Cryptocurrencies plunged more than 1 percent in the past 24 hours as warnings of interest rate hikes by Fed Chair weighed on sentiment. Market capitalization is currently at $1.01 trillion, a tad above the psychological $1 trillion mark.
Jerome Powell in his Semi-annual Monetary Policy Report on Tuesday before the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs said that the ultimate level of interest rates is likely to be higher than previously anticipated. Powell also stated that if the totality of the data were to indicate that faster tightening was warranted, the Fed would be prepared to increase the pace of rate hikes. Restoring price stability, he added, would likely require maintaining a restrictive stance of monetary policy for some time. The Fed Chair warned that the historical record cautions strongly against prematurely loosening policy and that the Fed would stay the course until the job is done.
The aggressive warnings on higher interest rates lifted the U.S. Dollar and the Dollar Index touched a high of 105.65 on Tuesday and 105.88 on Wednesday. It is currently at 105.70.
The Fed Chair also opined that crypto industry has of late seen turmoil and spoke in favor of crypto industry regulation that does not stifle innovation.
Bitcoin shed 1.6 percent overnight and 6.8 percent in the past week to trade at $22,032.31. BTC traded between a high of $22,393.68 and a low of $21,964.99 in the past 24 hours. Reports of massive Bitcoin movements in wallets connected to the U.S. government, implying a likely market sale also swayed sentiment.
Ethereum also dropped 0.9 percent in the past 24 hours and is currently trading at $1,553.13. The 24-hour trading range was between $1,568.18 and $1,543.13.
90th ranked Bone ShipaSwap (BONE), jumped 20 percent in the past 24 hours and topped the price charts for the maximum overnight gain. The meme token belonging to the Shiba Inu (SHIB) ecosystem was recently listed by the Crypto.com platform.
6th ranked XRP (XRP) also withstood the turbulence amidst expectations of a favorable legal verdict. XRP has rallied 6 percent overnight.
13th ranked Shiba Inu (SHIB) rallied 2.6 percent overnight amidst the highly anticipated layer-2 scaling solution Shibarium nearing launch.
85th ranked BinaryX (old) (BNX), 29th ranked Stellar (XLM) and 79th ranked Conflux (CFX) have also gained more than 1 percent in the past 24 hours.
84th ranked SingularityNET (AGIX) and 100th ranked FLOKI (FLOKI) are the biggest laggards among the top 100 cryptos, with overnight losses exceeding 10 percent. 65th ranked Optimism (OP) and 94th ranked Enjin Coin (ENJ) have also declined more than 8 percent overnight.
Conflux (CFX) surged past 84th ranked SingularityNET (AGIX) to top the gainers list on a year-to-date basis. CFX has gained 793 percent in 2023, followed by AGIX which has rallied 733 percent during the same period.
81st ranked Trust Wallet Token (TWT) is the greatest laggard in 2023 among the top 100 cryptocurrencies. The TWT crypto has shed close to 15 percent in 2023.
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