuates at around $2T. With the Bank of Canada cutting rates by 25 bps and the ECB set to follow suit, fear of a sustained slowdown in the global economy continue to linger. All eyes will be on this week’s US Consumer Price Index announcement on the 11th ahead of the FOMC interest rate decision on the 18th.
With last week’s US unemployment rate announcement of 4.2% falling in-line with expectations, there is a growing sentiment that favorable US CPI numbers will precede the FED announcing a rate cut on the 18th. However, despite this possibility, markets may continue to drop in the meanwhile.

📣 September 2024 Weekly Update #3

September 9th to 15th Recap:

▫️ MicroStrategy acquired 18,300 BTC for $1.11B at $60,408 per BTC
▫️ eToro reached $1.5M settlement with SEC & restricted US trading activity to BTC, BCH, & ETH
▫️ Binance released its 22nd proof of reserves with customer balances worth $36.3B of BTC & $22.1B of USDT
▫️ The SEC expanded its lawsuit against Binance including ATOM, AXS, FIL, MANA, & SAND as unregistered securities
▫️ FTX reached a settlement with Emergent Technologies over $600M worth of disputed Robinhood shares
▫️ Standard Chartered Bank received Dubai crypto custody license & launched crypto custody services in the UAE
▫️ English high court ruled Tether's USDT qualifies as property
▫️ Coinbase launched its Wrapped BTC offering (cbBTC) on Ethereum and Base
▫️ Paypal & Venmo integrated Ethereum Name Service for crypto payments
▫️ Sam Bankman-Fried appealed to overturn his fraud conviction

🔼 Bitcoin Weekly High: $60,599
🔽 Bitcoin Weekly Low: $52,827

🔼 Ethereum Weekly High: $2,455
🔽 Ethereum Weekly Low: $2,171

September 16th to 22nd Upcoming Events:

▪️ September 16 - ARB, $49M token unlock
▪️ September 17 - APE, $11.4M token unlock
▪️ September 18- FOMC interest-rate decision
▪️ September 18/19 - Token 2049 Singapore
▪️ September 22 - ID, $27M token unlock

*Nota Bene:

All eyes are on the Fed’s interest rate decision on Wednesday and market’s may have already begun pricing in a Fed pivot in monetary policy. The S&P 500 was up 2.75% across the week while BTC ETFs recorded inflows of $28.7M on Monday to break eight consecutive days of outflows. This spate of buying hit a peak on Friday as BTC ETFs saw $263M of inflows to close out the week.

With both the Bank of Canada and ECB recently cutting rates by 25 bps speculation has shifted to focus on the size of a potential interest rate cut. JPMorgan and Evercore expect a 50 bps easing by the Fed this coming week, while Goldman Sachs, Bank of America, and Wells Fargo expect a more conservative 25 bps easing. If the Fed reveals a rate cut as expected, analysts will be keeping an eye on whether the announcement turns out to be a sell the news event or more of a long term stimulus for overall bullish market sentiment.

📣 September 2024 Weekly Update #4

September 16th to 22nd Recap:

▫️ MicroStrategy announced proposed private offering of $700M of convertible senior notes & acquired 7,420 BTC for $458.2M at $61,750 per BTC
▫️ SEC approved options on Blackrock spot Bitcoin ETF
▫️ Silvergate Capital, parent co of Silvergate Bank, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy with listed assets between $100M & $500M & liabilities between $10M & $50M
▫️ The Royal Government of Bhutan’s 13k BTC holdings worth over $750M revealed
▫️ Singapore's largest bank, DBS Bank announced launch of OTC crypto services & structured notes for institutional clients in Q4 2024
▫️ Texas Court dismissed Consensys lawsuit against SEC over MetaMask & Ethereum claims
▫️ Commerzbank announced launch of BTC, ETH trading to corporate clients
▫️ Google Cloud released Ethereum-compatible RPC service
▫️ WalletConnect released plan to airdrop 185 million WCT tokens at launch
▫️ Base hit a record 4.5M transactions in 24 hours after cbBTC launch
▫️ Delta Prime DeFi protocol & Banana Gun Telegram bot exploited

🔼 Bitcoin Weekly High: $63,983
🔽 Bitcoin Weekly Low: $57,594

🔼 Ethereum Weekly High: $2,622
🔽 Ethereum Weekly Low: $2,264

September 23rd to 29th Upcoming Events:

▪️ September 23 - U.S. services PMI announcement
▪️ September 24 - PancakeSwap/Eigenpie IFO on Arbitrum
▪️ September 24 -WCT airdrop registration opens
▪️ September 25 - VENOM, $26M token unlock
▪️ September 27- YGG, $6.4M token unlock
▪️ September 28 - AGIX, $5.7M token unlock
▪️ September 29 -CZ's scheduled release date

*Nota Bene:

Prior to the Fed announcement, the general consensus amongst market watchers was that a 25 bps cut was on the cards. The Fed therefore caught many analysts by surprise by opting for an aggressive 50 bps rate cut on Wednesday, stimulating an almost immediate market reaction. Both global and crypto markets traded higher over the week with BTC up by approximately 9% WoW and looking to reclaim $65k.

