Mooners and Shakers: Bitcoin JOLTS up; Coinbase launches international exchange

Bitcoin had a wee boost in the wee hours (AEST) last night, pretty much straight after the latest US JOLTS jobs data came to light. Oh, you weren’t up waiting for that info, either? Fair enough.

Meanwhile, Coinbase has just made an announcement of some significance for its business model, in light of its struggles with regulators in the US. You can read about that, in brief, further below.

As for price action and chart movements, the S&P 500 and Nasdaq closed in the red (which ususally means slumpy crypto prices, too), but Bitcoin and pals ticked up a percentage point or two. The US Dollar Index (DXY), incidentally, has pulled back a fraction (-0.21%).

As our very own non-fungible macro guru Eddy Sunarto pointed out in his early-bird-gets-the-worm Market Highlights roundup:

“Last night’s US JOLTS data provided some optimism that the US labour market is softening, which could allow the Fed to refrain from remaining aggressive.”

Here’s hoping, eh, Eddy?

Those crypto investors who manage to put down the PEPE hopium pipe for half a minute and look around the macroscape might consider that labour markets probably need to cool off for inflation to decline. And that inflation-combatting interest-rate hikes are a pain in the butt for risk assets like crypto (and indeed most assets).

There are plenty of bearish voices about, however, regarding the outcome of the FOMC meeting and what the Fed has in store beyond it.

“Regardless of what is going to be said on Wednesday, I struggle to see how the markets would think that the Fed is definitely done with its hiking cycle,” noted Erik Weisman, chief economist of MFS Investment Management.

Eddy has more details in his must-read roundup.

 

Top 10 overview

We’re still seeing a hell of a lot of difference in opinion out there from crypto swing traders and analysts. And when we say “out there”, we mean on Crypto Twitter.

Here’s Justin Bennett, for example, who has been watching the US Dollar Index closely, which is so very often inversely correlated to the fortunes of risk assets such as crypto. He’s pointing out a “higher high” for the DXY here, which can be a sign of potential continuation in technical analytical land.

“Roman”, meanwhile, has other ideas about it all just at the moment…

As for another go-to Crypto Twittering analyst, Dutchman Michael van de Poppe, he thinks Bitcoin’s not finished the frisson upwards that’s seen it become one of the best-performing assets so far this year.

Paints a decent short-midterm picture, there. For altcoins, too. Would be nice if it plays out like that.

 

Uppers and downers

Some of the biggest 24-hour gainers and losers at press time. (Stats accurate at time of publishing, based on CoinGecko.com data.)

PUMPERS (11-100 market cap position)

• Stacks (STX), (market cap: US$1.03 billion) +10%

• Rocket Pool (RPL), (market cap: US$940 million) +5%

• Synthetix Network (SNX), (market cap: US$774 million) +5%

• Optimism (OP), (market cap: US$681 million) +4%

• Conflux (CFX), (market cap: US$653 million) +2%

 

PUMPERS (lower, lower caps)

• Wojak (WOJAK), (market cap: US$56 million) +157%

• DinoLFG (DINO), (market cap: US$23 million) +110%

• Radicle (RAD), (market cap: US$194 million) +47%

• Cult DAO (CULT), (market cap: US$28 million) +44%

 

SLUMPERS

• Radix (XRD), (market cap: US$935 million) -9%

• Render (RNDR), (mc: US$748 million) -6%

• Pepe (PEPE), (mc: US$479 million) -3%

• MultiverX (EGLD), (mc: US$1.02 billion) -2%

• VeChain (VET), (mc: US$1.53 billion) -1%

 

Around the blocks: Coinbase makes moves of its own

Some pertinence and randomness that stuck with us on our morning moves through the Crypto Twitterverse.