Category Archives: Bitcoin

Bitcoin struggled to stay above $9,750 and declined towards the $9,500 support against the US Dollar. BTC price could decline heavily if it settles below the key $9,500 support.

Recently, we saw a rejection in bitcoin near the $9,880 level against the US Dollar. BTC even started a downside extension from the $9,847 swing high and declined below the $9,750 support.

Besides, there was break below the $9,680 level and the 100 hourly simple moving average. It opened the doors for more losses and the price dropped towards the key $9,500 support area, where the bulls emerged.

A swing low is formed near $9,481 and the price is currently correcting higher. It surpassed the 23.6% Fib retracement level of the recent drop from the $9,841 high to $9,481 low.

However, there are many hurdles on the upside, starting with $9,640 and $9,680. More importantly, there is a key bearish trend line forming with resistance near $9,640 on the hourly chart of the BTC/USD pair.

Bitcoin Price

On the downside, the main support for bitcoin is near the $9,500 area. If there is a downside break and proper close below $9,500, the bears are likely to take over. In the mentioned case, there are chances of more losses towards the $9,200 and $9,050 support levels.

On the upside, the first key resistance is near the trend line and $9,640. The next one is near the 50% Fib retracement level of the recent drop from the $9,841 high to $9,481 low.

The main hurdle for bitcoin is near the $9,740 level and the 100 hourly simple moving average. Therefore, the bulls need to clear the trend line resistance and gain momentum above the 100 hourly simple moving average to start a fresh increase in the near term. If not, there is a risk of a sharp decline below $9,500.

Technical indicators:

Hourly MACD The MACD is slowly moving back into the bullish zone.

Hourly RSI (Relative Strength Index) The RSI for BTC/USD is currently correcting higher towards the 45 level.

Major Support Levels $9,500 followed by $9,200.

Major Resistance Levels $9,680, $9,740 and $9,880.

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This Critical Bitcoin Short-Term Top is Sparking Big Correction Fears - newsBTC

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is once again poised to approve or reject a bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF), when Wilshire Phoenixs United States Bitcoin and Treasury Investment Trust meets a filing deadline Wednesday.

Wilshire Phoenix is the latest in a long line of companies hoping to secure SEC approval to list shares of a bitcoin-related ETF, and the only one that has an active application before the securities regulator. Such an instrument would allow retail investors to get exposure to the bitcoin market without what some see as the added difficulty of owning bitcoin itself, potentially boosting market participation by individuals wary of bitcoins stance as an unregulated investment.

While its chances are slim the SEC has yet to approve any bitcoin ETF applications for a multitude of stated reasons the company was filing updates to its proposal as recently as last week in efforts to bolster its application.

Wilshire managing partner William Herrmann told CoinDesk that he was optimistic about the filing, saying in a phone call last week that we wouldn't have filed it if we didn't think that it would be approved.

To boost its chances, the amended S-1 filed on Feb. 14 now includes an entire additional section on underwriters, though no specific entities are named. The filing also now includes Wilshire Phoenixs maximum share price ($2,500), a number of shares it intends to register initially (8,040) (though this number is likely to change when the actual shares are being offered) and a note on the trust's fees (68 basis points).

The firm filed the ETF application in mid-2019, with the regulator repeatedly postponing any decision, leading to the final Feb. 26 deadline.

In rejecting ETFs previously, the SEC has pointed to concerns about market manipulation, the bitcoin markets overall size and a need for surveillance-sharing agreements as some factors it considers.

Wilshire is attempting to address these concerns by composing its ETF with a basket that automatically rebalances itself between U.S. Treasury bonds and bitcoin in response to the cryptocurrencys volatility. As volatility goes up, the basket favors bonds, and vice versa.

Herrmann previously told CoinDesk that in his view, this automatic rebalancing reduces the risk to investors.

The SEC certainly appears to be paying attention to the filing. According to public documents, Commissioners Hester Peirce and Allison Herren Lee both met with representatives from Wilshire Phoenix, NYSE Arca and their law firms.

The Division of Trading and Markets met with representatives from the companies in January, as well as twice last year, to discuss the proposal. Still, the SECs thinking on the proposal remains opaque.

Wilshires Herrmann, reiterating a point often brought up in favor of bitcoin ETFs, told CoinDesk the product would allow a wider group of investors to safely access what is essentially a new asset class.

