The cryptocurrency market got off to a slow start on Aug. 19 after stimulus tapering talks from the U.S. Federal Reserve put pressure on global financial markets, but momentum within the crypto market picked up in the afternoon session as Bitcoin (BTC) bulls finally managed to break above the $46,000 level.
While most altcoins were slow to warm up on Thursday, several altcoins led the way with gains in excess of 20% due to major protocol upgrades and exchange listings.
Top 7 coins with the highest 24-hour price change. Source:Cointelegraph Markets Pro
Data from Cointelegraph Markets Pro and TradingView shows that the biggest gainers over the past 24-hours were Voyager Token (VGX), SwissBorg (CHSB) and Energy Web Token (EWT).
Voyager 2.0 excites investors
VGX is the native coin of the Voyager platform, a cryptocurrency broker that provides trading services to retail and institutional investors.
VORTECS™ data from Cointelegraph Markets Pro began to detect a bullish outlook for VGX on Aug. 16, prior to the recent price rise.
The VORTECS™ Score, exclusive to Cointelegraph, is an algorithmic comparison of historic and current market conditions derived from a combination of data points including market sentiment, trading volume, recent price movements and Twitter activity.
VORTECS™ Score (green) vs. VGX price. Source:Cointelegraph Markets Pro
As seen on the chart above, the VORTECS™ Score for VGX turned green on Aug.15 and proceeded to climb to a high of 85 on Aug. 16, around 46 hours before the price increased 100% over the next day.
Excitement for the project comes as VGX and the platform are undergoing a token swap and upgrade to Voyager 2.0.
SwissBorg pumps after a new exchange listing
SwissBorg is another platform focused on wealth management and it provides a community-centric environment where users can exchange and store their crypto assets.
Data from Cointelegraph Markets Pro and CoinGecko shows that after hitting a low at $0.714 on Aug. 18, the price of CHSB spiked 35% to an intraday high at $0.973 as its 24-hour trading volume surged 445% to $16.1 million.
CHSB/USDT 1-hour chart. Source:CoinGecko
The sudden boost in momentum for the project was the result of the CHSB token being listed on the Bitfinex exchange on Aug. 18 and the growing strength of the ecosystem is evidenced by the recent revelation that the SwissBorg community now has 450,000 verified users.
Related:Stablecoin adoption and the future of financial inclusion
Energy Web Token staking attracts users
The price of Energy Web Token also rallied today after the project debuted new staking features. According to data from Cointelegraph Markets Pro, market conditions for EWT have been favorable for some time.
VORTECS™ Score (green) vs. EWT price. Source:Cointelegraph Markets Pro
As seen in the chart above, the VORTECS™ Score for EWT began to pick up on Aug. 13 and reached a high of 77 on Aug. 14, around 84 hours before the price increased 33% over the next day.
Interest in the project has begun to rise thanks to an ongoing series of team member-led discussions that explain the different aspects of the protocol, including staking and the ‘switchboard’ user interface.
The overall cryptocurrency market cap now stands at $1.954 trillion and Bitcoin’s dominance rate is 43.9%.
The views and opinions expressed here are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of Cointelegraph.com. Every investment and trading move involves risk, you should conduct your own research when making a decision.
The total market capitalization of cryptocurrencies surged to $1.139 trillion on Feb. 4, just short of silver’s total market cap at $1.5 trillion.
While the crypto market cap is still way below that of gold, Bloomberg senior commodity strategist Mike McGlone said in a report that Bitcoin (BTC) has found strong support at $30,000 and it may now rally to $50,000 and higher.
Crypto market data daily view. Source:Coin360
However, some institutional investors who had invested at lower levels and are sitting on huge profits are taking some money off the table.
United Kingdom-based Ruffer Investment Management said it had initially invested about $600 million in November 2020, which had more than doubled when Bitcoin hit an all-time high at $41,959.63. The firm booked profits on an amount just more than their cost and decided to let the remaining balance ride.
While Bitcoin gradually climbs towards the all-time high, altcoins have been soaring, suggesting that traders have shifted their funds from BTC into Ether and other smaller-cap coins.
Let’s analyze three such tokens that are backed by strong fundamentals.
UMA/USD
Professional traders use volatility data to make informed decisions and be on the right side of trade. Therefore, the CBOE Volatility Index, known as the VIX, is popular with traders.
Bitcoin is known for its high volatility and Universal Market Access (UMA) plans to offer traders an opportunity to trade volatility in a decentralized way. For that, the protocol plans to launch a uVol-BTC product that will be settled at the end of the month. Traders could use the token to speculate on the increase or decrease in volatility, or hedge their Bitcoin positions they do not want to sell during sharp corrections. If the product turns out to be successful, a uVOL-ETH token is also planned in the future.