The sudden sentiment shift saw digital asset investment products experience a second consecutive week of inflows, totalling around $321M, with BTC seeing $284M in inflows. Short traders also got their fingers burnt as over $155M worth of shorts were liquidated during the midweek period as Bitcoin surged by roughly 6% and broke past $63.3k.

BlackRock has announced it is preparing for a potential U.S. dollar crisis, and that the $35T debt pile could see institutions flock to BTC as a hedge with BTC increasingly seen as a unique diversifier against economic risks for both retail and institutional actors. Looking ahead, with the big rate cut announcement in the back mirror and no obvious near-term bearish catalysts, the week ahead could be dictated by a "follow the trend" mindset and the crypto market trading higher.

September 2024 Weekly Update #5

September 23rd to 29th Recap:

▫️ BNY approved by SEC for crypto custody beyond ETFs
▫️ PayPal enabled U.S. merchants to buy, hold & sell cryptos from their business accounts
▫️ The SEC delayed options on BlackRock spot ETH ETF
▫️ TrustToken & TrueCoin reach $340K settlement with SEC over TrueUSD allegations
▫️ Ex Alameda CEO Caroline Ellison received a 2 year prison sentence
▫️ Entities operating Mango Markets trading platform settle with SEC & agree to destroy MNGO tokens
▫️ $300B asset management giant Guggenheim partnered with Zeconomy to tokenize $20M of commercial paper on ETH
▫️ Celestia foundation raised $100M led by Bain Capital Crypto, total amount raised jumped to $155M
▫️ USDC issuer Circle launched compliance platform to enable KYC & travel rule compliance
▫️ Coinbase Ventures-backed Truflation suffered $5M hack

🔼 Bitcoin Weekly High: $66,331
🔽 Bitcoin Weekly Low: $62,808

🔼 Ethereum Weekly High: $2,722
🔽 Ethereum Weekly Low: $2,565

September 30th to October 6th Upcoming Events:

▪️ September 30 to October 2 - Messari Mainnet 2024
▪️ October 1 - SUI, $114M token unlock
▪️ October 2 - ADA, $7.3M token unlock
▪️ October 2 - ENA, $166.7M token unlock
▪️ October 4 - IMX, $53M token unlock
▪️ October 4 - US Unemployment rate announcement

*Nota Bene:

While the S&P 500 moved sideways last week, crypto markets rose with BTC & ETH gaining 3% & 2% respectively. In addition, digital asset investment products saw a third consecutive week of inflows with the total hitting $1.2B. BTC saw inflows of $1B while ETH saw inflows of $87M, breaking its 5-week spell of outflows.

This provides a hint that the market expects continued dovish monetary policy in the US while the US presidential election candidate Kamala Harris' recent quotes imply the campaign is beginning to cozy up to crypto. Considering that, another marginally positive week for digital asset prices remains likely.

With regards to macro factors, last week saw China's larger than expected stimulus news cause Chinese markets to rally while geopolitical tensions escalated in the Middle East following Israeli attacks on Hezbollah, both possible triggers for volatility in the week ahead.

Coming back to crypto, October is a big month in the token world with over $3B worth of tokens hitting the market. Sui kicks things off with over 64M SUI tokens worth around $114M being unlocked on October 1 with 11.3M APT tokens worth $89M dropping on October 11. However, Celestia’s end of the month unlock outweighs them both with the 175.5M TIA token unlock valued at around $1B. These sizable unlocks could also provide a further trigger for volatility over the next seven days.

October Weekly Update #1

September 30th to October 6th Recap:

▫️ Middle East tension caused over $450M of liquidations on Tuesday
▫️ Bitwise filed an S-1 registration with the SEC for a spot XRP ETF
▫️ Coinbase announced the delisting of all EU MiCA non compliant stablecoins by the end of 2024
▫️ Gemini announced the termination of its services to Canadians by December 31
▫️ CFTC approved guidelines allowing tokenized funds to be used as collateral in TradFi transactions
▫️ Robinhood launched crypto transfers for European customers
▫️ The UAE exempted crypto transfers & conversions from value-added tax
▫️ It was revealed that Bitcoin miners' revenue dropped to a yearly low of $816M in September
▫️ Grayscale rolled out an Aave fund
▫️ Aerodrome topped $1B in deposits, taking 1st place for DeFi on Base

