Bitcoin, Ether continue run up; Solana, Dogecoin lead gainers; U.S. equities rebound

Bitcoin and Ether continued the strong price gains for the week to move higher in Wednesday morning trading in Asia, with most of the top 10 non-stablecoin cryptocurrencies logging advances for the past seven days. Solana and Dogecoin led the Wednesday winners. The rise in cryptocurrencies accompanied a rebound in U.S. equities on Tuesday as concern about bank failures receded and February inflation data released the same day was in line with expectations.

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Fast facts

• Bitcoin rose 2.10% in the past 24 hours to US$24,789 at 09:00 a.m. in Hong Kong, according to CoinMarketCap data, for a weekly gain of 11.39%. The world’s largest cryptocurrency briefly broke the US$26,000 ceiling on Tuesday evening in Asia and is now up almost 50% for the year to date.

• Ether gained 1.90% to US$1,706, rising 8.86% in the past seven days.

• Solana led the gainers in the top 10, adding 2.75% to US$20.93 for a rise of 3.12% for the week. The Solana Foundation introduced Ask Solana U on Tuesday, an AI-powered chat-like engine that aims to assist Web3 developers on the Solana blockchain.

• Dogecoin rose 2.74% to US$0.07478. The memecoin is up 0.85% for the seven-day period, but still down more than 7% from the beginning of March.

• XRP edged 0.54% higher to trade at US$0.3735, but is the only top 10 non-stablecoin cryptocurrency with a weekly loss, down 2.20%. Brad Garlinghouse, the CEO of Ripple Labs whose payment network is powered by XRP,  tweeted on Monday that Ripple had some exposure to the failed Silicon Valley Bank. This was accompanied by a large flow of XRP transactions on the same day, according to crypto tracker Whale Alert.

• Crypto exchange Binance’s BNB rose 0.51% to US$309.51, posting a weekly gain of 6.88%. The world’s largest crypto exchange on Tuesday said it will halt its U.K. pound deposits and withdrawals by May this year, after its local partner for fiat on- and off-ramps said it was ending the service due to regulatory concerns.

• The total crypto market capitalization rose 1.30% in the past 24 hours to US$1.09 trillion. Total trading volume over the last 24 hours gained 8.47% to US$101.54 billion.

• U.S. equities closed higher on Tuesday. The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 1.06%, the S&P 500 moved up 1.65% and the Nasdaq Composite Index posted the biggest gain of 2.14%.

• Efforts by U.S. regulators and President Joe Biden to calm markets seemed to have the desired effect after the collapses of U.S. banks at the weekend. First Republic Bank, which slid over 60% on Monday and was briefly suspended from trading, bounced back almost 27% on Tuesday, according to CNBC.

• Investors in U.S. equities and cryptocurrencies also gained some reassurance from the U.S. Labor Department’s February inflation report released Tuesday, which showed the Consumer Price Index (CPI) rose 0.6% by month and 6% on year, all in line with expectations. Though still above the Federal Reserve’s stated goal to keep annual inflation below 2%, the data suggest inflation in the U.S. is moderating and may convince the Fed to ease back on interest rate hikes.

• After a raft of rate hikes last year and into 2023, U.S. interest rates are now between 4.5% to 4.75%, the highest since October 2007. Analysts at the CME Group expect a 79.7% chance the Fed will raise rates by 25 basis points this month. The chance of no rate increase is at 20.3%, a decrease from 35% on Tuesday.

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