Bitcoin, Ether, Major Altcoins – Weekly Market Update October 18, 2021
The total crypto market cap added $134 billion to its valuation for the last seven days and now stands at $2,455 billion. The top 10 coins were mostly in green for the same time period with Polkadot (DOT) adding 21.5 percent for the period while XRP (XRP) lost 4.5 percent. Bitcoin (BTC) is currently trading at $61,000 while ether (ETH) is at $3,780.
BTC/USD
Bitcoin closed the trading session on Sunday, October 10 at $54,730 after an extremely volatile trading day during which it was moving up and down the $56,550 – $51,000 range. The price of BTC finally stabilized right below the $55,000 line (the zone with the highest concentration of trading volume and where the Volume Profile Point of control is located) and registered a 13 percent of price increase on a weekly basis.
On Monday, the BTC/USDT pair rallied 4.8 percent to reach the $57,400 mark for the first time since May 10, 2021. The good perspectives in front of a potential Bitcoin ETF approval in the US later this month were driving the market towards a new all-time high. The futures and options markets also registered a significant inflow of funds betting on higher bitcoin prices before year-end.
Bears pushed the price all the way down to $54,000 in the early hours of trading on Tuesday, but the sell orders were quickly absorbed and buyers partially recovered in the evening. The coin closed with a short red candle to $56,000.
The mid-week session on Wednesday brought back green to the chart and the biggest cryptocurrency fully erased the losses from the previous day by stopping at $57,400 for the second time this week, turning it into a short-term resistance.
On Thursday, October 14 the BTC/USDT pair remained flat, but stable at the $47,400 level as the price was consolidating the recent gains.
The last day of the workweek came with a solid green candle to $61,500. For the first time since April 17, BTC was trading above $60,000. The move resulted in a 7.2 percent increase as both the May weekly candle close and the last remaining horizontal resistance on the weekly chart were surpassed. BTC was on its way to new price discovery.
The entire cryptocurrency market was flying on the news that the SEC has accepted the ETF Futures registrations from ProShares Trust’s Bitcoin (BTC) and also the one registered by Valkyrie. The agency is expected to officially approve on October 18.
The weekend of October 16-17 started with a drop to $60,883 on Saturday, which was followed by a fresh new jump to $61,576 on Sunday.
What we are seeing midday on Monday is an attempt from bears to push the price below the short-term horizontal support at $6,440.
ETH/USD
The Ethereum Project token ETH was closely following BTC’s trajectory, working its way towards its own all-time high.
On Sunday, October 10, the ether dropped 4.3 percent to $3,417 after failing to break above the established September resistance right above $3,600.
The coin was flat for the seven-day period as neither bulls nor bears were able to take over control of the market.
On Monday, the ETH/USDT pair jumped back up from the mentioned low and closed at $3,545 after touching $3,622 during intraday. The $3,390 – $3,420 zone where the Volume Profile Point of Control is situated, is now also acting as support.
The price of ETH tested the level once more on Tuesday and registered a slight pullback, down to $3,491.
The coin started moving North again during the third working day of the week. Bears tested the horizontal support for a third consecutive day and the failed attempt to break it resulted in a rally up to the next resistance around $3,600.
On Thursday, October 14, the ether jumped 5 percent to reach $3,786 in its second consecutive day in green.
The Friday session was no different and the coin continued to move in an uptrend, this time hitting $3,872 at the daily candle close. Still, it was now just a step away from the major diagonal downtrend resistance line.
The first day of the weekend was when bears finally became active. The selling pressure increased around the mentioned resistance and the ETH/USDT pair dropped down to $3,835.
Then on Sunday, it formed a short green candle to $3,844 after experiencing significant volatility during intraday.
It is now trading at $3,780.
Leading Majors
- Binance Coin (BNB)
The native coin of the Binance exchange rallied 14.7 percent to reach a weekly high of $486 on Saturday, October 16. The last time BNB was trading at this level was in early September.
Buyers are using the 21-period EMA on the weekly chart as dynamic support, but there is an already established diagonal downtrend on the same timeframe and the BNB/USDT pair is currently hovering around it.
The uptrend is fueled by the upcoming LAZIO fan token release on the Binance Launchpad in combination with the recently announced а $1 billion fund to support digital asset developments.
Bulls can face resistance around the already-mentioned downtrend at $460, then there is the horizontal resistance at $500.
Altcoin of the Week
Our Altcoin of the week is NuCypher (NU). The data privacy protocol was without a doubt the best performing crypto asset last week. It rallied 811 percent on Friday, October 15 peaking at $2,75 while also entering Coingecko’s Top 100 list with a market cap of approximately $2.65 billion at that time.
However, most of the gains were erased as the coin retraced more than 46 percent of its original run in the next two days. The extreme volatility was unprecedented as Nu was mainly trading in the $0.20-$0.50 range for the last 4 months.
Still, it ended the week with a 436 percent of increase.
The most probable reason for the recent surge in the price of NU is the upcoming merge with the Keep Network (KEEP). KEEP is a fellow Ethereum-based privacy coin. The protocol focuses on proxy re-encryption, threshold signatures, and other cryptographic features. The new entity will be called Threshold Network and will introduce a new token – T, which users will be able to exchange for NU or KEEP.
As of the time of writing, NU is trading at $1,27 while KEEP is at $0.879.
