Going against a broader market trend this morning, Crypto.com Coin (CRO) — the token issued by the exchange of the same name — has continued its price tear, gaining more than 12% overnight Asia time to reach a new all-time high of US$0.9698. It has since retreated somewhat to trade at US$0.8393 at press time, though even at this lower point still represents a gain of 325% this month alone, according to data from CoinMarketCap.
Looking at the month that the Singapore-based exchange has had suggests why: Its Ethereum virtual machine-compatible chain Cronos already has over US$940 million in total value locked, according to DeFi Llama, after launching on Nov. 8. Additionally, the exchange also won the naming rights to Los Angeles’s Staples Center beginning Dec. 25 for US$700 million as part of a broader global advertising campaign featuring Hollywood actor Matt Damon.
“Crypto.com has been going from strength to strength over the past few months,” Blake Cassidy, CEO of Australian micro-investments firm Bamboo, told Forkast.News, adding the firm also became one of the first cryptocurrency platforms to achieve Service Organization Control (SOC) 2 Audit compliance, conducted by Deloitte, the global audit and consulting firm. “[The accreditation] is impressive and demonstrates their commitment to providing their customers with a best-in-class product.”
“The Crypto.com app is now one of the most popular platforms in the app store and Google Play store to buy, sell and spend crypto,” Cassidy added. “Therefore, the uptake in the token is expected to be somewhat correlated.”
In less positive news for the world’s former number three most popular blockchain, ADA — the native token of the Cardano network — has continued its downward price trend after crypto-trading platform eToro announced it would delist the token for U.S.-based users by the end of the year. In a statement explaining the delisting, which also applied to the token of the TRON Foundation, TRX, eToro said it was disappointed to have to make the decision but it was necessary due to the evolving regulatory environment, though did not elaborate any further.
“It’s no surprise that projects lacking a strong real-world use case are being delisted,” Cassidy said. “We’ve also seen this with other coins such as Ripple who also had regulatory scrutiny. There’s little information available on the legal stance of Cardano at this stage, so it’s difficult to gather further insight.”
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission filed a lawsuit against Ripple Labs, the issuer of world’s seventh-largest blockchain, in December 2020, alleging that its sale of XRP was an unregistered securities offering worth over US$1.38 billion. Since that time, U.S.-based crypto exchanges such as Coinbase and Kraken have delisted XRP, though the token remains popular in Asia — particularly in Japan.
U.K.-based crypto exchange Bitstamp has taken the opposite approach to eToro recently, however, and announced late last week it would start listing Cardano ADA — but did stipulate the listing would not be immediately available for their U.S. and Singapore-based customers.
ADA’s price has been steadily falling since reaching its all-time high of US$3.10 in early September in the lead-up to the much-anticipated Alonzo upgrade, which brought smart contract and non-fungible token support to the network. It was trading down roughly 6% since before the announcement from eToro at US$1.65 at press time, having slid to number six position by market cap. TRX is down more than 20% from its six-month high it reached earlier in the month and was trading at US$0.099 at press time, according to CoinMarketCap.
Investors looking at the sea of red in crypto markets this week are often advised by experts not to despair, as markets often see reduced trading volume around significant public holidays such as Thanksgiving. “This has certainly always been the case,” Cassidy said. “In previous years we would see a downturn in trader activity in December and during Chinese New Year.”
Bitcoin, the world’s most popular cryptocurrency, is trading down more than 15% from its all-time high it set earlier this month at US$57,274, while the number two, Ethereum is down 12% from its all-time high from around the same time at US$4,277, according to CoinMarketCap.
