Bitcoin falls to near $28,000, Ether flat, US stocks fall on interest rate hike worries

Bitcoin fell to near US$28,000 on Friday morning in Asia, with Ether trading flat and most of the other top 10 non-stablecoin cryptocurrencies losing momentum. Dogecoin led the losers. The slide comes amid broader concerns about liquidity and the direction of the US economy. US regulation of cryptocurrencies is another downward arrow, with Coinbase, the largest US-based crypto exchange, indicating it is considering moving elsewhere. U.S. stock futures traded mixed in Asia after Wall Street closed lower on Thursday on recession worries and the prospect of higher interest rates ahead.

See related article: The EU Parliament approves its first crypto regulation MiCA

Fast facts

• Bitcoin fell 2.10% to US$28,321 in the 24 hours to 09:00 a.m. in Hong Kong, extending its weekly loss to 7.95%, according to CoinMarketCap data. The world’s largest cryptocurrency fell to a low of $28,037 earlier on Friday, but later made up some of that.

• Ether was the only top 10 non-stablecoin token logging gains in the past 24 hours, but it traded essentially flat at US$1,950, up 0.16%. The token has lost 7.14% in the last seven days. Ethereum Name Services, a digital identity protocol, so on Thursday it partnered with crypto payment platform Moonpay to allow the purchase of .eth domain names through fiat currencies.

• Dogecoin led the losers, falling 7.63% to $0.08446 for a weekly loss of 4.57%.

• Cryptocurrencies face pressure from the potential weakness of the US and European economies and the prospect of higher interest rates, said Denys Peleshok, head of Asia at CPT Markets. “Both economies may continue to see a slowdown in growth, contributing to a weakening of investor sentiment and risk appetite, particularly among institutional investors,” Peleshok said.

• Coinbase said on Thursday that it had received a license to operate in Bermuda. The announcement followed Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong’s statement on Tuesday that the company may move outside the US due to a lack of clarity from regulators, according to a Bloomberg report on Tuesday.

• The total crypto market cap fell 1.35% in the last 24 hours to $1.20 trillion. Total trading volume in the last 24 hours fell 16.17% to USD 52.28 billion.

• In the NFT market, the Forkast 500 NFT index fell 1.73% to 3,962.23 in the 24 hours to 09:00 in Hong Kong, down 1.23% for the week. The index is a proxy measure of the performance of the global NFT market and includes 500 eligible smart contracts on a given day. It is managed by CryptoSlam, a sister company of Forkast.News under the Forkast.Labs umbrella.

• NFT trades fell due to an increase in gas fees on the Ethereum blockchain, which can be attributed in part to the recent hype surrounding the PepeCoin meme, Forkast Labs NFT strategist Yehudah Petscher said.

• US stock futures traded mixed from 09.00 in Hong Kong. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 0.05 percent. S&P 500 futures edged 0.04% higher. The Nasdaq Composite Index rose 0.14 percent. The three indexes fell on Thursday, partly due to poor first-quarter earnings from Tesla Inc. and AT&T Inc.

• The US Labor Department reported on Thursday that initial jobless claims last week were higher than expected, pointing to a slowing economy.

• Despite the soft economic readings and growing fears of a recession, Cleveland Federal Reserve President Loretta Mester said Thursday that she expected interest rates to move above 5% this year, but noted that the monetary tightening cycle was coming to an end.

• US interest rates are currently between 4.75% and 5%, the highest since June 2006. Analysts at CME Group now see a 17.9% chance that the Fed will leave rates unchanged at its next meeting on May 3, while 82.1 predicts a 25 basis point increase, down from 83.3% on Thursday.

See related article: Bittrex in SEC’s crosshairs as compliance lawsuits keep coming