The latest moves in crypto markets, in context By Lyllah Ledesma, CoinDesk reporter Was this newsletter forwarded to you? Sign up here. |
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Happy Friday! Here's what you need to know today in crypto: |
- Bitcoin tumbled Thursday following a private measure of June job gains and now awaits the government's employment report.
- SEC approval of a spot bitcoin ETF will not be a game changer for the market, said JPMorgan.
- Three senior officials depart crypto exchange Binance.
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CoinDesk Market Index (CMI): 1,267 −3.6%
Bitcoin (BTC): $30,139 −3.4%
Ether (ETC): $1,862 −4.0%
S&P 500 futures: 4,444.75 −0.1%
FTSE 100: 7,259.28 −0.3%
Treasury Yield 10 Years: 4.04% +0.1 |
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| Bitcoin (BTC) has witnessed a choppy trading week, mostly remaining between the $30,000 and $31,000 levels. A breakout above $31,000 was quickly snuffed out on Thursday after a blowout ADP jobs report – 497,000 jobs added in June versus 220,000 expected – sent bitcoin tumbling more than 3% to below $30,000. With markets now awaiting government employment numbers for June later Friday morning, bitcoin is trading around the $30,100 level. The MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares, excluding Japan, extended the prior session's weakness to drop to a five-week low, while U.S. stocks registered notable losses after the ADP number raised concerns of higher interest rates. In other markets early Friday, gold edged up to $1,914 per ounce and the yield on the 10-year Treasury note stood at 4.02%, down 6 basis points from Thursday's four-month high. The dollar index, which gauges the greenback's exchange rate against major fiat currencies, consolidated on overnight losses near 103.00. |
Any U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) approval of a spot bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF) will not be a game changer for crypto markets, JPMorgan said in a research report Thursday. Nikolaos Panigirtzoglou and team note spot bitcoin ETFs have existed for some time outside of the U.S. in Canada and Europe, but have failed to generate much in the way of investor interest. They also noted that bitcoin futures funds in the U.S. haven't seen a lot of interest either, even amid investor outflows from gold ETFs over roughly the past year. The SEC, of course, has yet to approve a spot bitcoin ETF. Optimism about approval is running higher now, though, as the most recent spate of applications have attempted to address some of the agency's concerns. At least three senior officials have departed embattled crypto exchange Binance this week as the company prepares to defend itself on multiple fronts, Fortune reported on Thursday. Binance General Counsel Han Ng, Chief Strategy Officer Patrick Hillmann and Senior Vice President for Compliance Steven Christie are among those that have resigned, a source familiar with the matter told Fortune. In addition, Binance's Global Vice President of Marketing and Communications Steve Milton left the company in June, according to his LinkedIn profile. Their departure follows Senior Director of Investigations Matthew Price's recent decision to part ways with the exchange. Binance CEO Changpeng "CZ" Zhao, brushed off the news, tweeting: "More FUD about some departures. Yes, there is turnover (at every company). But the reasons dreamed up by the 'news' are completely wrong. As markets and the global environment for crypto changes, as our organization evolves, and as personal situations change, there is turnover at every company." |
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Market Insight: Big Banks See Merit in Digital Ledgers
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Citigroup Inc., HSBC, BNY Mellon and other global financial giants have been experimenting with what they call a "regulated liability network" for conducting round-the-clock, wholesale payments using shared ledgers, and a paper released Thursday suggests the system has potential. Fitting somewhere in the middle of the debate between central bank digital currencies (CBDCs) and private stablecoins, the Federal Reserve Bank of New York's New York Innovation Center (NYIC), which has collaborated on the project since last year, concluded that "the network has the potential to deliver improvements in the processing of wholesale payments due to its ability to synchronize U.S. dollar-denominated payments and facilitate settlement on a near-real time, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week basis." "From a central banking perspective, the proof of concept was conducive to exploring tokenized regulated deposits and understanding the potential functional benefits of central bank and commercial bank digital money operating together on a shared ledger," said Per von Zelowitz, director of the NYIC, in a statement. |
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- The number of active bitcoin futures contracts on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME) has declined by 16,960 BTC in the past seven days.
- The decline in open positions in the July contract and the past week's expiry of June contracts are responsible for the decline in the overall open interest, according to K33's Senior Research Analyst Vetle Lunde.
- The decline in open interest in July contracts suggests institutions are taking their foot off the pedal.
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Disclaimer: The information presented in this message is intended as a news item that provides a brief summary of various events and developments that affect, or that might in the future affect, the value of one or more of the cryptocurrencies described above. The information contained in this message, and any information liked through the items contained herein, is not intended to provide sufficient information to form the basis for an investment decision. The information presented herein is accurate only as of its date, and it was not prepared by a research analyst or other investment professional. You should seek additional information regarding the merits and risks of investing in any cryptocurrency before deciding to purchase or sell any such instruments. |
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Bitcoin Loses Ground As Investors Await U.S. Jobs Report