Cryptocurrency prices dropped again this morning Asia time, with Bitcoin and Ethereum trading 7% and 8% lower respectively in 24-hour trading, according to CoinGecko data. In the meanwhile, a new CoinShares report on institutional investing in cryptocurrency found record inflows year-to-date, suggesting that big investors overall are still bullish on crypto.
Fast facts
- Bitcoin — the largest cryptocurrency by market cap — was trading at US$61,133, down more than 11% from BTC’s all-time high of US$69,045, which occurred just six days ago. “Though analysts still see $BTC in a bullish phase, the overall market sentiment has cooled somewhat as the expectations of price explosions towards the end of the year are becoming deflated,” said cryptocurrency platform OSL in its OSL Trader View update today.
- Tony Sycamore, City Index’s senior market analyst for APAC said in a tweet today: “Bitcoin closed below the support noted yesterday at $64k…next stop likely to be $59.7k.”
- Bitcoin prices had been rising in lead-up to the Taproot update — the Bitcoin blockchain’s first upgrade in four years — that was successfully activated this past Sunday. Last week, Bitcoin investment products took the majority of institutional investments into crypto, with US$98 million of inflows, bringing asset under management (AUM) to a record US$56 billion, according to digital asset manager CoinShares.
- Ethereum investment products saw inflows of US$17 million, with AUM over US$21 billion for the first time, CoinShares reported. Cardano, Solana and Polkadot saw institutional investment inflows of US$16 million, US$10 million and US$5 million respectively.
- “Digital asset investment products saw inflows totalling US$151m last week, the 13th consecutive week of inflows, bringing year-to-date inflows to a record US$9bn. Intra-week prices rises also saw total assets under management (AuM) reach record highs of nearly US$87bn, but closing the week at US$83bn,” wrote CoinShares investment strategist James Butterfill. “Although flows have been positive recently, we have witnessed subdued volumes in 2H, averaging US$750m daily versus US$960m in 1H 2021.”