The lead to the verdict of Bitcoin (BTC) exchange-traded funds (ETFs) by the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) until their eventual approval showed a bullish trajectory for the world’s leading cryptocurrency by market cap. However, it turned out that $49K was the top of the mountain as it all went downhill after a “sell the news” event. Now, FUD is going around as the usual Bitcoin bashers are saying that the digital asset is finally losing its grip in the market.
Bitcoin Now
As of 4:45 AM UTC this Saturday, Bitcoin is trading around the $41,800 level and over 4% up on the 24-hour chart. Interestingly, the trading volume of the crypto spiked more than 37% during this period as $25.17 billion worth of BTC changed hands between wallets and exchanges.
With the current market cap at $820.64 billion, the statistics indicate a 3% volume/market cap ratio for BTC. This metric shows the stability of the asset and the ease of trading it close to its value.
The same timeframe saw Bitcoin find a low of $39,902 and a peak of $42,209. The crypto asset is nearly 15% down since it topped in on January 11 this year.
Grayscale and US Dump
One of the key narratives driving negative market sentiments is the continuing Bitcoin dump of Grayscale. At the start of the weekend, the Bitcoin ETF issuer’s massive sell-off had already hit $5 billion as it let go 123,923 BTC. The latest was the 10,923 BTC it moved to Coinbase Prime Deposit to the tune of $449 million.
Another event that shills is capitalizing on is the upcoming sale of the US Government of 2,399 BTC. That’s approximately $100 million worth of Bitcoin seized from the Silk Road crackdown.
Is It Really Over? (Not a Financial Advice)
These are pretty staggering figures at present values. But come to think of it, the total of these supplies only makes up 0.64% out of the 19.61 million BTC in circulation.
Sure, these dribbles would send ripples into the market, but these are not enough to destabilize or crash it. These figures are not even at par with the sum held by Michael Saylor’s MicroStrategy at 189,150 BTC, which is nearly 1% of all Bitcoin we have before the coming halving. That’s not even mentioning whales, including other established institutional powerhouses that are aggressively hoarding its supply like BlackRock and Fidelity using the proceeds of their Bitcoin ETFs and investments in Bitcoin mining firms.
If you are paperhanding your way in the current situation, then it probably is over for you. But then again, if you keep your diamond hands in your game, there’s a big chance that you will hit the jackpot as Bitcoin is about to hit a major milestone.
We are at a critical juncture for Bitcoin right now as the halving nears. But as history has shown, Bitcoin halvings have never failed to drive a sense of scarcity and more demand for the coin, which in turn have resulted in rising prices.
Analysts are super bullish on the upcoming event, and some like Aaron Arnold of Altcoin Daily even predicted Bitcoin’s push to over $100K one-year post-halving. These, however, do not account for any untoward circumstances or hype that may change public sentiment. Nonetheless, it can’t be denied that the after-effects of the affair would be profound.