Watershed Moment

The latest moves in crypto markets, in context

Edited by Omkar Godbole

October 19, 2021

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Bitcoin (BTC)

+1.5% $62,100

Ether (ETH)

+0.03% $3,790

(Price data as of October 19 @ 11:00 UTC)

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Good morning, Here's what's happening this morning:

Market Moves: Bitcoin in Stasis Ahead of ETF Launch

Technician's Take: Bitcoin's Uptrend Intact

And check out the CoinDesk TV show "First Mover," hosted by Christine Lee, Emily Parker and Lawrence Lewitinn at 9:00 a.m. U.S. Eastern time. Today's show will feature guests:

– Omkar Godbole

Biggest Movers

These are the biggest movers in the CoinDesk 20 over the past 24 hours:

Top Gainers:

Top Losers:

The CoinDesk 20 are 20 digital assets filtered from the larger universe of thousands of cryptocurrencies and constitute roughly 99% of the market by volume at eight of the largest and most trustworthy exchanges.

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Market Moves

by Omkar Godbole

Bitcoin was trading flat near $62,000 as the investor community assessed the possibility of a sell-the-fact price pullback following the listing of ProShares Bitcoin Futures ETF on the New York Stock Exchange later Tuesday.

“Will someone please remind [me] the day before the bitcoin ETF officially launches? I might want to take some chips off the table,” Dan Morehead, CEO & co-chief investment officer of Pantera Capital, wrote in his newsletter earlier this month. “On Wall Street, there’s a saying, “Buy the rumor, sell the fact. [Its] definitely working in our space.”

Bitcoin's 2017 bull run ended with the Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME) listing futures contracts in mid-December of that year. Similar price action was seen earlier this year as bitcoin topped out at $64,801 after crypto exchange Coinbase's stock debuted on Nasdaq on April 14.

Alternative cryptocurrencies were trading higher, with FIL, the native token of Ethereum-based open video infrastructure, leading the way with 40% gains.

In traditional markets, the U.S. dollar dipped on poor industrial production data released Monday, while the futures tied to the S&P 500 were up 0.5%.

Watershed Moment

"While a futures-based ETF may underperform the underlying asset due to contango effects, its approval is still a watershed moment for crypto, opening up adoption to a much larger audience," Sui Chung, CEO of CF Benchmarks, told CoinDesk.

ETFs that invest in futures contracts underperform the underlying asset due to contango bleed. Contango refers to a situation where the futures price of an asset is higher than the spot price. Even so, demand is likely to be strong in the first few weeks.

"There is pent-up demand for bitcoin exposure across the spectrum of investors from pension and endowments to the average worker's 401K and all the other myriad capital pools in the U.S. that don't want to trade spot but want to allocate capital via a regulated vehicle - just in the same way they invest in equities or fixed income," Chung added. CF Benchmarks' data underpins many ETF products, including ProShares' application.

Bitcoin may face some selling pressure if the initial uptake for the product is particularly weak, analysts told CoinDesk early Tuesday.

Also read:

Analysts Divided on Prospects of Sell-the-Fact Move as Bitcoin ETF Listing Nears

Technician's Take

by Omkar Godbole

Bitcoin Faces Resistance Above $62K

While bitcoin's uptrend remains intact, the momentum looks to have weakened, with prices consolidating above $60,000 for the fourth straight day.

Bitcoin's 4-hour chart Source: TradingView)

"We need a quick break to new all-time highs above $64,801," Patrick Heusser, head of trading at Crypto Finance AG said. "If we don't get it, the cryptocurrency may pull back to mid-$50,000 levels."

Read the original story here:

Bitcoin Equilibrium Price Likely to Top $168,000 Following ETF Approval, FSInsight Says

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BOLO

Be on the lookout for the following events today:

19:00 UTC (03:00 p.m. ET):
- Fed's Waller Speech

ICYMI

In case you missed it, here are the most recent episodes of "First Mover" on CoinDesk TV:

Outlook of Bitcoin Futures ETFs in the US, Crypto Policy Week at CoinDesk, Bitcoin Charging Above $60K and More

"First Mover" team dives into SEC's pending decisions on three other bitcoin futures ETFs as ProShares just received the green light to start trading its bitcoin futures ETF on NYSE on Tuesday; SEC Defense Attorney Lisa Braganca shares her take into this highly anticipated event and her outlook for bitcoin futures ETFs in the U.S., Pete Flint, general partner at VC firm NFX and former CEO and co-founder of real estate website Trulia provides his analysis on the crypto markets as bitcoin is charging above $60K, and it's policy week at CoinDesk, Steven Kelly, research associate at Yale University's Program on Financial Stability will provide analysis on the crypto industry's reckoning with regulation.

A Message from CoinDesk

What will 2022 bring? Crypto 2022 is CoinDesk’s ambitious effort to scope out what’s next. This week it's Policy Week, a week devoted to exploring the complex ways governments are interacting with the cryptocurrency ecosystem, and how policy decisions or lack thereof will affect the year ahead. Read more here.

Latest Headlines

The SEC has given the go-ahead for bitcoin futures ETFs.

France Trials CBDC, Blockchain for Government Bond Deals

The CBDC experiment is one of the EU’s largest to date with nearly 500 transactions executed during trial.

The U.S. regulator issued an order “simultaneously filing and settling charges against Tether,” the issuer of the crypto industry’s largest stablecoin.

The French bank is said to be looking closely at a pair of Swiss firms.

Japan’s top financial watchdog has some of the strictest rules for crypto in the world.

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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