Altcoins saw some love from crypto traders on Thursday as Bitcoin (BTC) consolidated above $52,000 but struggled to take out resistance at $52,500, leading to price compression and the likelihood of a near-term breakout.
Stocks climbed higher but remained below the highs reached earlier in the week as January’s hotter-than-expected CPI report and uncertainty around when the Federal Reserve will cut interest rates have given many investors a reason to pause putting more funds to work in the current market conditions.
At the closing bell, the S&P, Dow, and Nasdaq all finished higher, gaining 0.58%, 0.91%, and 0.30%, respectively.
Data provided by TradingView shows that Bitcoin bulls made a run at $53,000 during the morning session on Thursday, but were rejected by bears, resulting in BTC sliding back into a trading range between $51,630 and $52,430. At the time of writing, Bitcoin trades at $51,770, an increase of 0.45% on the 24-hour chart.
BTC/USD Chart by TradingView
According to analysts at QCP Capital, Bitcoin “broke above the 50k level again after more than 2 years on the back of impressive inflows from the BTC spot ETFs of about $500-650m a day, which works out to 10-13k BTC bought daily.”
“We expect these inflows to continue as global liquidity rotates into the spot ETFs,” the analysts said. “With the likes of Fidelity announcing a 1-3% cryptocurrency allocation in their All-in-One conservative ETF, the crypto asset class is now front and center for mainstream investors.”
“In addition to these spot inflows, there has been massive BTC call option buying,” they added. “This week alone, we saw close to $10 mil USD spent on premiums for 60-80k strikes expiring from April to December. On the back of these flows, BTC can easily break all-time highs by the end of March.”
Representing the bears was market analyst il Capo of Crypto, who posted the following chart outlining the path he thinks BTC will take down to support at $30,000.
“I'm expecting a rejection of $BTC from the $50k level while alts keep pumping more, forming a divergence,” he said. “After that, the entire market should reverse.”
And MN Trading founder Michaël van de Poppe offered the following warning for less experienced crypto traders who may be unfamiliar with the volatility and FOMO-inducing moves that Bitcoin is known for.
“A general tip towards people feeling the rush to enter #Bitcoin or the markets: Don’t. Just don’t listen to the emotions. It’s a recipe for disaster,” he warned. “How should you enter? There will be 20-30% corrections. Always. No matter the narrative. Use those as an opportunity.”
Altcoins record double-digit gains
The majority of tokens in the top 200 trended higher on Thursday as traders took the sight of Bitcoin trading sideways as a cue to rotate into altcoins, which have a history of pumping after a runup in BTC price.
Daily cryptocurrency market performance. Source: Coin360
The VeChain (VET) ecosystem had a banner day as the network's gas token, VeThor Token (VTHO), surged 99.8%, while VET gained 27.8%. Other notable gainers include Chromia (CHR) and Bitget Token (BGB), which recorded increases of 18.6%, and Neutron (NTRN), which climbed 17.3%. dogwifhat (WIF) fell 8.5% to lead the losers, followed by declines of 6.8% for Altlayer (ALT) and 6.3% for Pendle (PENDLE).
The overall cryptocurrency market cap now stands at $1.95 trillion, and Bitcoin’s dominance rate is 52.2%.