"We want to provide easy access to strategies that are often only limited to institutions or accredited investors, Herrmann said. Restraining who is able to invest in any product or strategy on the basis of socioeconomic status or for any reason is simply wrong. This leaves many exposed to sudden market volatility followed by likely losses due to lack of diversification.

The bitcoin ETF Wilshire has proposed is actually one in a larger family of such products. The company has also filed to issue a gold and Treasury-backed ETF.

Herrmann said he believes creating multiple investment strategies for consumers is a part of its overall strategy.

"We're confident we will have the bitcoin ETF soon, and the gold ETF won't be far behind. We are aiming to launch a lot more products as well, Herrmann said.

The leader in blockchain news, CoinDesk is a media outlet that strives for the highest journalistic standards and abides by a strict set of editorial policies. CoinDesk is an independent operating subsidiary of Digital Currency Group, which invests in cryptocurrencies and blockchain startups.

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SEC to Decide the Fate of Another Bitcoin ETF Proposal This Week - CoinDesk - CoinDesk

Bitcoin's (BTC) price volatility spiked in January and could further increase over the near term because whales have surfaced.

The cryptocurrencys annualized volatility grew roughly eight percentage points in January to a three-month high of 58.2 percent, according to Krakens monthly report.

Volatility rose as bitcoins price rallied from lows near $6,850 on Jan. 3 to a three-month high of $9,570 on Jan. 31. The cryptocurrency closed out January with 30 percent gains, registering its best January performance since 2013.

With the price rally, whales - those buyers of large numbers of coins - seem to have woken from their long slumber. The number of whale addresses ones with balances ranging from 1K BTC to 10k BTC ticked higher in the second half of January, as noted by Krakens researchers.

The number of whale addresses increased from 2,000 to 2,030, marking a transition to an accumulation phase from the wait and see phase seen in the last four months of 2019.

Historically, that transition has injected volatility into the bitcoin market. For instance, whales began accumulating coins in September 2018 and entered wait-and-watch mode in early 2019. Meanwhile, the annualized volatility bottomed out below 20 percent by mid-November and skyrocketed to 100 percent by the end of December.

On similar lines, the spike in price volatility in the second quarter of 2019 was preceded by accumulation by large wallets.

The peculiar behavior could be associated with whales having the resources to affect the market with large orders.

During the accumulation phase, whales eat into market liquidity, Ashish Singhal, co-founder and CEO of CRUXPay and CoinSwitch.co told CoinDesk. That affects the supply-demand ratio and causes volatility to re-enter the market.

Sudden price swings have been observed during whales accumulation period. The cryptocurrencys sharp rise from $4,100 to $5,100, seen on April 2, 2019, was reportedly caused by an order worth about $100 million spread across three exchanges.

Whale action has also led to big price sell-offs in the past; a bitcoin flash crash from $12,600 to $12,100 in less than 15 minutes on July 9, 2019, was triggered by a massive sell order of 6,500 BTC on cryptocurrency exchange Binance.

Singhal added that HODLers addresses with balances ranging from 10 BTC to 100 BTC also influence liquidity and volatility. According to historical data, volatility tends to rise once the 10 to 100 BTC cohort concludes accumulation.

As the growth in the number of addresses with 10 to 100 BTC topped out in November 2018, volatility kicked in and rose sharply from 20 percent to 100 percent. A similar divergence between the two metrics was seen during the four months to mid-July 2019.

Currently, the 10 to 100 BTC cohort is in the accumulation phase, having bottomed out in November. The number of addresses have increased from 135,000 to 137,500 over the past three months.

"Family offices, high-net-worth individuals and proprietary trading accounts have been building BTC positions continuously in the 10 to 100 range. It's a sign of growing adoption of bitcoin as an investment," Gabor Gurbacs, digital asset strategist/director at VanEck/MVIS, told CoinDesk.

If HODLers exit the accumulation phase and whales continue to snap up coins over the coming weeks, the demand supply-imbalance could worsen, resulting in a big jump in volatility.

The problem, however, is that it is difficult to predict how long these periods of accumulation for HODLers will last, said Connor Abendschein, crypto research analyst at Digital Assets Data.

