Market Wrap: Bitcoin Stabilizes Amid Geopolitical Uncertainty

Bitcoin (BTC) and other cryptocurrencies experienced sharp price swings over the past 24 hours amid Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

On Thursday, U.S. President Biden imposed additional sanctions on Russia for the attack. Russian airstrikes triggered declines across speculative assets worldwide, including cryptocurrencies.

The market capitalization across all cryptos slid toward $1.5 trillion, losing almost 9%. Bitcoin fell as much as 7%, although the crypto pared earlier losses and had returned above $38,000 at press time. Most alternative cryptocurrencies underperformed bitcoin over the past 24 hours.

"Option volumes point to the likelihood that many investors are maintaining long positions while hedging risk with derivatives," Sean Farrell, head of digital asset strategy at FundStrat, wrote in a email on Thursday.

"Consistent with last week, we think it is wise to maintain long positions with time horizons beyond six months and be prepared to buy on dips," Farrell wrote.

Latest prices

●Bitcoin BTC$90,352.90: $38456, +1.84%

●Ether ETH$3,199.61: $2645, +0.75%

●S&P 500 daily close: $4289, +1.50%

●Gold: $1898 per troy ounce, −0.61%

●Ten-year Treasury yield daily close: 1.97%

Bitcoin, ether and gold prices are taken at approximately 4pm New York time. Bitcoin is the CoinDesk Bitcoin Price Index (XBX); Ether is the CoinDesk Ether Price Index (ETX); Gold is the COMEX spot price. Information about CoinDesk Indices can be found at coindesk.com/indices.

Signs of capitulation

Bitcoin's trading volume across major spot exchanges reached its highest level in a month, according to CoinDesk data. Typically, high volume corrections could signal capitulation among sellers.

And from a technical perspective, there are initial signs on the charts of downside exhaustion, which typically precede short-term upswings in price.

Katie Stockton, managing partner at Fairlead Strategies, a technical research firm, also noticed a short-term counter trend signal for BTC. "Hopefully this allows bitcoin to avoid a confirmed breakdown," Katie wrote in an email to CoinDesk.

A break below $37,361 would be bearish, although Stockton's work shows the current dip in BTC could exhaust itself today and give way to two weeks of stabilization.

Flight to safety

Risk-off has been the dominant theme so far this year, even before the events in Russia and Ukraine escalated into a full-scale war.

The chart below shows that long-term U.S. Treasurys have moved in lockstep with stocks, offering little protection for investors. Meanwhile, bitcoin have largely underperformed traditional assets year to date. And gold has maintained its status as a safe haven asset.

Still, returns across assets have narrowed, with bitcoin still in the lead over the past year.

Altcoin roundup

• Tether's USDT stablecoin well over $1 on Ukrainian crypto exchange: Ukrainians were paying a steep premium over the U.S. dollar for Tether's USDT stablecoin after Russia invaded the Eastern European country. The price of USDT on the popular Ukrainian cryptocurrency exchange Kuna jumped Thursday by almost 5% in the past 24 hours to 32 Ukrainian hryvnia, the country’s national currency. The price works out to $1.10 per USDT, which is supposed to be worth $1, according to CoinDesk’s Helene Braun. Read more here.
• OneOf expands sports NFT presence with new collection on Polygon: The digital sports collectible market is growing faster than ever, and non-fungible token (NFT) platform OneOf is planning to get in on the action. On Thursday, the company announced the launch of its “Sports Pass” collection, a series of NFTs designed by animation studio 8th Frame that grant holders exclusive perks on OneOf’s new sports-themed NFT marketplace, according to CoinDesk reporter Eli Tan. Read more here.
• Smart contract tokens’ gain wiped out: Cosmos’ ATOM fell 9.2% today after leading the smart contract tokens’ gains with a 7.2% rise yesterday. Major gainers yesterday like Avalanche’s AVAX fell as much as 7.6% today. Price plunges were more severe in the earlier hours in reaction to the Russian-Ukrainian conflict. Partial recovery were seen later, but overall sentiment is still bearish.

Relevant news

• Crypto Market Capitalization Slumps to $1.5T as Russia Attacks Ukraine
• US to Expand Sanctions Against Russia After Ukraine Invasion
• Bloomberg Integrates Elwood Technologies' Crypto Platform Into Buy-Side Order System
• Bitcoin Miner Core Scientific Has More Than 100% Upside: BTIG
• China's Supreme Court Rules Crypto Transactions Constitute 'Illegal Fundraising'

Other markets

Digital assets in the CoinDesk 20 ended the day slightly lower.

Largest gainers:

Asset Ticker Returns Sector Bitcoin Cash BCH +3.5% Currency Solana SOL +2.2% Smart Contract Platform Bitcoin BTC +1.5% Currency

Largest losers:

Asset Ticker Returns Sector Cosmos ATOM −6.5% Smart Contract Platform Internet Computer ICP −6.4% Computing Cardano ADA −5.6% Smart Contract Platform

Sector classifications are provided via the Digital Asset Classification Standard (DACS), developed by CoinDesk Indices to provide a reliable, comprehensive, and standardized classification system for digital assets. The CoinDesk 20 is a ranking of the largest digital assets by volume on trusted exchanges.