Bitcoin, Ether drop; Dogecoin, Polygon lead losers

Bitcoin slipped and traded below US$30,000 on Friday afternoon in Asia, with most other top 10 non-stablecoin cryptocurrencies dropping. Tron and Litecoin were the only gainers, rising less than 1% in the past 24 hours.

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Bitcoin extends decline to remain under US$30,000

Bitcoin dropped 0.97% to US$29,130 in 24 hours to 4 p.m. in Hong Kong, bringing its weekly losses to 2.15%, according to CoinMarketCap data.

The performance of the world’s largest cryptocurrency in August will likely tread water or trend upwards with limited downside risk, said Le Shi, head of trading at crypto market making firm Auros.

“Recent positive corporate earnings surprises, combined with cooling inflation will provide traders with ample justification for risk-on plays, betting on softening of policy and the subsequent buoying of both crypto and traditional equities,” Shi told Forkast in emailed comments.

“Conversely, any rally from current levels is likely to be mild unless there is an obvious catalyst. Above US$30,000 is generally viewed as bull market territory and the low 30s range is expected to provide a decent amount of resistance,” Shi said.

The initial deadline for approving BlackRock’s spot Bitcoin ETF application is expected at the end of August. “If the [U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission] was to extend the deadline, it would be seen by the market as a mildly bearish signal, given BlackRock’s impressive historical ‘win rate’ on ETF applications,” Shi added.

Ether, the second-largest cryptocurrency in the world, dipped 0.71% to US$1,858 in 24 hours, bringing its weekly losses to 1.63%.

Dogecoin led losses, dropping 3.17% in the past 24 hours to US$0.07628, although it gained 6.95% on the week. Polygon’s Matic token was the second-biggest loser of the day, falling 2.40% to US$0.7086 in the last 24 hours and 6.79% over the previous seven days.

Tron and Litecoin were the only gainers among top 10 non-stablecoin cryptos. Tron climbed 0.84% to US$0.08311, gaining 3.15% in the past seven days.

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Litecoin gained 0.15% to US$91.14, but lost 0.96% on the week.

Litecoin’s halving event in early August will “represent reductions in supply of the coin, which in theory should drive the price up,” Shi of Auros said.

“The past two major crypto bull runs have tended to lag Bitcoin halving events by approximately 12-18 months, and Litecoin halvings by even more, so the jury is still out on whether this will have meaningful impact on the market,” Shi added.

The total crypto market capitalization dropped 0.88% to US$1.18 trillion, while the total market volume declined 14.22% to US$26.2 billion over the past 24 hours.

Sales volumes on Immutable X NFT network edge higher

The indexes are proxy measures of the performance of the global NFT market. They are managed by CryptoSlam, a sister company of Forkast.News under the Forkast.Labs umbrella.

The main Forkast 500 NFT index dipped 0.55% to 2,608.81 in the past 24 hours to 6.40 p.m. in Hong Kong, down 3.34% on the week. Forkast’s Ethereum and Solana NFT indexes declined while Polygon NFT index rose in the past 24 hours.

Total NFT sales volumes dropped 9.17% to US$18.43 million, according to data from CryptoSlam.

By NFT collections, Immutable X-based Gods Unchained Cards saw the largest 24-hour sales volumes, rising 1.02% to US$1.36 million. Ethereum-based Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC) recorded the second-highest sales volume, gaining 17.29% to US$919,623.

NFT sales volume on Ethereum network dropped 17.02% to US$12.30 million, while that on Immutable X gained 96.13% to US$1.40 million in the past 24 hours.

Elsewhere, the U.S.-based online music store Beatport, which is known for selling music resources to DJs for remixes, launched its NFT marketplace Beatport.io on Thursday, where users can buy, sell and trade electronic music recordings as NFTs.

The Beatport NFT marketplace was developed in partnership with Germany-based Web3 startup Define Creative, and is built on Aventus, a parachain based on the Polkadot network.

(updates with NFT section.)