Market Wrap: Bitcoin Rangebound as XRP plummets after SEC lawsuit

The price of Bitcoin continues to trade below $ 24,000, as legal action against Ripple Labs has shaken the XRP market. Bitcoin is the only asset on CoinDesk20 with a positive 24-hour return starting at 4 pm ET.

The price of bitcoin has fluctuated between $ 22,000 and $ 24,000 since Friday.

Despite its monstrous recovery in the fourth quarter of 2020, bitcoin’s volatility remained low. There was a slight increase in December, as bitcoin continued to set new records, but the 180-day volatility is at its lowest levels since February 2017, according to Coin Metrics data.

Nobody knows where the next price goes. But on Twitter, Ki Young Ju, CEO of cryptocurrency data provider CryptoQuant, shared his optimism, saying, “BTC will break $ 25,000 without testing $ 21,000 again.”

Part of the reason for Ju’s forecast is Coinbase’s large outflows, which could be seen as transfers to Coinbase’s cold storage after new over-the-counter deals for institutional customers.

Sharing Ju’s market vision, Zoran Scekic, managing partner of cryptocurrency trading firm Zorax Capital, also accessed Twitter, calling bitcoin’s market conditions a “consolidation or bullish” trend. Regardless of what it is called, the current bitcoin trend has resulted in more than 200% of cumulative returns for the year, with a gain of around 20% so far in December.

Along the way, bitcoin’s correlation with traditional markets continued to weaken, according to Coin Metrics data, with the 90-day correlation between bitcoin and the S&P 500 stock index at its lowest level since shortly before. of the market crash in March 2020.

Following news of the SEC’s lawsuit against Ripple, XRP investors are facing an unhappy Christmas weekend. The fifth largest cryptocurrency by market cap fell more than 40% on Wednesday at 21:00 UTC (4 pm ET), trading hands at around $ 0.27.

Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse warned on Monday that the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) planned to file a lawsuit, according to previous reports from CoinDesk. Certainly, on Tuesday afternoon, the SEC filed a lawsuit that alleged that Ripple Labs violated federal securities laws by selling the XRP cryptocurrency to retail consumers.

Some organizations are waiting to see this news, such as Ripple partner MoneyGram, which said it has yet to see any “negative impact” on its business deals with Ripple after the SEC lawsuit.

But some investors are not being so patient. Bitwise cryptocurrency financial manager settled his $ 9.3 million XRP after news of the SEC lawsuit. “The Fund liquidated its position and reinvested earnings in other assets in the portfolio,” wrote Bitwise to clients.

Digital assets at CoinDesk 20 fell on Wednesday. Bitcoin is the only asset on the index with a positive 24-hour return starting at 21:00 UTC (16:00 ET), reporting a 0.4% gain.

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