First Mover Asia: Bitcoin Stabilizes Near $43K as Layer 1 Tokens Attract Attention

Good morning. Here’s what’s happening:

Market moves: Bitcoin stabilized adjacent $43,000 aft Wednesday’s sell-off, portion traders’ attraction turned to furniture 1 tokens.

Technician’s take: Oversold signals stay intact for bitcoin, though upside is limited.

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Bitcoin (BTC): $43,073 -1.09%

Ether (ETH): $3,407 -4.097%

Bitcoin stabilized astir $43,000 aft it fell to adjacent $42,000, portion a fewer furniture 1 tokens specified arsenic Harmony (ONE), Fantom (FTM), Cosmos (ATOM) and NEAR (NEAR) rapidly turned to greenish contempt Wednesday’s broader marketplace sell-off.

At the clip of writing, bitcoin, the oldest cryptocurrency, was trading astatine $43,073, down by 1.09% successful the past 24 hours, according to CoinDesk Data.

Data from TradingView and Binance shows that astir of the dumping events took spot connected Wednesday during U.S. trading hours. Notably, the terms of the No. 1 cryptocurrency took lone a tiny deed during Asian hours connected Thursday.

Hong Kong-based crypto lender Babel wrote successful its newsletter dated Jan. 5 that bitcoin failed to travel U.S. stocks’ “Santa Rally” successful the past week of 2021, perchance due to the fact that of China’s crypto trading ban. Dec. 31 was the deadline for galore Chinese crypto exchanges to halt offering crypto trading services to users from mainland China.

Meanwhile, crypto Twitter shows that galore traders person turned their attraction to alternate cryptocurrencies (altcoin) trading, with a fewer furniture 1 tokens having logged gains contempt a broader crypto sell-off.

According to Messari’s plus screener, ONE, ATOM, FTM and NEAR – each tokens associated with smart-contract platforms – are among immoderate of the biggest winners connected Thursday. Prices of Harmony’s ONE token, for example, were up by 10.7% astatine the clip of writing.

Crypto traders continued to stake connected the occurrence of furniture 1 tokens, arsenic SOL, LUNA and AVAX past twelvemonth logged awesome terms returns. Layer 1 blockchains person been 1 of the biggest narratives successful the crypto industry, particularly successful the past fewer years. Their occurrence came arsenic Ethereum, the No. 1 blockchain by the full worth of tokens locked successful the astute contract, became excessively congested, starring to an summation successful its transactions fees.

Bitcoin (BTC) dipped beneath archetypal enactment astatine $45,000 connected Wednesday, but aboriginal stabilized astir $42,000, which is adjacent the Dec. 5 clang low. Oversold signals stay intact, which suggests selling unit could subside.

Given the bid of little terms highs since November, enactment ranges and oversold readings are viewed arsenic countertrends. This lowers the probability of important buying spot until the downtrend is reversed.

There is beardown absorption up which could bounds upside moves implicit the abbreviated term. For example, terms momentum turned antagonistic connected the monthly chart, indicating a imaginable inclination displacement from bullish to bearish.

Further, bitcoin remains stuck beneath cardinal moving averages and is astir 35% beneath its all-time precocious astir $69,000.

The cryptocurrency is down astir 8% implicit the past week arsenic buyers failed to prolong a interruption supra $50,000.

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