Here’s an interesting statistic: Bitcoin (BTC) hasn’t seen two consecutive days of negative returns since March 10, the day financial markets went into a post-SVB meltdown and investors rushed to their respective safe havens.
That speaks to the resilience of the benchmark cryptocurrency in recent weeks, in the face of bank collapses and intense regulatory crackdowns on fiat-to-crypto ramps.
But there are signs that this resilience is stalling, given how the BTC/USDT pair is currently changing hands 5% lower from yesterday’s intraday – no, nine month – high of US$29,184.
Deteriorating market liquidity conditions due to increasing constraints are contributing to an increase in volatility, which appears to favor bearish price action at the moment.
At the time of writing, bitcoin was changing hands at a flat US$27,800, wedged between a US$27,500 support line and US$29,000 resistance, according to the Binance order book.
Bitcoin’s Bullish March Performance – Source: currency.com
Most of the price action in the last couple of weeks has been in the 26.5k to 28.5k range, which is where, optimistically, BTC/USDT can persist.
Taking stock of the broader March picture, bitcoin’s performance has undoubtedly been stellar, surging over 40% since the March 10 safe haven, or 20% for the month; still a healthy sum.
Ethereum (ETH) is currently trading at $1,800 on the ETH/USDT pair, marking a 30% rally since the March 10 pivot and 12% for the month as a whole.
ETH’s relative underperformance against bitcoin is evident when looking at the ETH/BTC trading pair, which fell around 7% for the month, primarily due to investors flocking to the relative stability of bitcoin.
Altcoins take a backseat
In an environment of extreme uncertainty like the one we had in March, altcoins tend to fall out of favor, as has been the case this month.
Bitcoin Dominance – a metric that compares the benchmark cryptocurrency’s market capitalization to the entire crypto market, increased by over 7% over the month. It currently stands at over 47%.
As has already been widely discussed, Ripple (XRP) was the only altcoin to buck the trend. The payment ended March more than 40% higher at $0.53, spurred by the perception that it is close to victory in the long-running dispute with the SEC.
In terms of overnight risers, alternative blockchains Hedera (HBAR), Stellar (XLM) and Casper (CSPR) topped the list while Flare (FLR) and Nexo (NEXO) saw the biggest losses among the top-100 set.
Global cryptocurrency market capitalization fell 1.8% to US$1.17 billion overnight, while the total value locked in the decentralized financial space fell 0.4% to US$49.5 billion.
