The cryptocurrency market is green with most coins posting positive numbers on 24-hour and 7-day exchange rates. Terra’s LUNA and meme coin Dogecoin lead 7-day gains, while Cardano’s ADA tops 24-hour gains at the time of writing.
Among other headlines outside the markets, a Swiss bank has made more bullish predictions for the pioneering cryptocurrency. The IMF has raised concerns that the movement of cryptocurrencies alongside equities could raise financial stability concerns.
Here are more details on these and other exciting events.
Bitcoin has matured, but its co-movement with stocks poses risks, says IMF
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) recently published new research on global financial stability. He was accompanied by a blog post in which the IMF warned that Bitcoin is increasingly becoming an integral part of the digital asset ecosystem, a matter of concern.
The monetary body argued against the idea that Bitcoin is a hedge against inflation. The reason is that, after the injection of financial support to the economy by the US government at the beginning of the pandemic, the prices of both Bitcoin and stocks increased.
This meant that the main digital assets, BTC and ETH, experienced a greater connection with stocks. For context, the correlation coefficient between Bitcoin and the S&P 500 remained constant at 0.01 between 2017 and 2019.
In the pandemic period, 2020-2021, that number shot up to 0.36. The blog noted that with crypto adoption on the rise and becoming an integral part of economic systems, it could soon raise financial stability concerns. Therefore, he advised the creation of a global regulatory framework for cryptocurrencies.
Swiss Bank CEO Predicts Record High for Bitcoin in 2022
The CEO of Swiss-based SEBA Bank said that Bitcoin could be on track to break its all-time high this year. During the Crypto Finance Conference on Wednesday, Guido Buehler told CNBC that according to his company’s internal valuation, Bitcoin showed a price level ranging between $50,000 and $75,000.
Therefore, he said that he expects that over time, the value of the world’s largest cryptocurrency will increase to that level.
When asked what motivated the belief that the value of Bitcoin would increase at that price, Buehler cited institutional investors. He explained that, as a bank, they had ” asset groups “waiting for the right time to put your money in the coin.
Having dipped below the crucial $40,000 support earlier in the week, Bitcoin found its footing and has been hovering around $43,000. Bitcoin’s recovery was swift and markets were buoyed by the news that the consumer price index rose 7% last month.
Mike Novogratz of Galaxy Digital said to CNBC last week that his company is experiencing increasing demand from institutional investors. He further explained that these investors were setting up positions to buy at his intended floor for the coin, $38k to $42k.
Solana dubbed the “Visa” of tomorrow’s cryptocurrencies
Bank of America showed overwhelming optimism on Solana earlier this week. The bank’s digital asset strategist Alkesh Shah wrote in a research note published Tuesday that the ecosystem could become the “Digital Asset Ecosystem Visa”.
Explaining the claim, Shah noted that Solana outperforms its competitors in that it hosts more than 400 dApps that offer services on the network, such as NFT marketplaces.
Additionally, Solana boasts significantly high network performance, enjoying up to 65,000 TPS. Comparatively, Visa practically averages 1,700 TPS, while Ethereum has a figure of about 15 TPS.
Shah also suggested that Solana’s low fees, scalability, and ease of use have conveniently set it up to continually bite off chunks of Ethereum’s dominant market share. In contrast, Ethereum, while secure, lacks scalability, leading to congestion and high gas fees.
Solana, whose native token SOL ranks fifth in crypto market capitalization, grew alongside other crypto ecosystems throughout 2021. The network saw massive development strides across the ecosystem, registering faster growth than the market giant Ethereum at the same time in history.
Bitcoin Will Never Be an Inflation Hedge, Billionaire Investor Mark Cuban Insists
Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban has dispelled the view that Bitcoin could act as a hedge against inflation.
During a recent exchange of Twittering with YouTuber Preston Pysh, the billionaire investor said that Bitcoin is not and will never be an inflation hedge.
Furthermore, he surmised that his preferred coin, Doge, was a better alternative to spend, citing the 1-year performance evaluation between the two coins. He also noted that the DOGE/BTC pair has been flat for the past 30 days.
In the past, the Shark Tank investor has not taken an entirely welcoming approach to Bitcoin. In an April 2020 episode of the Pomp Podcast, Cuban said that it was easier to trade bananas than Bitcoin.
Being a crypto advocate, in 2019 his NBA team began accepting crypto payments for merchandise and game-day tickets. However, Cuban has pointed out that users are hardly willing to spend their Bitcoin, seeing it as an asset that is likely to appreciate.
On the other hand, he said, a lot of fans use Doge since it’s easy to transact and doesn’t appreciate as much, so people are willing to let it go.
Kim Kardashian, Mayweather in Trouble Over ‘Bomb and Dump’ Accusations
A class-action lawsuit has named celebrity Kim Kardashian, boxer Floyd Mayweather Jr, and former basketball star Paul Pierce as defendants in a case in which they are accused of promoting a fake token.
The lawsuit, filed by New York resident Ryan Huegerich and other investors, claims that the named individuals used their popularity to influence investors to put their money into Ethereum MAX.
The filing suggests that public figures’ endorsement of the token was just a cover for the token’s creators, Steve Gentile of Connecticut and Giovanni Perone of Florida, to increase the price of the token. The lawsuit claims that the two creators then sold part of their EMAX holdings.” for substantial profit “.
Kim Kardashian promoted EMAX to her more than 250 million Instagram followers, sharing a publication that seemed to support the token. Mayweather wore shorts with the Ethereum Max URL during a confrontation with Logan Paul, and Pierce wore it made On Twitter.
Huegerich’s attorneys concluded that the creators of EMAX had resorted to a pump-and-dump scam with celebrities to inflate the price and then sell. Notably, the lawsuit did not mention the cost and recipient of the downloaded tokens and whether celebrities benefited from them.
