Mazel Tov. Bitcoin crossed the $30,000 price upwards again this week, for the first time since June of last year, completing a jump of over 100% from the low recorded at the end of last year, and over 80% since the beginning of the year. What causes Bitcoin to rise again like the phoenix even though quite a few praise it time and time again, among them the world’s most respected policymakers and investors (Charlie Munger, Jamie Dimon, Jerome Powell, to name just a few), and after decrees Variations imposed on the market operators by tough regulators (more on that later)? The simple answer is that ultimately prices are determined in the market by an equation of demand and supply. In the meantime this provides a very hard floor for the price of Bitcoin, which rises higher each time. An examination of both sides of the equation points to Bitcoin’s strengths and the reason for the surprising durability displayed by the maligned currency.
On the demand side, it seems that the potential is still huge. This is a global product with “potential customers” in the form of all of humanity, and meanwhile only fractions of a percentage of it has already been exposed to the market. People decide to “throw a few pennies, what can happen” on Bitcoin, institutions think that some exposure can’t hurt too much, and an ever-increasing supply of devices offering Bitcoin exposure or additional investment options to the market all the time, as more and more people enter the market. In the end, the number of potential customers of the product still includes several billion people, and even if a small part of them continues to join, a stream of investors is created that creates a stable supply.
This is, apparently, the reason that, although there is still no clear concrete use of the currency, the equation of supply and demand continues to support the price of the currency, which is followed by the other cryptocurrencies. So is there intrinsic value or no intrinsic value? Is there a practical use or not? As long as the current equilibrium lasts it is less interesting, at least as far as the price is concerned.
God-SEC Opens another front
It’s starting to look like a working method. senior officials ofSEC, the American Securities and Exchange Commission, are interviewed and express one or another concern, a short time later a lawsuit is filed, often against side players rather than the powerful ones, and then it becomes a new rule designed to narrow the steps of the crypto players, to which the entire market must align. It seems that this method opened another front this week, following a lawsuit filed by theSEC Against a small player in the field of crypto trading – Beaxy.com Which could turn into a huge lawsuit against Coinbase. God-SEC Trying to gain precedents against the small players who will later become tools against the big ones.
For example, two years ago a lawsuit was filed against Poloniex alleging violation of the Securities Authority’s laws in the sale of unlisted securities. Now this is one of the main issues in the regulatory dispute as also reflected in the lawsuit against Ripple, and as it appears from other lawsuits and additional actions by the SEC. An enforcement activist against the Kraken exchange calls into question the entire “staking” industry, which faces a serious boost with this week’s expected upgrade to the Ethereum network. The two companies reached an agreement to settle the claims against theSEC without reaching a trial, but having created the basis on which they will be able toSEC to act against larger platforms, led by Coinbase, which, as I recall, resented the SEC’s claims regarding staking.
The lawsuit against Bixie also appears to be a preparation for a larger lawsuit or regulatory activity against the largest player in the United States – Coinbase. after the chairman of theSEC Gary Gensler has spoken out on the issue several times, the Bixie company has now announced that it has received a lawsuit claiming that it simultaneously operates trading, brokerage, custody and clearing services – which by law requires separate companies. Gensler previously argued that such activity constitutes a conflict of interest, and now the lawsuit is also coming, but not against Coinbase, which operates in exactly the same way, but through a smaller company. B-SEC They probably think that before messing with the big thugs it is better to create some precedents against weaker players, and then reach a big lawsuit. At least that’s what some of the activists in the field think.
Wondering what the SEC case against Coinbase might look like?
Look at the charges in today’s SEC case against crypto trading platform Beaxy & its executives re operating an unregistered exchange, broker & clearing agency. The SEC crypto-sweep runneth over.https://t.co/vLEcdDcufQ pic.twitter.com/qvGk18bWvA— John Reed Stark (@JohnReedStark) March 29, 2023
More news from last week
Ethereum upgrade It went through successfully and now those who did “staking” will be able to gradually withdraw their money. This will encourage more investors to participate in the network’s activity and is expected to have a positive effect on the price of the Ether currency in the long term. The concerns were that in the short term there would be an immediate withdrawal of funds, however, at least in relation to the first day after the upgrade, the currency responded positively with a jump of about 10% in its price.
“Bitcoin shares” surge after crossing the $30,000 mark; are on the rise of hundreds of percent since the beginning of the year. There are several companies on Wall Street which for many investors are equivalent to investing in the Bitcoin currency – how much more can they continue to rise? (To the full article).
Musk returned the The bird logo for Twitter, Dogecoin lost all gains. The “hmm” currency has fallen in the last four days back to the price it was before Musk’s move, did he just give his prosecutors more material against him? (To the full article).
Lending against NFT – The market for loans against tokens continues to grow and crossed the billion dollar mark, according to data from the DUNE company. The NFT market did indeed experience a dramatic drop in value due to the bursting of the bubble that characterized it about a year ago, but now the volatility has decreased and there is a sense of a certain maturity even in this strange market that allows more people to feel comfortable with this type of collateral.
Solana comes back to life and leads the gains since the beginning of the year among the 30 largest currencies. In the past, Solana reached to be among the 5 largest currencies in the world, however, in light of repeated failures of the network that had to stop its activities more than once, and the increased competition in the market of smart contract networks, together with the general decline in the crypto market, brought it out of the top ten and a significant decrease in value. Now it is again in 10th place in terms of market size, or 8 if you don’t consider the stablecoins. In the last week, the singer jumped by another 23%. The Solana network is expected to launch a smartphone called Saga that should facilitate use related to crypto in general and the Solana ecosystem in particular.
Everyone has a story. What will yours be?
Start your Saga on 4.13.2023
Solana Mobile Saga Launch Event
Thursday, 4.13.2023, 10am Pacific Time
What did the major currencies do this week?
Binance Coin (BNB) +6.9%.
Cardano (ADA) +15.7%.
Dogecoin (DOGE) +6.2%.
Polygon (MATIC) +6.1%.