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Bitcoin Crypto News Markets Trading

Crypto Exchange Volumes Rise 37% In May 2021 To US$2.2 Trillion

Binance Adds Apple (AAPL) as Fourth Stock Token

Last month, major cryptocurrency exchanges recorded a massive volume of over $2.2 trillion USD, despite the recent drops in the price of cryptocurrencies.

The volume in May represents over a 37 percent increase compared to the previous month (April – $1.66 trillion USD), according to the data from TheBlock shown below.

Crypto Exchange Volume is up 132% YTD

Following the data, crypto exchange volume has increased by 132 percent compared to the January record of $977.79 billion USD, and over 2,000 percent compared to the record of $107 billion in May last year. In February, crypto exchanges made their first +$1.2 trillion volume, which has been on the rise for four consecutive months.

The leading crypto-to-crypto exchange, Binance, recorded over $1.5 trillion volume, which is about 66 percent of the total volume in May. Coinbase recorded the largest volume amongst fiat-to-crypto exchanges. Coinbase gained about $201 billion USD, which is approximately nine percent of the entire volume last month.

Judging by the growing trend, exchange volume is likely to increase further this month.

Bitcoin Futures Volumes Also On The Rise

Likewise, derivative exchanges also recorded an increase in Bitcoin Futures trading volume for the past month. The volume precisely increased by 48 percent in May, led by OKEx, which gained over 48 percent in BTC Futures volume, followed by Binance (+42%), FTX (+38%).

Huobi and Deribit gained about 36 percent in volume, while BitMEX lost four percent.  

At the time of writing, open interest in Bitcoin Futures totaled $11.25 billion USD, with the price of the underlying asset at $35,962 USD.

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Crypto News Cryptocurrencies Investing Markets Trading

Angry and Upset Crypto Traders Take To Reddit

May has been definitely one of the craziest and most volatile months for the crypto market so far in 2021.

There are several possible reasons why the market has shaken so much. The previous bull run attracted new traders and investors entering the crypto world, sometimes without any proper training and buying at the top of the market.

With so much happening, some crypto traders have taken their stories to Reddit, especially sharing their frustrations and to blow off some steam.

Some Lost Everything

Some traders were hit hard by the crypto crash — seeing even 50% of their portfolio vanished, losing life savings, the chance to pay their houses, car, or even rent.

One user shared his story on how he and his wife lost 50% in their total investments, and now they can’t buy a car and their dreams of being homeowners will be put on hold — and to complete the picture, they have a baby incoming.

However, despite the adversity, they still don’t plan to sell.

She was upset, but she said we shouldn’t sell for a loss, and just to keep holding for the next few years and act as if the money doesn’t exist. […] Remember, if you do all the investing, that means you did all the losing. Don’t deny this.

A Reddit user

Some are Staying Optimistic

One trader said the crypto crash came amid an already rough month for him. Despite the adversity, he incited everyone in the community to not let themselves go in a downward spiral if they’re going through a similar situation. “Remember to consider the good things in life first before dwelling on depressing news and events”, he said.

Excited for crypto to change the world for the better, just going to take a little bit longer than we want but the good things always take patience and especially this year, I am trying to be as patient as any sane person in these tumultuous times.

A Reddit user

Some traders believe the current situation is an opportunity for everyone that wants to join the crypto space but thought they were already too late. One user bought ETH when it was priced around $120 USD. However, he emphasised the difficulty of buying the dip especially when there’s a lot of FUD (Fear, Uncertainty, Doubt) going on and the markets are in red, adding “it takes courage to buy dips”.

The thing I’m trying to say is that it’s impossible to time the market, but don’t call people who buy at dips ‘lucky’. It takes courage to buy at long time lows, not knowing if the market is going to back up. It’s much easier in hindsight, during a bull run. Remember this.

