Optimism returned to the cryptocurrency market on March 17, after a brighter economic forecast from the U.S. Federal Reserve and comments that suggested the possibility of an interest rate hike in 2022 if employment and economic indicators continue to improve.
Data from Cointelegraph Markets and TradingView shows that Bitcoin struggled below the $ 57,000 level during the first hours of trading until the U.S. Federal Reserve’s announcement triggered a recovery that led BTC to an intraday high of $ 58,243.
The bullish momentum for the main cryptocurrency began to grow after it was revealed that institutional banking giant Morgan Stanley will soon offer certain investors access to three funds that allow customers to own Bitcoin.
Additional validation for the continuation of the current bull market came from Bitcoin flow stock creator PlanB, who feels that BTC “will not stop” at $ 100,000 and can reach an average price of up to $ 288,000 with its highest record until higher.
Traditional markets recover after Powell’s comments
After moderate trading in the early hours of Wednesday, the stock markets saw an increase in activity following comments by Fed Chairman Jerome Powell, which spurred stocks and major indices.
The S&P 500, Dow and NASDAQ closed the day up 0.29%, 0.58% and 0.40%, respectively. The 10-year US Treasury note also increased from 1.23% to 1.641
Altcoins gain momentum as gray scale offers exposure
Selected altcoins also rose after Grayscale Investments announced that it had added five new products to its line, offering exposure to Basic Attention Token (BAT), Chainlink (LINK), Decentraland (MANA), Filecoin (FIL) and Livepeer (LPT).
ANNOUNCEMENT: 5 new products have been added to @Grayscale line up!
Basic attention token $ BAT
Chain link $ LINK
Decentraland $ MANA
Filecoin $ FIL
Livepeer $ LPTInterested? https://t.co/YfK2YUKgCj pic.twitter.com/jLqDph4MEH
– Michael Sonnenshein (@Sonnenshein) March 17, 2021
The announcement generated price hikes for all projects involved, with Livepeer seeing the biggest impact, as its price soared more than 260%, from a low of $ 5.53 to a new historic high of $ 20.21.
At the time of writing, FIL has risen 40.7% to a price of $ 89, MANA has risen 7.3% to a price of $ 1.01 and BAT has increased 44% to set a new historical record for $ 1.36.
The overall capitalization of the cryptocurrency market is now $ 1.8 trillion and Bitcoin’s dominance rate is 60.9%.
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