The ongoing accumulation by HODLers could last at least for a few more weeks, with the cryptocurrency set to undergo mining reward halving in three months.

The rewards per block mined on bitcoins blockchain will be reduced from 12.5 BTC to 6.25 BTC at some point in May. Essentially, miners would have fewer bitcoins to sell after May, and that could lead to a supply deficit.

In the past, markets have priced in the impending supply cut by rallying to a new market cycle top (the highest point from the preceding bear market low) in the calendar year of reward halving, but on a date before the event.

Thus, if history were to repeat itself, bitcoin could rise above the June 2019 high of $13,880 before May. With such strong bullish expectations dominating the market sentiment, HODLers are unlikely to end accumulation anytime soon.

However, that does not necessarily mean volatility would crash, as whales are also likely to continue accumulating coins ahead of the reward halving.

If the whales shift to accumulating bitcoin while HODLers are still within their current phase, it would suggest an additional increase in demand for BTC at near the same as the mining supply is scheduled to be cut in half in early May, Abendschein told CoinDesk. This imbalance has the potential to not only see a spike in volatility, but also in price.

The leader in blockchain news, CoinDesk is a media outlet that strives for the highest journalistic standards and abides by a strict set of editorial policies. CoinDesk is an independent operating subsidiary of Digital Currency Group, which invests in cryptocurrencies and blockchain startups.

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On-Chain Activity Suggests Bitcoin Price Volatility Will Continue, Thanks to 'Whales' - Coindesk

The Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) plummeted by 850 points upon opening, as fears towards the coronavirus outbreak hit its peak. Bitcoin also dropped by 3.5 percent on the day and is down by 8 percent in the past 11 days.

When fear strikes the global financial market, investors tend to eliminate the riskiest assets in their portfolio.

For most investors, the asset class with the highest level of risk is single stocks, and Bitcoin fits that category. Throughout the last 12 months, data from multi-billion dollar investment firms like Grayscale have shown a consistent inflow of capital into the bitcoin market from institutional investors.

The Q4 2019 report of Grayscale read:

Institutional investors, primarily hedge funds, continued to be the primary source of investment capital for 2019 (71%). However, larger investments from high-net-worth individuals added a meaningful $93.2 million of investment in 4Q19.

But, bitcoin is still too volatile and too small in terms of market capitalization compared to other traditional safe-haven assets like gold. At $177 billion, the total market cap of bitcoin is about 2.21 percent of golds market cap.

Bitcoin has likely dropped substantially against the USD in the past two weeks because of the shock that has penetrated into the international equities market and the Dow Jones.

In December 2018, when the bitcoin price fell abruptly from around $6,300 to $3,150, several strategists said that the uncertainty around the trade war could have prompted investors to sell high-risk assets including bitcoin amidst a Dow Jones correction.

BTC could possibly be seeing a similar trend; as the coronavirus outbreak in Italy and South Korea start to freeze up the Asian and European economy, investors are looking to sell the riskiest assets first.

Considering that the bitcoin price is up by around 50 percent year-to-date, the decent price action could sway investors to sell BTC at the height of geopolitical uncertainty.

Italy reported 130 confirmed cases of coronavirus overnight and South Korea is close to reaching 1,000 cases, all stemming from a single cult church that is suspected of having infected at least 400 individuals.

The Dow Jones and the rest of the equities market saw a sharp reaction from traders on the day, but the slump could worsen over time as coronavirus shows no signs of slowing down.

Dr. Gabriel Leung, the dean of medicine at the prestigious Hong Kong University, said that the peak of coronavirus is set to be reached in May.

The coronavirus outbreak rapidly expanding throughout Europe and Asia until May could have a detrimental impact on productivity and business sentiment.

In some regions like China, businesses have started to run short of cash and banks have reportedly been struggling to help businesses in need due to overwhelming demand.

Bitcoin, currently ranked #1 by market cap, is down 2.97% over the past 24 hours. BTC has a market cap of $174.73B with a 24 hour volume of $43.08B.

Chart by CryptoCompare

Bitcoin is down 2.97% over the past 24 hours.