A Reddit user

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Bitcoin Crypto News Markets

Open Interest in Bitcoin Drops to $12.9 Billion as BTC Plunged to Almost $30,000 USD

Bitcoins on ladder chart cryptocurrency background concept
Bitcoins on ladder chart cryptocurrency background concept https://www.dreamstime.com/bitcoins-ladder-chart-cryptocurrency-background-concept-image112362966

Open interest in Bitcoin (BTC) has dropped significantly following the massive decline in the price of the leading cryptocurrency within the past 24 hours.

Open Interest in BTC Drops Below $13 Billion USD

On Wednesday, the price of Bitcoin dropped to about $32,000 USD as more people sold off their holdings. This drop brought the market capitalisation of the cryptocurrency below $640 billion USD, according to data on CoinMarketCap. BTC’s drop to $32,000 USD also affected many investment products tied to it, including the futures markets.

Open interest in Bitcoin futures has dropped to about $12.9 billion USD (about 386k BTC) at the time of writing, amid the declining value of the underlying crypto asset. This represents a -25.89 percent change over the last 24 hours. Binance accounts for $2.93 billion USD of the open interest in BTC, followed by CME ($1.58 billion), and Deribit ($1.46 billion), according to the market data from ByBt.

BTC Futures Open Interest Chart [ByBt]

Over $3 Billion USD in BTC Liquidated

Many Bitcoin traders got over-leveraged as the cryptocurrency dropped to almost $30,000 USD. As per ByBt, about $3.57 billion USD worth of Bitcoin has been liquidated over the past 24 hours. This affected traders on derivatives exchanges with a long position.

Total BTC Liquidations by ByBt

While there could have been multiple reasons for BTC price crash, it’s also worth noting that Bitcoin is not the only cryptocurrency affected in this bear market. In fact, the market capitalization of cryptocurrencies dropped further to about $1.5 trillion USD, as Bitcoin tanked, followed by other major altcoins, including Ethereum (ETH), Binance Coin (BNB), Dogecoin (DOGE) and many more.

Open interest in Ethereum also dropped by 30 percent to $6.67 billion USD, during the time of writing.

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Binance Coin Bitcoin Crypto News Cryptocurrencies Dogecoin Ethereum Litecoin Markets Ripple

Top 10 Cryptos Prices in 2016 vs 2021

Crypto prices and market caps, 2016 (left) vs 2021 (right)
Crypto prices and market caps, 2016 (left) vs 2021 (right) [CoinMarketCap]

A lot has changed in the cryptocurrency market over the past five years. There have been many coin ranking reshuffles, with massive growth in the global market capitalization as more people got to know and invest in digital currencies.

Back in 2016, the top-ten digital currencies by market capitalization (according to data from CoinMarketCap) and their corresponding prices were:

  1. Bitcoin (BTC) at $455.25 USD
  2. Ethereum (ETH) at $9.82 USD
  3. Ripple (XRP) at $0.006069 USD
  4. Litecoin (LTC) at $3.98 USD
  5. Dash (DASH) at $6.89 USD
  6. DigixDAO (DGD) at $12.17 USD
  7. Dogecoin (DOGE) at $0.000233 USD
  8. MaidSafeCoin (MAID) at $0.052008 USD
  9. NEM (XEM) at $0.001491 USD
  10. FedoraCoin (TIPS) at $0.000029 USD

At the time, Bitcoin was only a three-digit price cryptocurrency ($455 USD), with a total market valuation of $7.075 billion USD. Also, Ethereum was less than $10 USD, while XRP traded around $0.006 USD, according to data from CoinMarketCap.

Crypto prices and market caps, 2016 (left) vs 2021 (right)
Crypto prices and market caps, 2016 (left) vs 2021 (right) [CoinMarketCap]

As of May 2016, the global cryptocurrency market capitalization was $8.449 billion USD.

Crypto total market capitalization [CoinMarketCap]

The Crypto Market is up by Over 29,000% Since 2016

Fast forward to today, the crypto market has seen immense growth of over 29,000 percent in the market cap – in other words, more than 290 times. The total valuation of global cryptocurrencies now sits around $2.47 trillion USD compared to $8.4 billion USD cap in the past five years. This follows the wake of more retail and institutional investors.