🔼 Bitcoin Weekly High: $64,100
🔽 Bitcoin Weekly Low: $60,092

🔼 Ethereum Weekly High: $2,653
🔽 Ethereum Weekly Low: $2,313

October 7th to 13th Upcoming Events:

▪️ October 7 - FTX reorganization plan confirmation hearing
▪️ October 9 - Stacks Nakamoto hard fork
▪️ October 10 - US Inflation Announcement
▪️ October 10 - OP, $13M token unlock
▪️ October 11 - APT, $97.5M token unlock
▪️ October 13 - NEAR, start of 423.68k token unlock per day for 365 days

*Nota Bene:

After experiencing gains last week, rising tensions in the Middle East caused both BTC & ETH to end the week down in price with decreases of around 1% & 4% respectively. The sudden dip in prices early in the week also resulted in over $500M of liquidations over 24 hours on Tuesday.

Digital asset investment products also saw outflows over the week totalling $147M. US BTC ETFs experienced approximately $274M in outflows with US ETH ETFs losing $25M. Interestingly, inflows from Canada & Switzerland into various domestic funds exceeded $77M bringing down the overall outflow total.

With the market now steadily recovering from last week’s dip, the focus returns to US macro factors, & after a strong jobs report last week, next Thursday's US CPI reading is worth tracking closely. This is due to the fact that a higher than expected inflation reading directly lowers the odds of further rate-cuts this year & can be expected to negatively affect market sentiment in the short term.

October Weekly Update #2

October 7th to 13th Recap:

▫️ Delaware judge approved FTX estate’s $16.5B bankruptcy repayment plan
▫️ U.S. Supreme Court ruled that U.S. govt can sell 69,370k silk road BTC worth $4.4B
▫️ Crypto dot com received Wells notice then sued the SEC
▫️ Bitfinex deemed 'sole victim' eligible for return of 120k BTC worth $7.4B
▫️ Mt. Gox extended its repayment deadline for compensation by 1 year, to Oct 31, 2025
▫️ SEC sued Cumberland DRW for operating as unregistered securities dealer
▫️ U.S. District Court charged market makers including Gotbit & ZM Quant for market manipulation & wash trading
▫️ Trump-supported World Liberty Financial announced public token sale on Oct 15 for $300M raise
▫️ Google integrated support for Ethereum Name Service (ENS)
▫️ VanEck launched VanEck Ventures, $30M fintech, digital assets,& AI startup fund
▫️ Uniswap Labs unveiled own Layer-2 network, Unichain, built on Optimism stack
▫️ Optimism launched fifth airdrop, sending 10.3M OP tokens worth $16M to 54,700 addresses
▫️ Arbitrum became first L2 to surpass $200B in swap volume on Uniswap

🔼 Bitcoin Weekly High: $63,743
🔽 Bitcoin Weekly Low: $59,161

🔼 Ethereum Weekly High: $2,482
🔽 Ethereum Weekly Low: $2,347

October 14th to 20th Upcoming Events:

▪️ October 14 - DEEP token launch on Sui
▪️ October 15 - Australia’s 1st spot ETH ETF goes live
▪️ October 15 - STRK, $27M token unlock
▪️ October 15 - EIGEN, $40M token unlock
▪️ October 16 - ARB, $49M token unlock
▪️ October 17 to 19 - ETH Sofia
▪️ October 18 - WalletConnect, WCT airdrop registration closes

*Nota Bene:

A relatively kind US inflation report (2.4% YoY/ 0.2% MoM) gave credence to investors backing a "soft-landing" as markets generally experienced a mixed week. However, BTC recovered from a sluggish start to end the week trading above $63K. Digital asset investment products saw inflows of US$407M, with BTC experiencing inflows totalling US$419M, while ETH saw outflows of just under $10M.

With upcoming Q3 earnings announcements from Taiwan Semiconductors, Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, Charles Schwab, Blackstone, and Amex, markets could continue to trend upwards in the week ahead. However, this of course assumes that there aren't any unexpected negative surprises hiding in the reports. Other key developments to watch out for in the coming week include any fiscal stimulus details released by the government of China and any crypto-related assertions made by either of the US presidential candidates as the election draws near.

