(Kitco News) - The theme of this week in the crypto market was regulation as several major developments including a new bill proposed in the Senate and the revelation of widespread investigations into U.S.-based crypto exchanges indicate that the government crackdown on crypto has begun.
Data from TradingView shows that the price action for Bitcoin (BTC) has been on a slight downtrend over the past 5 days after topping out at $24,670 on July 31, finishing the week down 6.87% and trading at a price of $22,900 at the close of the traditional markets on Friday.
BTC/USD 1-day chart. Source: TradingView
Despite the week’s negative performance, the uptrend seen over the past month remains intact as noted in the daily update from Kitco contributor Jim Wyckoff, who stated “Bulls are maintaining a six-week-old price uptrend on the daily bar chart and have the overall near-term technical advantage.”
According to Wyckoff, this “suggests the path of least resistance for prices will remain sideways to higher in the near term.
The top altcoin Ethereum (ETH) faired slightly better than Bitcoin over the past few days following the introduction of the Digital Commodities Consumer Protection Act of 2022 (DCCPA) which seeks to classify BTC and ETH as commodities.
While Bitcoin has long been considered a commodity by regulators there has been far less consensus on whether Ethereum should be classified as a security or commodity.
ETH/USD 1-day chart. Source: TradingView
The potential for regulatory clarity surrounding Ether helped provide a boost that lifted its price to $1,680, marking a gain of 5% on the day.
Altcoins trend higher
A vast majority of the altcoins in the top 100 managed to close the week on a positive note as more investors begin to reallocate into the market after hitting a low in June and July.
Daily cryptocurrency market performance. Source: Coin360
The top performer on the 24-hour chart was Decred (DCR) with a gain of 57.5%, followed by a 16.18% increase for NEAR Protocol (NEAR) and a pair of 14% price gains for Holo (HOT) and Theta Network (THETA).
The overall cryptocurrency market capitalization now stands at $1.083 trillion, and Bitcoin’s dominance rate is 40.4%.