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Why is the Bitcoin price crashing in tandem with the Dow Jones? - CryptoSlate

Cryptocurrency markets are on the move again: Category giant bitcoin has seen its tokens gain 40% in value in 2020 alone, and 155% over the last 52 weeks. If bitcoin was a stock, the "company" would be worth roughly $185 billion today. That market cap would land it right between aerospace titan Boeing and software giant Adobe as one of the 40 most valuable companies on the U.S. stock market.

Bitcoin's founders and supporters see it as "a new kind of money." As such, market watchers on both the bull and bear sides of the cryptocurrency debate often argue that the tokens -- currently trading in the neighborhood of $9,700 each -- will either skyrocket in value to at least $1 million, or bitcoin will collapse and die. There is no middle ground.

If bitcoin achieves a large enough scale and a wide enough acceptance to become a viable alternative to gold, silver, or national currencies as a value store, the cryptocurrency will have a bright future. If not, it's supposedly heading to zero in the end. The same goes for many other cryptocurrencies, and hundreds of them have already crashed and burned.

Image source: Getty Images.

So how big is the total cryptocurrency market as a value store today? Surprisingly small, actually:

Data sources: Coinmarketcap.com, SIFMA, World Federation of Exchanges, Golden Eagle Coin, JM Bullion. The chart uses the latest available value estimate for each category as of Feb. 19, 2020.

The stock and bond markets make the others look tiny. Let's zoom in on the precious metals and cryptocurrencies alone:

Data sources: Coinmarketcap.com, SIFMA, World Federation of Exchanges, Golden Eagle Coin, JM Bullion. The chart uses the latest available value estimate for each category as of Feb. 19, 2020.

Yeah, it's still difficult to see bitcoin and its crypto-peers next to the mountain of gold. I was surprised to see the relative lack of value in silver, but while modern mining companies extract more than 10 times as much silver every year than gold, ounce for ounce, gold is close to 90 times more valuable. And less than 5% of all the silver ever mined is in an investable form today -- coins or bullion. The rest has been used for jewelry, decoration, or by industry -- and a fair share of it has essentially been lost. You learn something new every day.

So where does this leave the cryptocurrency discussion? Well, neither bitcoin nor the crypto market as a whole stand anywhere near the multitrillion-dollar value levels of gold, bonds, and stocks. Investors looking for stable assets would clearly be better served to put their money into any of the three larger asset classes, not to mention alternatives such as real estate or owning your own business.

On the flip side, let's imagine a future where bitcoin (or some better-designed cryptocurrency) becomes a viable alternative to owning gold and reaches a similar market scale. If it's bitcoin, that would require its value to increase at least 40-fold from current levels. We're not likely to see a surge like that in a single upward run; bitcoin only multiplied 21-fold during its historic price run of 2017, and the volatility of investments tends to fall as the assets grow larger.

But many investors/speculators/visionaries/gamblers (pick your preferred epithet) are betting on that bullish outcome in this all-or-nothing asset class. Over a recent 24-hour period, $46 billion of bitcoin tokens changed hands, or 25% of the entire currency. That's huge next to the average daily dollar volumes of trading in Adobe ($734 million) or scandal-stricken Boeing ($2.15 billion). It's even enormous in comparison to trillion-dollar market behemoth Apple, whose average dollar volume clocks in at $8.8 billion.

It takes a lot of traders to move that much bitcoin in a single day, including plenty of deep-pocketed market makers. Bitcoin's trading volumes have never been this overheated, not even at the peak of 2017's crypto-mania, when daily trading topped out near $23 billion.

I wouldn't be surprised to see bitcoin and friends making a big move soon as the higher trading pressure either becomes the new normal or pops and drops. Whether the cryptocurrency market rises or falls, I'm content to simply hold on to my tiny crypto portfolio, which consists of a $20 "let's try this" whim from six years ago.

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Will Bitcoin Ever Be a Serious Alternative to Gold and Stocks? - The Motley Fool

Its happened: Bitcoin and cryptocurrency got their own segment, albeit brief, on The Simpsons one of televisions most popular shows. Ever.

So what exactly happened during that segment? And more importantly, how is the industry responding to it?

To create hype for the episode (S31, E13) of The Simpsons being realized on Sunday night, the show released a short segment of the upcoming episode: a Simpsonified Jim Parsons, the actor behind Sheldon in The Big Bang Theory, explaining crypto currency.