October Weekly Update #3

October 14th to 20th Recap:

▫️ SEC cleared all 11 spot BTC ETFs for options trading
▫️ Grayscale filed to convert crypto fund with BTC, ETH & SOL into ETF
▫️ Blockstream secured $210M to expand BTC treasury & drive Layer 2 growth
▫️ Thailand's oldest bank, Siam Commercial Bank (SCB) debuted stablecoin adoption in partnership with Lightnet
▫️ SEC charged creator of Saitama Inu memecoin for unregistered securities & market manipulation
▫️ Kraken launched its Wrapped Bitcoin token kBTC
▫️ Vitalik Buterin presented an updated ETH roadmap focused on layer 2 scaling, wallet security, & data privacy
▫️ Polymarket crossed $1B in monthly trading volume & led Apple US app downloads
▫️ Base became the largest ETH rollup by total value locked, surpassing Arbitrum
▫️ Uniswap revealed to be largest driver of fees on Ethereum L1, generating almost $3B since launching
▫️ Radiant Capital suffered a $51M exploit on its BNB Chain & Arbitrum instances

🔼 Bitcoin Weekly High: $68,872
🔽 Bitcoin Weekly Low: $65,261

🔼 Ethereum Weekly High: $2,708
🔽 Ethereum Weekly Low: $2,560

October 21st to 27th Upcoming Events:

▪️ October 22 - Scroll’s SCR token launch
▪️ October 22 to 23 - Blockchain Life conference in Dubai
▪️ October 22 - ADA, $6.7M token unlock
▪️ October 23 - ENA, $5.3M token unlock
▪️ October 27 - YGG, $7.7M token unlock

*Nota Bene:

As we predicted last week, markets continued their upward trend with BTC & ETH gaining around 10% WoW at the time of writing. The two leading digital assets pulled the market along with them as the total market cap teeters close to $2.5T for the first time since July.

Digital asset investment products saw inflows of $2.2B, the largest weekly increase since July. Interestingly, BTC was the main beneficiary with inflows of $2.13B, while US inflows alone hit $2.3B. Almost every other country saw minor outflows, including Canada, Sweden & Switzerland bringing the total down slightly.

In terms of macro, last week saw the ECB announce a key interest rate cut by 25 basis points to 3.25% & outline continued hope for a "soft landing" which can be taken as a positive for crypto. Looking forward, with no major macro news expected in the week ahead, both Trump & Harris will tour swing states as a final push before the elections to rally support. Any pro-Harris polling indications or breaking news developments could affect crypto market sentiment as Trump is viewed as the more bullish-crypto candidate.

In addition, the U.S. Supreme Court ruling that the U.S. government can sell 69,370k silk road BTC worth $4.4B, alongside Tesla moving its entire 11.5k BTC holdings, worth approximately $760M may lead to some twitchy trading fingers over the coming days.

October Weekly Update #4

October 21st to 27th Recap:

▫️ US government wallet addresses compromised for $20M then recovered
▫️ Stripe announced acquisition of stablecoin platform Bridge in a $1.1B deal
▫️ Pennsylvania passed the Bitcoin Rights bill, protecting BTC self-custody & payment method use
▫️ Microsoft revealed "Assessment of Investing in Bitcoin" voting to occur in a shareholder meeting on Dec 10
▫️ Nigeria court released Binance executive Tigran Gambaryan detained since February
▫️ Kraken announced plan to launch its Ink Layer 2 blockchain in 2025
▫️ Vitalik Buterin presented The Verge phase outline, aimed at full blockchain verification on mobile wallets & smartwatches via Verkle trees & SNARKs use
▫️ Uniswap's permissionless bridging went live across nine networks including ETH, ARB, OP, & Base
▫️ Aerodrome revealed to account for over half of Base’s $1.3B TVL & 58% of Base’s DEX volumes
▫️ Restaked Bitcoin TVL revealed to have surpassed $1B
▫️ Uniswap crossed $2T in all-time volume on Ethereum L1
▫️ GnosisDAO approved launch of new $40M venture fund targeting RWA, crypto infrastructure, & payments

🔼 Bitcoin Weekly High: $$68,679
🔽 Bitcoin Weekly Low: $65,535

🔼 Ethereum Weekly High: $2,679
🔽 Ethereum Weekly Low: $2,387

October 28th to November 3rd Upcoming Events:

▪️ October 30 - TIA, $850M token unlock
▪️ October 31 - Elixir launches Mainnet phase 1
▪️ October 31 -OP, $50M token unlock
▪️ November 1 - US Unemployment report
▪️ November 1 - SUI, $105M token unlock
▪️ November 1 - IMX, 40M token unlock
▪️ November 1 - ZETA, $32M token unlock

*Nota Bene:

Last week proved to be fairly neutral across the markets as the S&P 500 closed around 1% down WoW while the total crypto market cap fluctuated between $2.4T & $2.5T for much of the week despite very strong BTC ETF inflows. Bitcoin attracted around $920M in global inflows with well over $900M inflows into US BTC ETFs alone.