The leading cryptocurrency Bitcoin (BTC) saw over a 12,300 percent increase from 2016 to date, with a market capitalization of over $1 trillion USD. This means that a $100 USD investment in BTC over the past five years would be worth more than $12,000 USD in today’s value. At the same time, the second-largest cryptocurrency Ethereum (ETH) surged by over 41,000 percent, which is a much higher return compared to Bitcoin.

Some of the top-ten coins in 2016 are no longer ranking high on the list today, including DigixDAO and FedoraCoin. It remains to be seen how the list will change in the next five years. Do you think Bitcoin and Ethereum can be overthrown by the likes of Binance Coin (BNB) or even Dogecoin (DOGE)?

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Binance Crypto News Investing Markets

Binance Adds Apple (AAPL) as Fourth Stock Token

Binance Adds Apple (AAPL) as Fourth Stock Token

Cryptocurrency exchange Binance listed the tokenized version of Apple stock (AAPL) on its new “stock token” market. At the moment, the crypto exchange supports four stock tokens for trading on its platform.

Binance is Bringing the Stock Market Closer to Crypto

Binance confirmed the listing of the Apple stock in a tweet on Wednesday, which means crypto users interested in buying AAPL can now access it in the form of a token. These stock tokens are pegged in the ratio of 1:1 to the underlying stock. Holders of these tokens will qualify for economic returns on the underlying shares, as well as potential dividends.

At the time of writing, the AAPL token was trading at the price of $133.51 USD, which represents about a 0.60 percent decrease over the last 24 hours.

Binance Stock Tokens are tokens of stocks (i.e., shares of public companies) that trade on traditional stock exchanges. Each Stock Token represents one ordinary share of the relevant stock. These Stock Tokens are fully backed by a depository portfolio of underlying securities held by CM-Equity AG, Germany (“CM-E”).

Binance

Binance Now Supports Four Stock Tokens

So far, the crypto exchange supports four stock tokens, which include Apple (AAPL), MicroStrategy (MSTR), Coinbase (COIN), and Tesla (TSLA). Binance is open to tokenizing more stocks on its new market. On Friday, the exchange will list Microsoft stock (MSFT) tokens for trading, according to an announcement earlier this week.

All these coins are available for trading with Binance’s USD-backed stablecoin, BUSD.

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Bitcoin Crypto News Market Analysis Markets

ASX Prices Climb as Bitcoin Price Plummets On Anzac Weekend

ASX Prices Climb as Bitcoin Price Plummets On Anzac Weekend
A board displaying stock prices is seen at the Australian Securities Exchange (ASX) in Sydney, Australia, February 9, 2018. REUTERS/David Gray

Over the weekend, Australia’s leading share market index S&P/ASX 200 saw a notable increase in price. Interestingly, the gains in ASX coincides with Anzac Day public holiday. This raises some questions on whether the increase in the Aussie market was related to the nation’s remembrance day.

Meanwhile, the leading cryptocurrency Bitcoin (BTC) declined within the week, while the S&P/ASX 200 gained.

Anzac-ASX Market Move

The 25th of April is the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps (ANZAC) Day, dedicated to commemorate the soldiers “who served and died in all wars, conflicts, and peacekeeping operations”, especially those in the Gallipoli Campaign during World War I.

It seems Aussie traders and investors got optimistic about Anzac Day as S&P/ASX 200 increased by almost one percent in two days leading up to the remembrance day.

ASX 200 chart. Source: Market Index

Within the same period, Bitcoin declined by over three percent from $51,739 USD on Friday to $50,052 USD on Sunday.

Bitcoin price chart. Source: Coinmarketcap

ASX Drops 0.2% on Monday

On Monday though, the Australian share market lost some points. The ASX/S&P 200 dropped by about 0.2 percent of its opening value. The market closed at 7045.6 points, according to data from Market Index. The drop may be attributed to the fact that there was a low trading volume on the market.

