Strengths
- Of the cryptocurrencies tracked by CoinMarketCap, the best performer for the week was Sats, rising 16.10%.
- Japanese investment firm Metaplanet Inc. announced today that it purchased an additional 57.1 bitcoin worth about $3.3 million, as the company remains bullish on the digital asset. The firm bought an additional 500 million yen worth of bitcoin after it secured a $6.8 million loan last week to buy more crypto, writes Bloomberg.
- Hut 8 shares rose 3.3% during the premarket session in New York after the energy infrastructure operator and bitcoin miner was upgraded to buy from sell at HC Wainwright. The analyst says the risk-reward is now skewed to the upside following Hut 8’s second quarter results on Tuesday, writes Bloomberg.
Weaknesses
- Of the cryptocurrencies tracked by CoinMarketCap, the worst performer for the week was dogwifhat, down 24%.
- Jump Trading’s wallets are under scrutiny after a nasty crypto sell off. The value of cryptocurrencies held by digital wallets believed to belong to Jump, dropped by around $247 million in total between August 4 and 8, according to wallet tracker Arkham and reported by Bloomberg.
- The amount of Bitcoin held in reserve by the companies who earn a profit validating transactions on the blockchain has dropped to a three-year low in the wake of the April software code adjustment that slashed revenue. The total amount of Bitcoin held by miners has dropped to around 1,510,300 tokens, writes Bloomberg.
Opportunities
- After seven years Coinbase will be resuming its offering to residents of Hawaii, the only U.S. state where it didn’t operate, Bloomberg explains. 1.4 million Hawaiians will now be able to trade cryptocurrencies and earn interest on their holdings through staking.
- Goldman Sachs holds positions in a variety of bitcoin ETFs, according to a 13F filing. The investment bank, in its quarterly 13F report, disclosed that it holds seven out of 11 BTC ETFs in the U.S. Its largest holding, Bloomberg reports, is the iShares Bitcoin Trust (IBIT) at $238.6 million.
- Bitcoin continued to rally in tandem with global stocks at the close of last week and moving into this week. In fact, Bitcoin was up around 70 basis points, while both Ether and Bitcoin tokens remained below their elevated levels weeks ago. Bitcoin has retreated a bit as we close this week. In the medium term, however, macro factors “will continue to weigh on risk assets,” said Justin d’Anethan, head of business development in Asia-Pacific at Keyrock.
Threats
- The value of crypto hacks almost doubled to $1.6 billion in the first seven months of 2024, reports Bloomberg, inflated by a jump in digital-asset prices. While the value of funds stolen has surged, the number of hacks rose only marginally to 149 so far this year, up from 145 in the corresponding year.
- Mining profitability fell to all-time lows in August, according to a JPMorgan analyst. The network hashrate rose in the first two weeks of August and U.S. miners’ share of the Bitcoin network rose to a new record high. According to Bloomberg, the total market cap of the 14 U.S. listed miners has fallen 18% since the end of July.
- Advisers to the Biden administration stopped short of making any promises to crypto industry executives who voiced policy concerns, according to a participant on a Zoom call. The White House advisers didn’t discuss any policy changes with the group which included Coinbase, Kraken and Ripple, writes Bloomberg.