However, with less than 10 days until the US Presidential Election, undoubtedly the biggest price catalyst, all focus has shifted in that direction. Presidential candidates Donald Trump & Kamala Harris appear neck-and -neck as early polling has already begun. While it is difficult to make any kind of definitive judgment based on early polling turnouts, any meaningful consensus forming among analysts and watchers in the week ahead will surely lead to volatility in the crypto markets.

However, this anticipated volatility might lead to some traders reducing exposure to crypto and waiting on the sidelines before a definitive trend emerges which could result in weak price action at the beginning of the week.

In addition, the next seven days could potentially see over $1B in token unlocks led by the TIA unlock on October 30 which represents just over 80% of the circulating supply & is currently worth over $850M.

November Weekly Update #1

October 28th to November 3rd Recap:

▫️ Microstrategy announced plan to raise $42B over next 3 years to buy BTC
▫️ BlackRock’s IBIT saw record 875M of BTC inflows
▫️ Florida's CFO revealed state holds about $800M in crypto related investments
▫️ Canary Capital Group filed Form S-1 for a Solana ETF
▫️ UBS launched uMINT, a tokenized USD Money Market Investment Fund on Ethereum
▫️ Franklin Templeton made its tokenized treasury fund available on Base
▫️ Coinbase announced $1.2B Q3 earnings & $1B share buyback scheme
▫️ Robinhood’s Q3 results revealed 112% YoY surge in crypto trading volume to $14.4B & 165% revenue jump to $61M
▫️ Tether reported a $2.5B Q3 profit Q3, & over $100B of U.S.Treasuries holdings
▫️ Consensys cut 20% of workforce, DYDX CEO laid off 35% of core team
▫️ DeFi fees revealed to have hit a 2024 low of $218M in Sept, down over 50% from $486M in March
▫️ Solana's DEX volume hit a record 168% of Ethereum's mainnet DEX volume as Raydium hit $22.3B in October
▫️ Nillion raised a further $25M to expand 'blind computing'
▫️ 1inch’s front-end got compromised

🔼 Bitcoin Weekly High: $73,274
🔽 Bitcoin Weekly Low: $67,605

🔼 Ethereum Weekly High: $2,716
🔽 Ethereum Weekly Low: $2,417

November 4th to 10th Upcoming Events:

▪️ November 5 - US Presidential Elections
▪️ November 6 - ADA, $6M token unlock
▪️ November 7 - US interest rate announcement
▪️ November 10 - BGB, 6M token unlock

*Nota Bene:

After very bullish price action early on in the week with BTC moving close to its ATH, the market retraced to close out at roughly 3% up WoW. Digital asset investment products saw inflows of $2.2B, which brought year-to-date inflows to a record $29.2B. BTC was the main beneficiary with $2.2B of inflows while ETH only saw $9.5M worth of inflows

After more than a year of the cryptosphere looking forward to the US Presidential election as its big defining bullrun moment, the elections are upon us. Without doubt the week ahead will be volatile, especially on Nov 5 as polling results from the 7 swing states start trickling in on election day. As of now, early polling slightly favors Trump which would be a positive for crypto sentiment as a result of his promises around regulatory clarity & overall positive statements about making the US the center of web3 development, however, the consensus among pollsters is that the election remains too close to call.

November Weekly Update #2

November 4th to 10th Recap:

▫️ Trump elected 47th US president as all 48 crypto PAC backed political candidates won their respective elections
▫️ US presidential winner prediction market crossed $3B on Polymarket day before the election
▫️ BlackRock’s IBIT BTC ETF saw ‘biggest volume day ever’ with $4.1B traded
▫️ Detroit became largest US city to accept crypto payments for taxes & fees
▫️ BTC price volatility resulted in over $600M worth of liquidations on Sunday
▫️ Medical device company Semler Scientific increased holdings by an additional 47 BTC, bringing total to 1,058 coins
▫️ UK pension advisor Cartwright, announced a pioneering 3% BTC allocation ($59M) into a pension scheme investment portfolio
▫️ Anchorage Digital, Galaxy Digital, Kraken, Robinhood, & Paxos introduced their Global Dollar Network (USDG)
▫️ Ethereum Foundation reported $970M treasury with $788M of crypto holdings
▫️ Galaxy Digital announced a net $54M loss in Q3 earnings report
▫️ Tether’s Trade Finance division processed a pioneering $45M Middle Eastern crude oil transaction using USDT
▫️ Coinbase launched cbBTC on the Solana blockchain
▫️ Coinbase gained legal win as a judge ordered the FDIC to release "Operation Chokepoint 2.0" pause letters

