Massive cryptocurrency market dump multiplies US stock market losses after Putin launches attack against Ukraine. While the Dow 30 and the S&P 500 indices are down over 1%, the top 10 market cap cryptocurrencies are all negative, some double-digits.
War in Europe, Market Crash, Buterin’s Supportive Message
As Russian aggression against Ukraine reached a breaking point and the threat of a full-scale war now is a stark reality, the markets have taken a plunge to new lows.
Bitcoin lost 8.5% of its value to trade at $34,337 following the barrage of Russian missiles on Ukrainian cities. Ethereum followed Bitcoin in the tumble, losing as much as 12% of its value to trade at $2,301 while other leading cryptocurrencies suffered the same fate.
Ethereum’s founder, Vitalik Buterin took to Twitter to express his displeasure over Russia’s decision to abandon the possibility of a peaceful resolution. Writing in Russian, Buterin noted that “this is a crime against the Ukrainian and Russian people,” and sent a supportive message to Ukraine saying, “Glory to Ukraine.”
The recent dip of cryptocurrencies in the face of macro-economic factors casts a measure of doubt on its capabilities as a store of wealth.
Analysts have theorized that the recent metrics is a result of the increasing correlation between the cryptocurrencies and traditional financial markets. At the moment, the global cryptocurrency market capitalization stands at $1.57 trillion, a far cry from the highs of $3 trillion.
Fundamentals are an integral part of investing and keeping an eye out for policy announcements helps traders navigate through the markets in addition to technical.
Trudeau Revokes Emergencies Act Powers But The Case For Crypto Grows
Canada’s Prime Minister has announced the end of the use of the Emergencies Act. The PM disclosed this in a televised press conference saying the country’s situation is no longer an emergency and “existing laws and local law enforcement authorities can keep people safe.”
The powers of the Emergencies Act was invoked last week by the government in the wake of the Freedom Convoy protests seeking to end Covid mandates and restrictions. Things escalated and led to the freezing of the bank accounts of protesters and donors causing an outcry.
After the announcement of the revocation of the Emergencies Act, the government has begun taking steps to unfreeze the affected bank account.
The Canadian debacle has triggered conversations on the need for individuals to embrace cryptocurrencies. Brian Armstrong, Coinbase’s founder, took it up a notch by saying that “self custodial wallets are important!” The need for cryptocurrencies was even more glaring following the blacklisting on traditional fundraising sites like GoFundMe and GiveSendGo, making the protesters resort to raising the funds via Bitcoin
Sotheby’s Withdraws NFTs + NFT Activity Exceeds One of Stablecoins & ERC20
An auction on Sotheby’s for a lot of 104 CryptoPunks has been cancelled. According to reports, the rare NFTs were expected to be sold for around $30 million before they were abruptly cancelled by the anonymous seller. Part of the reasons for the cancellation were rumors of a lukewarm reaction amongst potential bidders with sources claiming the highest pre-bid offer was $14 million.
The owner purchased the collection in July 2021 for the total sum of $7 million under the pseudonym “0x650d”. After holding the NFTs for over 6 months, he announced on February 8th that he was entering into partnership with Sotheby’s to create “the highest profile NFT sale of all time” titled “Punk It!”.
CryptoPunks were one of the earliest NFTs in the space and have attained a cult status, reaching over $2 billion in sales volume. On the other hand Sotheby’s have also been knee deep in digital art and cryptocurrencies by regularly hosting NFT auctions on their platforms.
In 2021, the auction house recorded over 100 million in NFTs sale with Beeple’s $69 million sale being the most iconic. It is important to note that NFT transactions have surpassed that of stablecoins and ERC tokens on the Ethereum Blockchain as adoption reaches frenetic levels.
NFTs are rising in popularity and transaction volumes are a testament to the increasing use cases of this technology.
Zuckerberg Showcases AI Projects Focused On Fleshing Out Metaverse
Facebook stirred the teapot after the announcement of the rebrand to Meta. The company’s CEO took to a livestream in the “Inside the Lab” event to disclose the steps the company was taking with AI in the evolution of the metaverse.
Part of the features include the ability of users to create virtual worlds through speech and a leap in the development in the interaction with voice assistance. In the livestream, Mark Zuckerberg demonstrated how to use “Builder Bot” to create features like trees and clouds. Other scintillating features that were disclosed included video calling with the addition of VR and AR as the company clearly shows that it is putting all its egg in the metaverse basket.
The race of the metaverse has stiffened since the start of 2022 with Big Tech firms like Microsoft joining crypto firms like SandBox and Decentraland. A recent report by JPMorgan predicted that the Metaverse could become a $1 trillion market opportunity.