During the segment, Parsons briefly explained how blockchain is essential to the function of Bitcoin, then explained how the chain works, including its distributions and how blocks are added to the chain.

The segment, which was somewhat factually questionable at times, also included a joking caption card, in which the show makers joked that they know who Satoshi is, but were not telling, and also joked by writing That is a total pile of cryptocurrency, referencing the more profanity-filled version of that phrase.

Crypto Twitter has quickly become enamored with this two-minute segment, sharing it everywhere and anywhere. No one has yet come to a conclusive opinion on how what was said will affect public perception of the industry.

This segment comes as his writer has noticed a strong uptick in mainstream media outlets (CNN, Bloomberg, Barrons, Financial Times, etc.) covering Bitcoin and the broader industry.

With mainstream mentions of Bitcoin and cryptocurrency by shows like The Simpsons and outlets as well-known as CNN, it should come as no surprise that data indicates retail investors are flooding back into the industry.

Late last month, analyst CryptoKeanotedthat search interest for Buy Bitcoin just recently reached a seven-month high, reaching a level of 10 per his analysis. This is important because a strong uptick in interest for the aforementioned term, which most attribute to consumers, not institutions, marked the start of 2017s effectively parabolic rally to $20,000.

Not to mention, our analysis found that interest from Googlers in altcoin, Bitcoin halving, Ethereum, amongst other terms, have started to grow.

Also, industry researcher from The Block Larry Cermak recently pointed out that Coinbases average daily volume has shot up in February, which has historically been a really good sign [for] the market.

The numbers indicate that the exchange saw an average of $342.46 million worth of trading volume every day in February thus far. $342.46 million is nearly three times that of the average seen in December 2019.

Original post:
The Simpsons Just Ran a Bitcoin Segment, and Crypto Twitter Is Raving About It - newsBTC

On Feb. 20 Bitcoin (BTC) price surprisingly dropped 8.85%, a move which caught many investors off guard as up to that moment the digital asset had recovered well from the Presidents Day weekend correction and was trading sideways in the $10,200 range. Citing data from CoinMetrics, ARK Invest crypto analyst Yassine Elmandjra tweeted that the $1,000 price drop was the fifth largest USD correction to occur on the hourly time frame since 2017.

Since the sharp downside move, traders, analysts, and crypto-Twitter have been attempting to pinpoint the source of the flash crash and a handful of theories have arisen. Some have attributed the volatility to the consecutive unplanned Binance exchange outages which halted trading on the platform and prevented many traders from being able to log into their accounts.

Others, like, Cointelegraph contributor and Bitcoin trader filbfilb speculated that a shortage of Tether (USDT) at Binance could possibly have contributed to the current market conditions.

In his Telegram-based trading channel filbfilb explained that the USDT shortage possibly shows that the majority of traders were in long positions, an observation further supported by the decreasing pace of Bitcoins momentum and the liquidation of $120 million leveraged longs at BitMex.

BitMEX XBTUSD Liquidations. Source: Skew.com

Regardless of the reason, the drop to $9,346 shook a lot of investors from their Bitcoin and altcoin positions and the current state of the market is negatively impacting investors bullish sentiment as they are choosing to wait on the sidelines for a clearer signal that a bottom has been reached.

Crypto Fear & Greed Index. Source: Alternative.me

Is the current price action a buy the dip opportunity or is Bitcoin on the verge of a significant trend change? Lets check the charts to see.

BTC USDT daily chart. Source: TradingView

As shown by the daily chart, Bitcoin formed a tweezer top candlestick pattern at $10,250 after recovering from the previous weekends drop to $9,450. This should have been a signal that the likelihood of a pullback could occur but traders were probably feeling bullish after Bitcoins quick recovery from $9,450 placed the digital asset back above key support levels.

Despite the shock caused by yesterdays correction Bitcoin price still found support at the high volume node of the volume profile visible range (VPVR) at $9,300 to $9,438. While this is reassuring, some cautionary notes are low purchasing volume which highlights a lack of buyers interested in stepping into the current dip and the state of the two most frequently referenced oscillators by traders not yet registering oversold conditions.

BTC USDT 6-hour chart. Source: TradingView

On the 6-hour timeframe, the relative strength index (RSI) has yet to manage an oversold bounce and the moving average convergence divergence (MACD) line continues to plummet, pressing on -100 at the time of writing.