🔼 Bitcoin Weekly High: $79,488
🔽 Bitcoin Weekly Low: $67,033

🔼 Ethereum Weekly High: $3,232
🔽 Ethereum Weekly Low: $2,366

November 11th to 17th Upcoming Events:

▪️ November 13 - US Inflation announcement
▪️ November 13 - Maple Finance SYRUP token launch on Maple & SyrupFi
▪️ November 15 - STRK, $32M token unlock
▪️ November 16 - ARB, $60M token unlock
▪️ November 16 - CKB, $20M token unlock
▪️ November 17 - APE, $17.5M token unlock

*Nota Bene:

Unforeseen by many except maybe the most passionate MAGA supporters, Donald Trump swept the US Presidential elections taking both the electoral college vote & the popular vote. In addition, the Republicans took control of the U.S. Senate & are on the brink of retaining control of the U.S. House of Representatives.

This comprehensive & historic victory has led to a feeling of a new dawn in the markets & an upswing in sentiment demonstrated by sustained positive price action as the crypto market rallied by around 23% over the past week to reach a total market cap of approximately $2.82T. Bitcoin unsurprisingly took charge sailing towards $80,000 & accounting for $1.8B of ETF inflows as digital asset investment products saw global inflows of $1.98B.

The euphoria resulted in BlackRock's IBIT ETF seeing its biggest daily trading volume since its inception as over $4.1B in trading took place on November 6. U.S. spot-listed BTC ETFs saw over $620M of net inflows on the same day.

The past week's developments are undoubtedly long-term bullish for the sector, however, a key issue to focus on is whether the bullish price action continues in the week ahead or if traders opt to do some profit-taking after the sudden run up in prices.

November Weekly Update #3

November 11th to 17th Recap:

▫️ US Spot ETH ETFs recorded their highest ever net inflow day, totaling $294.9M on Monday
▫️ MicroStrategy acquired an additional 27,200 BTC for $2.03B at $74,463 per BTC
▫️ 18 U.S. states filed to sue the SEC over unconstitutional overreach & unfair crypto industry persecution
▫️ Trump confirmed ‘DOGE’ efficiency dept led by Musk & Ramaswamy as Dogecoin investors drop $258B lawsuit against Musk
▫️ Pennsylvania House of Representatives introduced bill for Bitcoin Strategic Reserve Act paving the way for the state to hold BTC as a reserve asset
▫️ FBI raided Polymarket CEO's home, seizing phone & electronic devices
▫️ NYSE Arca filed Form 19b-4 to uplist the Bitwise 10 Crypto Index Fund (BITW) as an ETP
▫️ Franklin Templeton expanded its $410M money market fund to Ethereum blockchain
▫️ BlackRock launched BUIDL on Aptos, Arbitrum, Avalanche, Optimism, & Polygon
▫️ VanEck launched SUI ETN offering in Europe
▫️ Canary Capital filed with SEC for pioneering Hedera HBAR spot ETF
▫️ Zero Gravity LAbs (0G Labs) raised $40M seed & secured a further $250M in financing /token purchase commitment
▫️ Portal Ventures raised $75M for fund to invest in pre-seed crypto startups
▫️ Solana Wallet provider Phantom issued emergency iOS update after app reset locked users out of their wallets & required seed recovery phrase

🔼 Bitcoin Weekly High: $93,409
🔽 Bitcoin Weekly Low: $84,717

🔼 Ethereum Weekly High: $3,438
🔽 Ethereum Weekly Low: $3,027

November 18th to 24th Upcoming Events:

▪️ November 19 - Bitwise launches first Aptos Staking ETP on SIX Swiss Exchange
▪️ November 20 - ENA, $7.7M token unlock
▪️ November 20 to 21 - European Web3 Summit 2024
▪️ November 21 - ADA, $13.7M token unlock

*Nota Bene:

Another strong week in crypto markets took place with BTC hitting new highs of $93k before going on to fluctuate at around $89k amid confirmation of the Republican party retaining control of the U.S. House of Representatives.

Digital asset inflows hit $2.2B last week with BTC ETFs amassing $1.48B in global inflows while ETH ETFs had an even stronger week, going on to post record inflow numbers. US spot ETH ETFs experienced their highest net inflow day on record on Monday, totaling $294.9M while global ETH ETF inflows hit $646M for the week.

With the US inflation data coming in higher at 2.6% YoY rather than the expected 2.4% & given the relative general strength of financial markets & US economy, Fed Chair Jerome Powell outlined a likely slow-down in further rate cuts which is bearish for crypto near-term. While the week ahead sees no specific price action catalysts, the strength of the rally since the Nov. 6 election will make traders & investors wary of betting against the trend.

