More than 60% profit in one month. This is the parabolic trajectory that bitcoin has been on since the launch of spot ETFs in the United States. Enough to improve the record from 2021 by crossing the limit of 69,170 dollars (approximately 63,700 euros) on Tuesday, March 5. A step that comes barely 10 days later a note from the European Central Bank Compare Bitcoin with “a failure”.
The European monetary institution was undoubtedly delighted to see the cryptocurrency, and the entire market, collapse from record highs with an eye-popping crash: within a few hours, bitcoin fell to around $60,000. A drop of more than 10%, according to Coinglass, caused almost a billion dollars in liquidations in leveraged markets, before… rising just as quickly to stabilize around $65,000.
Will the return to upside continue with the halving?
Despite this crushing move, often a way to wipe out over-indebted traders through excessive leverage operations, many factors seem to indicate that bitcoin is not yet done with records.
First, most non-public sales counters no longer have bitcoin stocks available, according to reports from analytics site Glassnode. This means that supply currently does not meet demand.
An imbalance that will persist since the halving, an automatic mechanism written into the bitcoin code that halves the creation of new tokens every four years, takes place in a month. Only 450 bitcoins will be produced per day, compared to 900 today. Historically, the price always exploded after each halving. Here the increase is taking place even earlier: a phenomenon that can be attributed to the new demand caused by the use of ETFs.
NFT ordinal numbers are exploding
Another factor, more marginal but notable, could also put some more pressure on cryptocurrency: the new excitement surrounding Ordinals, these NFTs registered on the Bitcoin blockchain. After a large drop in volume last summer, speculation around this market has resumed in recent weeks: last week this segment generated almost $170 million in transactions according to Dune analysisreplacing the $162 million Ethereum blockchain, normally queen of NFTs.
Ether, the next big winner?
In its wake, Bitcoin is dragging ether, the currency of the Ethereum blockchain, to the point of returning to its high of November 3, 2021, when a unit was trading around $4,600. Currently listed at $3,700, ether is also causing a lot of speculation Spossible integration into spot ETFs, such as bitcoin at the beginning of the year. At the invitation of asset managers Blackrock and Fidelity to decide this Monday, March 4, on the authorization of such a financial product, the SEC (US Financial Police Officer) has postponed its decision until May 23, but there is little doubt about a positive outcome. markets.