Traders will also notice that the MACD histogram bars continue to elongate in negative territory (below 0) and the pattern of lower highs in the 6-hour chart is unbroken.

If buyers continue to believe the current price action is not a buy the dip opportunity the price could drop below the VPVR high volume node ($9,438) and the 200-day moving average at $8,800 where there is another VPVR high volume node.

The shorter timeframe shows the price slowly making higher lows but the purchasing volume is not significant enough to hold the price above $9,600. Over the short-term, bulls need to defend the $9,500 support (black arrow on chart below) as the daily and weekly timeframe shows it to be a key level. A more significant trend change could push the price lower to $8,800 to $8,400.

If we zoom out to assess Bitcoins price action since reaching its 2019 top at $13,800 on June 26, 2018, we can see that the 38.2% Fibonacci Retracement level has been a frequent area where the price has bounced after strong corrections.

BTC USDT daily chart. Source: TradingView

Since June 26, 2018, the price has bounced here more than 10 times and yesterdays pullback brought the price to the 38.6% level again. Its crucial that the price stays above this level because the 38.6% Fibonacci retracement has also functioned as a strong resistance once the price dips below it.

On the flip side, assuming the price breaks out, we can also see that the last three Bitcoin rallies on October 12, 2019,February 12, 2020, and February 18, 2020, have failed to break above the 50% Fibonacci Retracement level. Thus, Bitcoin price needs to secure a few daily closes above $10,250 (50% Fibonacci retracement) before any calls for $11,000 can be seriously considered.

For the short term, Bitcoin price needs to knock out $9,630 and above this price, $9,750 is likely to function as a level of resistance. A more convincing maneuver would be to see Bitcoin price overtake the 20-MA of the Bollinger Band indicator and sustain above $9,850.

The views and opinions expressed here are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of Cointelegraph. Every investment and trading move involves risk. You should conduct your own research when making a decision.

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Bitcoin Price Fights to Hold $9.5K to Stave Off a Trend Reversal - Cointelegraph

Bitcoin failed to climb convincingly above $10,200 against the US Dollar. As a result, BTC declined heavily below $9,800 and it is now vulnerable for a bigger a correction.

Yesterday, we discussed the importance of the $10,200 resistance area for bitcoin against the US Dollar. BTC price made two attempts to clear the $10,200 and $10,300 resistance levels.

However, the bulls failed to gain traction above $10,200. A swing high was formed near the $10,300 level and the price declined heavily below the $10,000 support area.

Moreover, yesterdays major bearish trend line acted as a strong hurdle near $10,200 on the hourly chart of the BTC/USD pair. The pair fell more than 5% and traded below the $9,800 and $9,700 levels.

Bitcoin

Similarly, there was a strong decline in Ethereum below $270 and ripple dived below $0.2850. Bitcoin even spiked below the $9,500 support area and traded to a new weekly low at $9,344.

It is currently correcting higher above the $9,500 level, plus the 23.6% Fib retracement level of the recent decline from the $10,301 high to $9,344 low. On the upside, there are many important hurdles forming for the bulls, starting with the $9,750 level.

The first key resistance is near the $9,800 and $9,820 levels. Besides, the 50% Fib retracement level of the recent decline from the $10,301 high to $9,344 low is near $9,823 to act as a strong resistance.

Therefore, bitcoin price must clear the $9,820 resistance to make another attempt for a clear break above the $10,200 resistance.

If BTC fails to continue above the $9,800 and $9,820 resistance levels, there is a risk of more downsides. An initial support is near the $9,500 level.

A daily close below $9,500 might push bitcoin in a bearish zone. In the mentioned case, the bears are likely to aim a test of the $9,000 support area.

Technical indicators:

Hourly MACD The MACD is now gaining strength in the bearish zone.

Hourly RSI (Relative Strength Index) The RSI for BTC/USD is now well below the 40 level.

Major Support Levels $9,500 followed by $9,200.

Major Resistance Levels $9,750, $9,800 and $10,000.

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Bitcoin Just Signaled Sell And Its Vulnerable to a Massive Correction - newsBTC

Bitcoin Gold (BTG)s price is being manipulated by a whale controlling close to half of the circulating supply. These are the findings of an analysis conducted by an independent trader and analyst, who preferred to remain anonymous.