November Weekly Update #4

November 18th to 24th Recap:

▫️ MicroStrategy acquired an additional 51,780 BTC for $4.6B at $88,627 per BTC & completed a $3B offering of convertible notes at 0% coupon & 55% conversion premium
▫️ BlackRock BTC ETF options went live & experienced just under $1.9B in notional exposure traded via 354k contracts on launch day
▫️ Cantor Fitzgerald negotiated a $600M deal to acquire a 5% ownership interest in Tether
▫️ Over $450M was liquidated as BTC hit a new ATH, surpassing $97,600
▫️ Cboe announced intention to launch first spot BTC cash-settled options product on Monday, December 2
▫️ SEC Chair Gary Gensler announced intention to depart agency on January 20
▫️ Bitwise registered Solana ETF in Delaware & CBOE received 21Shares & VanEck Solana ETF filings
▫️ Bitfinex Securities & NexBridge launched tokenized US T-Bill offering under El Salvador's legal framework
▫️ The SEC lost “crypto” broker-dealer rule lawsuit in US District Court
▫️ Binance introduced BFUSD, a yield-bearing “stablecoin” offering 19.55% APY
▫️ Polymarket blocked French users after scrutiny over US Presidential Election betting
▫️ Grayscale BTC ETF options went live with trading opened for $GBTC & $BTC
▫️ Bitcoin mining difficulty reached a new ATH of 102.29T
▫️ Coinbase announced 4.7% APY reward for USDC holders using Coinbase Wallet
▫️ MetaMask launched token swaps not requiring ETH to pay fees

🔼 Bitcoin Weekly High: $99,421
🔽 Bitcoin Weekly Low: $90,458

🔼 Ethereum Weekly High: $3,482
🔽 Ethereum Weekly Low: $3,038

November 25th to December 1st Upcoming Events:

▪️ November 26 - Starknet launch STRK staking on mainnet
▪️ November 26 - WalletConnect 185M WCT airdrop
▪️ November 26 - ADA, $18.5M token unlock
▪️ November 29 - IMX, $41M token unlock
▪️ November 30 - OP, $75M token unlock
▪️ November 30 - 1INCH, $39M token unlock
▪️ December 1 - SUI, $205M token unlock

*Nota Bene:

Crypto showed sustained strength this week with BTC taking out new ATH's before hitting $99k & then retracing back to $94k at the time of writing. Digital asset investment products experienced a record breaking week with the largest ever weekly inflows of $3.13B. BTC accounted for the vast majority of the total recording $3B of inflows, & inflows into US BTC ETFs actually surpassed $3.2B with European outflows bringing the global total down slightly.

Signs of the current bullish sentiment are everywhere from Donald Trump appointing pro-crypto hedge fund manager Scott Bessent as Treasury Secretary to the Solana-based Phantom wallet becoming the 2nd highest-ranked app under the Utilities category in the U.S. Apple App Store, trailing behind Google.

To cap it off, the Crypto Fear & Greed Index hit 94 signalling “Extreme Greed” on Friday, the highest level since February 2021. US Thanksgiving in the week ahead means fewer trading days & lighter volumes in the traditional markets which often results in higher volatility which can bleed into crypto markets. All eyes will be locked on to whether the week ahead will see BTC breaking the $100k barrier or whether bears will take temporary control as things cool off in the short term to provide a break from the sustained bullish activity.

December Weekly Update #1

November 25th to December 1st Recap:

▫️ MicroStrategy acquired an additional 55,500 BTC for $5.4B at $97,862 per BTC
▫️ BTC price fluctuations led to over $500M in liquidations over 24 hours at the start of the week
▫️ US court ruled that sanctions against Tornado Cash smart contracts are unlawful
▫️ Russia approves crypto law recognizing digital assets as property
▫️ BTC mining company MARA Holdings purchased $615M worth of BTC, increasing total holdings to 34,794 BTC
▫️ Celsius Network began 2nd distribution of $127M to eligible creditors, offering 60.4% recovery rate
▫️ Youtube competitor Rumble announced plan to allocate up to $20M of excess cash reserves to BTC
▫️ Bitwise 10 Crypto Index ETF filed with The SEC
▫️ OKX exchange published its 25th Proof of Reserves (PoR) report, detailing $26.61B of total reserve assets
▫️ Crypto fund issuer Valour launched 1st DOGE ETP on Sweden's Spotlight Stock Market
▫️ Total stablecoin value reached new ATH at just under $200B
▫️ The combined on-chain DEX volume across 23 chains reached an ATH of $16.8B using the seven-day moving average
▫️ Solana’s monthly DEX volume surpassed $100B for the first time
▫️ CowSwap DEX’s monthly volume revealed to have hit a new ATH in November of $5.3B
▫️ Coinbase announced end of USDC rewards for holders in the EEA due to MiCA regulation with rewards accruing until November 30
▫️ MetaMask users experienced connection problems due to outage at RPC provider Infura