ASX 200 chart. Source: Market Index

Bitcoin, however, gained some points on Monday. At the time of writing, it was trading at $53,772 USD on CoinMarketCap, which represents about an 8.11 percent increase over the past 24 hours. Bitcoin maintains a market capitalization above $1 trillion USD.

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Bitcoin Bitcoin Mining Crypto News Markets

939,185 Leveraged Traders Lose Big In The $10 Billion Liquidations Caused By The Latest Bitcoin Dip

On 18 April 2021 Bitcoin experienced one of the greatest dips in its history, bringing much of the crypto market down with it. Nearly one million traders’ accounts were liquidated in about an hour due to the downward spike.

According to the data on CoinMarketCap, the total market capitalization of cryptocurrencies around the world went down by about $310 billion in less than 24 hours, shrinking the market from more than $2.2 trillion to less than $1.9 trillion.

Xinjiang Grid Blackouts to blame?

A coal mine explosion in Xinjiang on April 10, caused blackouts and took days to tank bitcoin’s hash rate. The hashrate plummeted from an all-time high above 215 exahash per second on Wednesday to about 120 exahash per second early Sunday.

Since April 15, the Bitcoin network hashrate has dropped more than 49% after touching an all-time high at 218 exahash per second. Regional reports noted that in China the Xinjiang grid is having blackouts and “safety inspections.”

Popular market analyst Willy Woo shares that the Bitcoin hashrate and its price have always been correlated. And thus, following the blackout in Xinjiang, yesterday’s price action followed the collapse in the BTC hashrate.

China Mining Dominance

Following these events, some have even questioned if there isn’t an over-reliance on mining efforts from China. Since about 50% of the hashrate comes from China, if something more serious had to happen it could have serious effects on the global Bitcoin network.

An increase in global Bitcoin mining efforts will reduce the odds of such a hashrate collapse. In the U.S., mining firms are one of the targets of the new bill released in Kentucky. Lawmakers have approved a bill that proposed tax breaks for mining operations set up in the state. One of the proposals in the bill was the removal of the tax duty of electricity for Bitcoin mining.

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Crypto News Ethereum Markets Regulation

Three Management Firms Cleared To Open Ethereum ETFs in Canada

On Friday CI Global Asset Management, Purpose Investments Inc., and Evolve Funds have received clearance from Ontario Securities Commission to launch Ethereum exchange traded funds (ETFs) in Canada.

These ETFs will be available on Toronto’s Stock Exchange (TSX), which will allow retail investors in Canada to invest directly into the digital asset from 20 April 2021. Ethereum (ETH), which is currently the second-largest cryptocurrency by market capitalisation, is the obvious next choice for institutions looking to get their feet wet in the crypto economy.

While Bitcoin tends to get a lot of attention as it was the first major cryptocurrency, what ether and the Ethereum ecosystem represent is one of the most exciting new technology visions today in society

Som Seif, founder and CEO of Purpose Investments

Three Ethereum ETFs in One Day

All three of these funds were cleared on Friday:

The CI Galaxy Ethereum ETF will trade in Canadian dollars (ETHX.B, unhedged) and in U.S. dollars (ETHX.U). CI GAM is the manager of the ETF and Galaxy Digital Asset Management (“GDAM”) will be the sub-advisor.

Purpose Investments is the manager of Purpose Ether ETF and Ether Capital Corporation will consult. The ETH will be kept in cold storage with Gemini acting as the sub-custodian and CIBC Mellon Global Securities acting as the fund administrator. 

The approval comes a little over two months after Canada approved the Purpose Bitcoin ETF which held 10,064 BTC in the first week of trading.

Purpose ETF is designed to provide investors with exposure to ether by investing directly in physically settled ether. The ETF will offer three classes of units: Canadian dollar currency hedged units (ETHH), Canadian dollar non-currency hedged units (ETHH.B) and U.S. dollar units with ticker units (ETHH.U).

Evolve Funds stated that “similar to Bitcoin, investors will now be able to trade Ether as simple as buying shares through their bank or brokerage.” Evolve’s ETF will trade on the TSX as ETHR.