Other than the regular synthetic tokens that track the price of an asset, traders keep looking for new opportunities that do not give institutions a direct edge. In order to cater to this demand, UMA plans to launch a new synthetic token called ‘uSTONKS’ that will be based on the ten most commented stocks on the r/wallstreetbets Reddit forum. The new uSTONKS token offers retail traders a unique way to benefit from the movement of the most popularly discussed stocks on the forum.
Early discussions are also in progress to create a “Big Mac Synth” based on the index invented by The Economist back in 1986. Launching innovative tokens attracts new traders. Another reason that could have added to the short-term demand for UMA was the negative 15.5% annualized yield for depositing Ether as collateral to borrow USDC.
UMA has soared from an intraday low at $11.234 on Feb.2 to an intraday high at $43.998 today, a 291% gain within three days. This sharp rally has pushed the relative strength index (RSI) deep into the overbought territory.
UMA/USDT daily chart. Source:TradingView
The long wick on today’s candlestick shows that traders are booking profits after the recent run-up. The first support on the downside is the 38.2% Fibonacci retracement level at $31.482.
If the UMA/USD pair rebounds off this support, it will suggest that traders are buying on a shallow correction and not waiting for a deeper fall. The bulls will then try to resume the up-move by pushing the price above $43.998. If they succeed, the pair could rally to $62.
Contrary to this assumption, if the bears sink and sustain the price below $31.482, the correction could deepen to the 61.8% retracement level at $23.75. Such a move will suggest that the bullish momentum has weakened.
CHSB/USD
Crypto projects that carry out buybacks increase value for their long-term investors. SwissBorg (CHSB) also does buybacks with 20% of threvenues made from fees, but unlike the usually followed method of a publicly shared scheduled buyback, the protocol buys only when the price is bearish and has dropped below the 20-day EMA. This ensures that the HODLers who do not sell their positions during the downturn benefit from the buybacks.
However, in the age of decentralized finance, buyback alone is unlikely to attract investors. Therefore, the protocol started rewarding CHSB token holders from Jan. 28 of this year. The premium users, who have staked 50,000 CHSB for a 12-month period, earn double the rewards on their crypto tokens, barring the quantity staked to go premium.
The protocol plans to launch a robo advisor in the future that will work similar to the rating agencies in traditional finance. The robo advisor will provide users with all the necessary information that can help investors decide on the project and the yield depending on their risk profile.
CHSB has been in a strong uptrend for the past few days. It rallied from an intraday low at $0.289898 on Jan. 26 to an intraday high at $1.008969 today, which is a 248% rally in a short time.
CHSB/USD daily chart. Source:TradingView
However, the recent rally has pushed the RSI deep into the overbought territory, which suggests the rally is vulnerable to a minor correction or consolidation.
The long wick on today’s candlestick suggests traders are booking profits near the psychological resistance at $1. The first support on the downside is the 38.2% Fibonacci retracement level at $0.734282.
If the bulls defend this support, the CHSB/USD pair will attempt to resume the uptrend. A break above $1.008969 could start the next leg of the up-move that could reach $1.15 and then $1.40.
On the other hand, if the bears sink the price below $0.734284, the decline could extend to the 20-day exponential moving average ($0.52). Such a fall will point to a possible range-bound action for a few days.
SC/USD
Several large corporations like Microsoft, Google, and Amazon are spending large amounts of money on their cloud storage systems.
However, using a centralized cloud storage service means the data is at the mercy of the corporation and several security breaches in the past are an example of how the data can be compromised. These disadvantages are alleviated in a decentralized cloud storage service such as Siacoin (SC) where the owners have complete control over their data.
Sia recently completed a hardfork to incorporate a new Sia foundation that will handle the ongoing developments of the Sia ecosystem. This will gradually free the Sia foundation from Skynet labs, which currently handles the operations of the protocol.
Rumors are that Coinbase may add support to Sia. If that happens, the coin could extend its up-move further.
SC surged from $0.004108 on Jan. 28 to $0.009950 on Jan. 29, a 142% rally within two days. After this sharp up-move, the token witnessed a correction that found support near the 61.8% Fibonacci retracement at $0.006340.
SC/USDT daily chart. Source:TradingView
The bulls are currently attempting to resume the uptrend but the bears have other plans. The SC/USD pair turned down from $0.009709 on Feb. 3, indicating that the bears are defending the overhead resistance aggressively.
If the bulls do not allow the price to dip below $0.007718, the pair could again try to break out of the overhead resistance. If they succeed, the pair could rise to $0.0120 and then $0.0150.
On the other hand, if the price slips below $0.007718, the pair could drop to the 20-day EMA ($0.006). A strong rebound off this support will point to a few more days of range-bound action. A break below the 20-day EMA could signal advantage to the bears.
The views and opinions expressed here are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of Cointelegraph. Every investment and trading move involves risk, you should conduct your own research when making a decision.
The totalcrypto market capadded $78.1 billion to its value for the last seven-daysand now stands at $637.4billion. The top 10 currencieswere mostly in green for the same time period with Litecoin (LTC) adding 27.6 percent to its value while ChainLink (LINK) lost 4.7 percent.By the time of writingbitcoin (BTC)is trading at$22,860, ether (ETH) is hovering around $616.XRPdropped further to$0.532.