He published his findings in a blog post, where he explained why he believes a single group of people accumulated their way into a huge Bitcoin Gold position, and are now using that supply to control the market.

The events started in August 2018, when Bitfinex margin long positions began its sharp ascent to include almost two million BTG. The exchange makes its margin data publicly available, which can help gauge the general trader sentiment in a particular coin for example by comparing the ratio of short and long positions.

BTG/USD Longs on Bitfinex. Source: TradingView.

In Bitcoin Golds case, the strong increase in margin positions was accompanied by lackluster price action. While the coin generally followed the broader crypto market, the price eventually spiraled downward.

BTG/USD on Bitfinex. Source: TradingView.

The analyst estimated that the 1.9 million BTG held at some point in Bitfinex represents between 38% and 48% of its total circulating supply.

Bitcoin Gold was born in 2017 after a network fork from Bitcoin (BTC), thus maintaining its original history up until that point. This means that Bitcoin Gold contains at least as many inactive coins as its parent, including Satoshis cache.

He further elaborated how he reached that figure:

Over 11 million Bitcoins (BTC) havent moved in the last year. Considering big wallets unwillingness to claim their coins due to fear of private key leak for a minimal return, it can be argued that a number even larger than 11 million BTGs are inactive or lost forever.

He then estimated a figure of 4 to 5 million active BTG. When asked by Cointelegraph why he is so certain that this is the work of one whale, he explained:

The accumulation was very consistent and systematic over the course of almost a year, it would be almost impossible for it to be a coincidence that multiple entities were using the exact same system to accumulate.

The analyst also conducted a manual analysis of the average entry price for the whale. By comparing the number of coins bought each day with their price, he arrived at a figure of $22.86 as the break-even price.

Following the extensive accumulation, the whale began using its position to influence markets. In early January, Bitcoin Golds price rose in consecutive moves by up to 200%, from $5 to $15. Margin positions dropped precipitously just as the upward move was complete.

BTG/USD Longs with price superimposed. Source: TradingView.

No major announcements were posted at the time on Bitcoin Golds Twitter account, which highlights the potential for fabricated price action. The analyst further noticed that Bitfinexs wallets were subsequently drained of a significant chunk of BTG.

He conducted a test on Binance, which showed that it was not the destination wallet. A volume comparison points to Korean exchange Bithumb as the likely receiver of these funds. The analyst argues that this is part of the whales distribution strategy, which would have external retail traders join in a fabricated pump to let the whale offload the coins.

Comparison of exchange activity. Source: Onlyforesight.com and TradingView.

The price was, however, held back from rising due to a powerful sell wall on Bitfinex, around $15. The increased activity on Bithumb led the analyst to conclude that the whale could be Korean, as the exchange requires a national Social Security Number to create an account.

The sudden decrease in Bitfinex margin could also be explained by the whale divesting from BTG. The analyst argues that the trading group simply claimed its position:

I think the whale was planning on selling on Bitfinex originally, and then realized there wasn't enough liquidity to exit there, so now they're forced to send their coins to another exchange (by first 'claiming' their margin position, and then withdrawing).

Claiming is the act of settling a margin position by compensating the amount loaned in full.

These market manipulation tactics have since been observed on Binance. As the analyst explained:

Bitfinex acts as a suppression mechanism; every time the price tries to increase on Binance, Bitfinex holds it back. People (and bots) see the difference, and try to pounce on the arbitrage opportunity. However, by the time people transfer their BTGs from Bitfinex to Binance, the gap has already closed and the prices equalize.

This can be clearly seen in Feb. 10 trading. As shown in the picture below, candles on Bitfinex have a clean cut around $13.8, while the price on Binance clearly moved past the barrier.

BTG/USD on Bitfinex and Binance (orange line), H1 candles on Feb. 10. Source: TradingView.

Given the scale and amount of time invested into BTG accumulation, the analyst argued that the traders will seek a substantial profit:

It is expected that the price of BTG will multiply in value from the current value of ~$12 (as of this post) and increase a substantial amount from the $22.86 projected breakeven price.

