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In today’s article, we will do a brief analysis on USDT’s depeg situation and price actions of major crypto assets.
The stablecoin ecosystem, which plays an important role in bridging traditional finance with its decentralized counterpart, has been under enormous pressure and scrutiny for the past few months. Post algorithmic stablecoin UST’s collapse, sources report that major hedge funds are trying to short tether (USDT) by borrowing millions of dollars in loans. Tether is by far the largest stablecoin by market capitalization at over $65 billion. A stablecoin is a type of crypto asset that is pegged to an asset like the U.S. Dollar and claims to be backed by reserves that allow holders to redeem their stablecoins for the asset in question. USDT is currently trading on exchanges at $0.9989, slightly below its peg.
For years, many sources claimed that Tether was not 100% backed by reserves, had exposure to real estate giant Evergrande and short-term debts like Chinese commercial paper etc. The officials at Tether have continued to dispel doubts and fears as they haven’t failed at any redemptions in the past. In fact, according to its CTO, Tether has reaffirmed that all USDTs is redeemed for $1 (even though it's depegged) and has done $7 billion in redemptions in the last 48 hours.
For the past week, Bitcoin (BTC) has been sandwiched between $20,000 and $21,900 and its price movements are majorly affected by the major financial markets like Nasdaq. Adding more woes, Russia has defaulted on its international bonds for the first time in a century rendering its assets to the tune of $40 billion untouchable. While many argued that BTC is on the verge of a breakout to the upside, the macroeconomic conditions doesn’t warrant an extended rally even if it were to occur.
The short-term support has formed at $19,637 while the major resistance stands at $21,888. BTC is currently trading at $20,890 negating last week's gains. Market participants are vying for a full-on V-shaped recovery though the conditions are unlikely for it to happen. Despite the collapse of big decentralized finance (DeFi) companies, traditional companies like Goldman Sachs and crypto exchanges like FTX have stepped in to alleviate the insolvency issues by striking deals with Voyager, BlockFi and Celsius.
Ethereum (ETH), the second largest crypto asset by market capitalization, has been trying to hold strong against a heavy bearish climate. ETH is currently at $1,200, down by 2% in the last 24 hours. Ethereum has a major and crucial upgrade called the “Merge” dubbed as Ethereum 2.0. The upgrade, which will aid ETH network transition from proof-of-work (PoW) to proof-of-stake (PoS), has been in the pipeline for a long time. If the upgrade were to occur, major challenges faced by ETH like high gas fess, traffic congestion etc are likely to be solved.
Among the top 100 altcoins, most of the crypto assets flashed red as BTC got turned down near the $21,000 region except for Chiliz (CHZ) and few others. Trade volumes of CHZ surged by a massive 350% which led to a 16% rally. Chiliz project, which aims to generate revenue for sports clubs through blockchain, can further appreciate in price if it strikes more deals with sport clubs and organizations.
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Disclaimer: This article was authored by Giottus Crypto Exchange as a part of a paid partnership with The News Minute. Crypto-asset or cryptocurrency investments are subject to market risks such as volatility and have no guaranteed returns. Please do your own research before investing and seek independent legal/financial advice if you are unsure about the investments.