BTC/USD
Bitcoin closed the trading day on Sunday, December 13 at $19,155 after successfully rebounding from the weekly support situated around $18,100 a day earlier. It closed the seven-day period 1.1 percent lower.
Bulls successfully re-initiated the uptrend and did not allow further decline even when the price of BTC was pushed below the psychological level of $18,000.
The new trading period started positively for buyers. On Monday, the BTC/USD pair continued to climb and reached $19,279, which was followed by another green day on Tuesday. This time, the leading cryptocurrency hit $19,420 and surpassed the next major resistance line on the weekly/daily timeframe.
The mid-week session on Wednesday was one to remember. Bitcoin formed its fifth consecutive green candle on the daily chart and skyrocketed all the way up to $21,368 registering a new all-time high. This resulted in a 10 percent jump. Naturally, the coin also reached its highest market cap ever at $383.5 billion.
The rally continued on Thursday, December 17 and the BTC/USD pair climbed further to $22,819 and grew by another 6.7 percent. The biggest crypto entered a price discovery mode with no defined resistance in its way.
The Friday trading was no different and BTC achieved a new major milestone – breaking above $23k ($23,140).
The cryptocurrency market seemed unstoppable now and the fearing-of-missing-out or FOMO started to kick in with retail interest going through the roof.
On the first day of the weekend, bitcoin hit $24,170 before closing at $23,870 in the evening. Then on Sunday, it made a small pullback to $23,464.
The 24-hour trading volumes were hovering in the $22-$23 billion area for the first three days of the workweek then started to pick up the pace and peaked at $61 billion on Thursday. They dropped to $31 billion on Friday and Saturday morning and increased back to $36 billion late on Saturday and on Sunday.
ETH/USD
The Ethereum project token ETH successfully regained position above the weekly support at $560 on Saturday, December 12. It made another step forward on the next day and closed the week at $591, still 1.8 percent down compared to the previous seven-day period.
On Monday, the ETH/USD pair stabilized around the above-mentioned level in what seemed to be a consolidation before the continuation of the uptrend.
The trading day on Tuesday, December 15 was a quiet one, with low price volatility. The ether remained at $590.
The third day of the workweek brought a wave of optimism to the cryptocurrency market and the altcoins surged following the example of BTC. The ETH token climbed up to $638 for the first time since May 2018, adding 8.1 percent to its value.
On Thursday, December 17, it hit $677 during intraday, moving above the next monthly resistance line, but the momentum was not strong enough for such a big step and ETH registered a small green candle to $642.
The coin made another step up on Friday and reached $655 as the upward movement was not showing any signs of exhaustion. The move resulted in another 2 percent being added to the value of ETH.
The weekend of December 19-20 began with another attempt to break the mentioned horizontal level. Buyers again failed but were already closing the gap.
On Sunday, December 20 it made a healthy retrace down to $638, but not before hitting the weekly support at $620.
XRP/USD
The Ripple company token XRP closed the session on Sunday, December 13 at $0.513 after trading in the wide-area between $0.458 and 0.53 throughout the day. Bulls were fighting hard to defend the weekly support line at $0.50 after losing 17.5 percent for the seven-day period.
On Monday, the XRP/USD pair broke below the mentioned horizontal support and formed a short red candle to $0.496. It continued to slide on Tuesday, December 15, and hit $0.468, already threatening to breach the monthly/weekly support cluster at $0.445.
The mid-week session on Wednesday brought some relief for buyers. The “ripple” fell as low as $0.435 in the early hours of trading then managed to recover later in the evening by skyrocketing all the way up to $0.57, reaching the short 27-day EMA. The coin added 21.8 percent to its value and kept the uptrend intact, at least temporarily.
Thursday, December 17 was an extremely volatile day for the crypto markets and especially for XRP. It was moving up and down in the $0.536 – $0.661 range before closing with a short green candle to $0.58, the next major monthly line on the chart.
The last day of the workweek did not bring any major changes in the price of the altcoin and it continued to hover around the mentioned zone.
The weekend of December 19-20 started with a small drop to $0.576 on Saturday as neither bulls nor bears could trigger a trend.
The coin continued to slide on Sunday by closing at $0.556, still below the monthly resistance.
Altcoin of the Week
Our altcoin of the week is SwissBorg (CHSB). Another relatively unknown altcoin, SwissBorg stormed into CoinGecko’s top 100 list and is now ranked at #73 with a market capitalization of approximately $248 million.
CHSB is a blockchain-based wealth management system from Switzerland. According to the official webpage, the project enables users to manage their funds by utilizing it app features including yield and arbitrage instruments.
The coin grew by 132 percent for the last seven days, peaking at $0.279 on Sunday. December 20.
As of the time of writing, it is trading at 0.0000098 against BTC on HitBTC.