Canada Crypto Rush

Earlier this year Canada had also approved Bitcoin ETFs. Two of which broke records with their trading volumes: Purpose trading $80 million in its first hour and Evolve raised $421 million in just two days. With the now soon-to-be open Ethereum ETFs, mainstream crypto adoption is warming up in Canada.

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Coinbase Crypto News Markets

Coinbase Shares Finally Debut on NASDAQ at $381 per COIN

Coinbase Shares Finally Debut on NASDAQ at $381 per COIN

Coinbase, the leading United States cryptocurrency exchange, has finally launched on NASDAQ, with a 50 percent increase in the share price.

Coinbase Valuation Has Surpassed $100 Billion

The Coinbase Shares (ticker symbol COIN) began trading on the stock exchange on Wednesday at the market price of $381 USD. This is about 50 percent higher than the reference price set by the exchange on Tuesday. At 1:31 PM, New York time, the shares’ price exploded to as high as $403 USD, bringing Coinbase’s valuation to over $100 billion shortly after the market debut.

COIN performance so far ranked the exchange as the 142nd largest company in the globe, according to data from Companies Market Cap.

We’ve had a number of ups and downs on our way here. Through luck and skill, Coinbase succeeded where many predicted it would fail. […] Today’s listing is a milestone, but it’s not as important as every new day in front of us. Coinbase has an ambitious mission: to increase economic freedom in the world.

Brian Armstrong, Co-founder, and CEO of Coinbase

Industry Reaction to COIN Listing on NASDAQ

Coinbase listing on the stock market has been one of the most-discussed topic in the cryptocurrency space, as it marks the first-ever crypto company to go public. Instead of choosing the traditional initial public offering (IPO) route, the exchange direct-listed on NASDAQ, meaning the exchange will issue its existing shares rather than offering new ones.

Many crypto enthusiasts and companies reacted positively to the development today. Binance has announced it will list the Coinbase stock tokens after the stock market debut.

The author of Rich Dad Poor Dad, Robert Kiyosaki, also commented on the milestone, saying that Coinbase listing will bring more credibility to the crypto market.

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Crypto News Markets Ripple Trading

XRP Crashes Massively Despite Community Effort to Break Resistance Levels

XRP, Australia’s second favorite digital asset, surged more than 60% in the last few days. The currency even reached trading levels as high as 0.75 on Saturday, although the pump didn’t last long. On Monday 1st, XRP crashed nearly -50% in price.

XRP Supporters and Reddit Joined Forces

In a similar move called Crowd Pump, around 200,000 XRP supporters from Telegram groups and the Reddit forum r/SatoshiStreetBets gathered and placed several buying orders aiming to break resistance levels. The move had outstanding effects as it broke the previous downtrend following the Security and Exchange Commission —SEC—, trading at a maximum of $0.75 before dropping to $0.60.

The drop didn’t stop at 0.60, and recent data from TradingView shows how XRP crashed more than 40% this Monday, just hours before another Reddit group jumped in, the r/WallStreetBets forum, currently hated by hedge funds.

Source: TradingView

There is not an exact reason why the XRP market crash so suddenly, but most XRP users from both Telegram groups and Reddit are blaming downtimes in exchanges and possible interventions since the r/WallStreetBets community came in.

Another reason could be the backlash and the legal woes that Ripple still faces, as the company tries to drag Ethereum in an attempt to call out other high-profile cryptocurrencies.

XRP to Lose $50M in Trading Volume

Likewise, yet another exchange is delisting two Ripple trading pairs: XRP/USD, and XRP/BTC. The latest platform to delist XRP is PrimeXBT, a derivative crypto-exchange. As consequence, Ripple could lose more than $50M in trading volume in the platform.

In a recent announcement, the PrimeXBT stated:

Following significant events surrounding Ripple, as well as delisting of the asset across our multiple liquidity providers, PrimeXBT will remove and cease trading of the following trading pairs on Wednesday, February 10th, 2021 at 15:00 (UTC):