Prices Fall As Fear Invades Crypto Market

By RTTNews Staff Writer | Published: 2/22/2022 9:10 AM ET

Fears of Russia invading Ukraine and the tension escalating into a full-blown war reignited after after Russia recognized two breakaway regions viz Donetsk and Luhansk in eastern Ukraine as independent states. Russia has also ordered troops to move into the region on a peace-making patrol. The broad sell-off and subsequent recovery in global markets was reflected in the crypto markets too.

Gold touched a high of $1916 and is currently trading at $1905 per troy ounce. Brent Oil Futures climbed to $96.44 per barrel amidst escalation of tensions in eastern Europe and has now settled around $94.54.

The Dollar Index, which measures the U.S. Dollar against a basket of six currencies rose to 96.25 before falling to 96.02. The USD Rouble rate ranged between 78.6615 and 80.9087. It is currently hovering around 79.24.

Aggregate crypto market capitalization fell 0.57 percent overnight to $1.70 trillion, versus $1.75 trillion early on Monday and $1.86 trillion early on Friday.

Bitcoin dropped to a low of $36,488.93 in the past 24 hours. The lead cryptocurrency is trading at $37,652.92 allowing a mere 59 percent holders to be in the money.

Ethereum dropped to a low of $2,510.68 in the past 24 hours. The lead alternate coin is trading at $2,597.47 amidst 68 percent holders being in the money.

Bitcoin’s 42.1 percent dominance and Ethereum’s 18.3 percent dominance has pushed the residual altcoins lower to a dominance of 39.6 percent of the overall crypto market.

In tandem with the risk-off sentiment across the crypto sphere, stablecoins’ dominance has edged up to 10.71 percent. $181 billion of the overall market capitalization of $1.69 trillion is currently parked in stablecoins. Tether (USDT) is at top spot with $79 billion market cap, followed by USD Coin (USDC) with $53 billion, Binance USD (BUSD) with $18 billion, Terra USD(USDT) with $12 billion and Dai(Dai) with $10 billion).

While the overall crypto market capitalization has declined by 0.57 percent in the past 24 hours, larger tumbles are recorded in 6th ranked XRP (8.15%), 32nd ranked Fantom (5.42%), 45th ranked Tezos (5.01%) etc.

In a significant development from Canada, Bitcoin wallet Nunchuk has responded to the Ontario Superior Court of Justice’s injunction ordering it to freeze and disclose information about the assets involved in the Freedom Convoy 2022 campaign. Nunchuk replied to the order stating that it was a self-custodial, collaborative multi-sig Bitcoin wallet and that it was a software provider and not a custodial financial intermediary.

Nunchuk also stated that as it does not collect any user identification information beyond email addresses and does not hold any keys, it cannot ‘freeze’ its users’ assets. It also clarified that it could not ‘prevent’ user’s assets from being moved and that it did not have knowledge of ‘the existence, nature, value, and location’ of its users’ assets. It remains to be seen how the regulators respond to this stance and what it would portend for crypto users and crypto service providers.

In another unprecedented development, NFT market place OpenSea is facing a $1 million lawsuit from a former Bored Ape Yacht Club owner after an exploit on the platform allowed hackers to ‘purchase’ the Ape for just 0.01 ETH even though it was not listed for sale. The complaint is that OpenSea, instead of shutting down its platform to address and rectify the security issues, continued to operate, risking the security of its users’ NFTs and digital vaults, while also collecting 2.5 percent of every transaction. (Bored Ape Yacht Club, is one of the popular NFT collections with a floor price of nearly 100 ETH, or thousands of U.S. dollars. OpenSea is a marketplace similar to eBay and Amazon, where all the listed items are unique digital collectibles in the form of NFTs that users can buy, sell and mint. The OpenSea platform is a decentralized, peer-to-peer exchange that enables users to transact with one another directly in a trustless manner).

Investors fleeing cryptocurrencies in the midst of risk aversion triggered by war-like situation in eastern Europe have raised questions on its efficacy as a safe haven asset.

A truce in Europe and a rally in cryptos is what the crypto world is aspiring for at the moment.

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Article written by an RTT News Staff Writer, and posted on the RTT News.com website.

Article reposted on Markethive by Jeffrey Sloe