He conjectured that a potential target could be $100, which could result in a maximum profit of $150 million. The current attempts at price suppression are necessary to not let interest burn out too quickly, as the analyst explained:

If the price rises too fast, its destined to downtrend for an extended period as people gradually take profits and there is no-one to buy up the increasing supply hitting the market.

There are currently no signs that point to the Bitcoin Gold team having anything to do with this market manipulation. The developers did not respond to Cointelegraphs request for comment.

Original post:
Bitcoin Gold Is Held Captive by Whale With Almost Half the Supply - Cointelegraph

Bitcoin's price has rallied, posting positive price structure, but it is still too soon to declare a ... [+] longer-term trend change, analyst John Bollinger explained. (Photo by INA FASSBENDER / AFP) (Photo by INA FASSBENDER/AFP via Getty Images)

[Ed note: Investing in cryptocoins or tokens is highly speculative and the market is largely unregulated. Anyone considering it should be prepared to lose their entire investment.]

January has yielded several bouts of upward price action for bitcoin as the asset looks back on an overall positive start to 2020. John Bollinger, financial analyst, trader, author and originator of the Bollinger Bands technical chart indicator, said he sees positive structure on bitcoins chart, but its too soon to declare a longer-term bullish trend reversal.

Im very constructive on bitcoins price right now, Bollinger told me in an interview on January 27, 2020 while bitcoins held near $8,800. Weve completed a meaningful bottom formation, he added referring to bitcoins price chart.

We broke out, pulled back from very short term, made a little test of the breakout level and rallied higher, Bollinger continued. Bitcoin then proceeded to fall back to the midline of the Bollinger Band indicator before bouncing and heading higher in price, he added.

After starting 2019 below the $4,000 mark, bitcoin experienced an exuberant price run between April and June 2019, taking the asset up past $13,800 per coin by Junes end, according to Coinbases BTC chart on TradingView.com Bitcoins price fell on difficult times in the latter half of 2019, however, posting successive lower rally attempts until the end of the year, signaling the presence of a downward bearish price trend.

In contrast, 2020 so far has yielded positive price action for cryptos pioneer asset. Bitcoin began the year around the $7,000 mark, posting a seeming bottom-like price formation, as Bollinger mentioned. The asset has since rallied in price from its chart bottom near $7,000.

Most recently, bitcoin rose from approximately $7,700 to almost $9,200 on January 19. The coin then fell down to $8,250 by January 24, finding support in that region before rallying to a press time price of $9,265.

Its a pretty constructive pattern, Bollinger said, adding to his initial comments. The expert noted bitcoin formed its price chart base pattern between November 2019 and early January 2020. So far were progressing pretty well, he said.

Bollinger pointed to a tweet he posted on January 23 which expressed that bitcoins pullback to the middle Bollinger Band near $8,300 made sense as a support level.

I pointed out on Twitter a couple days ago that what bitcoin needed to do was hold support here at the middle Bollinger Band, and thats exactly what its done, Bollinger told me.

It held support. Weve had two days of rally now and I think the price of bitcoin looks higher.

Bitcoins recent rally begs the question has cryptos top asset broken its downtrend that began last summer? I think its a little bit early to be convinced of that, Bollinger said.

We just made an intermediate term bottom and just started up we need some more evidence here in terms of a bigger picture, but I think the outlook is pretty constructive right now.

Crypto trader and Brave New Coin analyst Josh Olszewicz (CarpeNoctom onTwitter) expressed similar sentiment on January 28. Well know how bullish we are in two weeks, Olszewicz told me in a Telegram message. Mentioning multiple charting signals, including the Ichimoku Cloud and a moving average golden cross, the trader added, All trend metrics point bullish soon.

Additionally, Olszewicz said his statement applies to the entire crypto market. This is across the board on everything, not just BTC, he noted.

Despite bitcoins exuberant history and optimistic charts, some folks still remain bearish on the asset as a whole, including Berkshire Hathaway CEO Warren Buffett, who called bitcoin a gambling device in 2019, according to a CNBC report.

Disclaimer: I actively trade cryptocurrencies, as well as hold a small amount of BTC, ETH, LTC, XMR, NEO, ZEC, BEAM, BCH, DASH, LINK, XTZ andvarious insignificant other altcoin positions.

Originally posted here:
Still Too Early To Declare Longer-Term Bitcoin Trend Change - Forbes