The global crypto market has shown promising signs of recovery this week despite a rate hike announcement and plans by the Federal Reserve to keep tightening policy.
Bitcoin is on the move, as are several altcoins, suggesting a possible market reversal bull run through the end of the month.
BTC Eyeing Key Upside Break
BTC, alongside most of the other top cryptocurrencies by market capitalization, is sitting in the green week-over-week. While the price of Bitcoin struggled for much of the week to overcome the $40,000 mark, it finally broke through on March 15, followed by a sharp rally on Thursday as the BTCUSD pair eyes a break past the $41,500 mark.
Two events triggered this intraday movement. First, the U.S. Federal Reserve raised the benchmark interest rate by 25 basis points for the first time since 2018.
Second, this week, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy legalized cryptocurrency in the country. The legislation establishes digital assets’ legal status, classification, ownership, and regulatory structure.
Although BTC has struggled to break past resistance at $45,000, it has maintained a slightly ascending trend, paired with frequent bounces from critical support levels. With $760 million worth of BTC options expiring on March 18, market analysts anticipate a sudden change in BTC prices over this weekend.
A recent report from blockchain analytics firm Glassnode indicates that $1.2 billion worth of BTC (31,130 BTC) moved from Coinbase last week — the highest single-week outflow since 2017.
Coins moving out of exchanges where they can readily be liquidated are generally viewed as bullish for overall sentiment, as owners move to hold instead of trade.
Rune Rally Advances
Despite the ongoing price hikes and geopolitical tensions, altcoins are having a dream run. Almost every prominent altcoin has recovered losses and is sitting in the green. THORChain (RUNE) was the top gainer this week, registering a near 70% rally over the past seven sessions.
RUNE has dominated the market throughout this month, gaining as much as 131% to jump from lows of $3.34 to blow past $8. This impressive bull run comes at the heels of the platform’s upcoming launch of THORChain Synthetics and other features.
Among the top altcoins by market capitalization, Polkadot (DOT) has registered almost an 11% gain this week. The DOT token witnessed huge losses since November 2021, but bulls have held their ground.
Earlier this week, blockchain firm Enjin announced the launch of Effinity, Polkadot’s first parachain dedicated to NFTs, which has played a crucial role in helping DOT maintain an upward rally this week.
AAVE, too, outperformed most of its competitors this week, recording an impressive 19% uptick. The platform recently announced the launch of the Aave V3 protocol across the Polygon, Fantom, Harmony, Arbitrum, Avalanche, Optimism, and Ethereum mainnets, which sparked positive buyer sentiment, pushing the token’s value from $115.08 to above $142.
LUNA Loses Its Luster
LUNA has pulled back after weeks of upward momentum, trimming almost 8% this last week. Paired with a more than 21% dip in its 24-hour trading volume, the seventh-largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization is now consolidating below $90.
Earlier this week, the Terra community burned 4 million LUNA tokens to build the platform’s stablecoin reserves. The platform’s total non-LUNA reserves now sit at $2.2 billion with this burn.
Do Kwon, founder of Terraform Labs (TFL) and Terra (LUNA), has announced that his company plans to accumulate $10 billion worth of BTC to add to its stablecoin reserves.
He also agreed to a $1-million bet with Twitter user Senesi Algod, who believes that $88 per coin is possible by this time in 2023. Kwon has also accepted another $10 million bet from Twitter user GCR, who believes LUNA will be at $92.48 a year from now.
Both parties have deposited their funds, a total of $22 million, which is now in an escrow under the care of the UpOnly TV Podcast co-host Crypto Cobie.
The value of Anchor Protocol (ANC), another notable performer from previous weeks, dipped by more than 20% this week. Even though the platform registered a massive surge in overnight trading volume (+41%), ANC is facing extreme resistance near the $3 handle.
Ukraine Launches NFT War Collection
The Ukrainian Ministry of Digital Transformation, in partnership with FRAME, has launched an NFT collection that documents the ongoing war between Russia and Ukraine.
According to Ukraine’s deputy minister of digital transformation, the NFT collection will serve as a true record for current events in chronological order. These NFTs will also be up for auctions to raise funds for Ukraine’s military and humanitarian causes.
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