🔼 Bitcoin Weekly High: $98,652
🔽 Bitcoin Weekly Low: $91,035

🔼 Ethereum Weekly High: $3,735
🔽 Ethereum Weekly Low: $3,277

December 2nd to 8th Upcoming Events:

▪️ December 3 - EIGEN, $5M token unlock
▪️ December 3 - Kaspa TN11 Hard Fork
▪️ December 4 - ENA, $10M token unlock
▪️ December 6 - US unemployment rate announcement
▪️ December 6 - ADA, $22M token unlock
▪️ December 7 - JTO, $465M token unlock

*Nota Bene:

BTC opened up the week with a sudden pull back followed by a rebound to $96k which triggered a raft of liquidations before going on to close at 2% down WoW. This matched broader markets & with a shortened trading week BTC experienced significant institutional selling. Globally, BTC ETFs saw outflows of US$457M, the first significant outflows since early September which appears to highlight some apprehension/profit taking as BTC tests the psychological $100k barrier.

Despite this, digital asset investment products still experienced $270M of inflows fueled by ETH attracting inflows of $634M, outdoing BTC for the first time & bringing year-to-date inflows to $2.2B. Ethereum's strong price action (8% up WoW) highlighted the shift in sentiment & the overall bullishness around crypto is apparent with corporations across the world either committing to or executing BTC purchases for their corporate treasuries. With more corporations carrying out their 2025 strategic planning, the week ahead could see more positive announcements around institutional digital asset inclusions setting the stage for a big December.

December Weekly Update #2

December 2nd to 8th Recap:

▫️ MicroStrategy acquired an additional 15,400 BTC for $1.5B at $95,976 per BTC
▫️ BTC broke $100K & price fluctuations led to over $1B in liquidations over 24 hours on Thursday
▫️ Trump nominated Paul Atkins as SEC Chair & named former PayPal COO David Sacks as White House AI & Crypto Czar
▫️ Coinbase announced launch of Apple Pay crypto purchases
▫️ The Czech Republic decided to exempt BTC holdings over 3 years from capital gains tax
▫️ BTC mining company MARA proposed $700M convertible senior note offering to buy more BTC
▫️ Former Celsius CEO Mashinsky plead guilty in US fraud case
▫️ Coinbase obtained letters revealing U.S. regulator FDIC told banks to avoid crypto companies
▫️ Grayscale filed for Solana ETF with NYSE
▫️ US govt moved $1.9B worth of BTC to Coinbase wallets & Mt. Gox moved $2.4B in BTC to unknown address
▫️ November revealed as record month for U.S. spot BTC ETFs as net inflows hit $6.1B
▫️ Pudgy Penguins announced release of PENGU token
▫️ Total stablecoin value reached new ATH at just under $200B
▫️ The combined on-chain DEX volume across 23 chains reached an ATH of $16.8B using the seven-day moving average
▫️ Solana’s SDK suffered breach resulting in compromised private keys & stolen funds

🔼 Bitcoin Weekly High: $103,551
🔽 Bitcoin Weekly Low: $94,035

🔼 Ethereum Weekly High: $4,089
🔽 Ethereum Weekly Low: $3,555

December 9nd to 15th Upcoming Events:

▪️ December 9 - BGB, $15M token unlock
▪️ December 10 - EIGEN, $6M token unlock
▪️ December 11 - ENA, $13M token unlock
▪️ December 11- APT, $162M token unlock
▪️ December 11 - US Inflation Announcement
▪️ December 15 - STRK, $41M token unlock

*Nota Bene:

After a prolonged period of testing, BTC finally crossed $100k this week, stimulating positive sentiment & generating significant interest in the future of both BTC & the digital asset space in general. Large buys by Microstrategy & MARA in addition to “crypto-friendly” announcements by the US govt regarding key recruitment positions possibly provided the impetus for the move up to $103k.

Digital asset investment products saw the largest weekly inflows ever with $3.85B flowing in. BTC saw inflows of $2.5B setting a new record while ETH saw its largest weekly inflows ever worth $1.2B. The positive sentiment also bled into DeFi with DEX trading volumes reaching new highs & the total value locked (TVL) for lending protocols reaching a new ATH of $54B.
BTC making the mainstream news will result in much stronger institutional interest in the mid to long term but may also result in both retail & institutions FOMO buying up assets in the week ahead. However, bears have been warning of a pullback for weeks, & it will be worth keeping an eye on which digital assets show strong price action over the week ahead.