Bitcoin and Ether gained with mixed results across the top 10 cryptocurrencies by market capitalization, excluding stablecoins. The Hong Kong Hang Seng Index gained 5.30% amid speculation that the Chinese economy will soon reopen.

Fast facts

Bitcoin gained 1.43% in the past 24 hours to trade at US$20,607 at 4 p.m. in Hong Kong, and Ether rose 2.70% to US$1,587, according to data from CoinMarketCap.
Dogecoin led losses among top 10 crypto for a second consecutive day, dropping 6.28% to US$0.12, after it was announced in a company email that Twitter plans to begin job cuts on Friday. Elon Musk reportedly plans to half Twitter’s workforce and is now the subject of a class-action lawsuit filed by Twitter employees. Musk is an avid supporter of DOGE and has hinted he hopes to integrate the leading memecoin into Twitter as a payment method.
Polygon led gains among the top 10 crypto, rising 18.95% to US$1.14, up 26.38% for the previous seven days, after the payment platform Worldpay, a subsidiary of FIS Group, announced it is set to provide USDC settlements on the Polygon blockchain.
XRP gained 1.50% to change hands at US$0.46, Cardano increased 3.73% to US$0.41 and Solana rose 2.22% to US$32.38
Asia equity markets were mixed following Wall Street’s losses overnight. The Nikkei 225 lost 1.88% in Tokyo and the Shanghai Composite Index gained 2.43%. The Hong Kong Hang Seng Index strengthened by 5.30% on market talk that China may soon ease its zero-Covid policies and reopen its economy.
The Bank of England (BOE) will raise interest rates by 75 basis points, the single biggest hike since 1989. Market reactions were positive, with the FTSE 100 rising 1.38% between the announcement on Thursday and closing time. The index swaps market’s estimates for the bank rate by next May’s BOE monetary policy committee meeting fell almost two percentage points below its peak during the crisis created by the previous government’s “mini-budget.” The BOE’s economic forecasts were markedly negative, however, saying the U.K. was already in a recession and projecting eight successive quarters of contraction.