Markets: Bitcoin back above US$20,000; Ether, Ether Classic jump ahead of merge

Lachlan Keller

2 years ago

Bitcoin broke back above US$20,000 in Tuesday morning trading in Asia, with most of the top 10 cryptocurrencies by market capitalization gaining. Ether rebounded, while Avalanche also recovered from a drop-off following whistleblower allegations that the company “weaponized” litigation against its rivals.

Fast facts

Bitcoin rose 3.4% in the past 24 hours to US$20,300 as of 8 a.m. in Hong Kong, while Ether jumped 8.5% to US$1,553, according to data from CoinMarketCap.
Ether Classic, the original chain from which Ether was forked, was also up 8% to US$33.58 as both networks are in the spotlight ahead of the upcoming Ethereum Merge.
Avalanche gained 5% to US$19.35, after posting its lowest price since mid-July on Monday at US$17.56. This followed a report on Friday that alleges Ava Labs, the firm behind the network, made a deal with law firm Roche Freedman to collect confidential information on rival companies to attack them with class-action lawsuits.
“How could anyone believe something so ridiculous as the conspiracy theory nonsense on Cryptoleaks?” said Emin Gün Sirer, Ava Labs founder and CEO on Twitter. “We would never engage in the unlawful, unethical and just plain wrong behavior claimed in these self-serving videos and inflammatory article.”
Solana added 6.9% to US$32.47 and Cardano rose 4.8% to US$0.45. Dogecoin saw more modest gains, adding 3.5% to US$0.063. Uniswap, which has a market cap slightly larger than Ethereum Classic, gained 9.6% to US$6.31 after advertising an event on the firm’s Discord channel to meet the firm’s head of customer experience.
U.S. equities started the week lower, extending the slump on Friday sparked by concern the U.S. Fed remains aggressive about raising interest rates. The Dow Jones Industrial Average and the S&P 500 Index were both down roughly 0.6% on Monday, while the Nasdaq Composite Index closed down 1%.