Markets: Bitcoin gains, Polygon leads top 10 crypto; Hong Kong stocks plunge

Oisin Mcilroy

2 years ago

Bitcoin rose in Monday evening trading in Asia in a mixed day across the top 10 cryptocurrencies by market capitalization, excluding stablecoins. Ether gained more than 2% and Polygon had a strong run up of more than 6%. XRP fell. Different picture for Hong Kong stocks, where the Hang Seng Index plunged to lows last seen 14 years ago in the financial crisis of 2008.

See related article: South Korea’s MIR4 maker Wemade launches stablecoin

Fast facts

Bitcoin gained 0.78% in the past 24 hours to trade at US$19,314 at 4 p.m. in Hong Kong, while Ether rose 2.15% to US$1,337, according to data from CoinMarketCap.

Polygon was the biggest gainer among the top 10, jumping 6.43% to US$0.88 after the company announced last week it is now hosting 53,000 decentralized apps on the network, an eightfold increase since the beginning of the year.

XRP was the biggest loser among the top 10 cryptos, falling 0.73% to US$0.46, though recovering from its seven day low on Friday of US$0.43. The drop followed the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) filing a rebuttal to the motion by Ripple Labs Inc. for a summary judgment in their legal case. The Ripple payment network is powered by XRP.

Asia equity markets were mixed after Wall Street posted the biggest gains since June on Friday. The Nikkei 225 rose 0.31%, while the Shanghai Composite Index fell 2.02%. In Hong Kong, the Hang Seng Index plunged 6.36% to reach levels last seen in the global financial crisis.

Commentators attributed the drop in Hong Kong to a lack of clear measures for reviving the economy in China coming out of the 20th National Congress that ended in Beijing on Saturday. The Congress focused mostly on the politics of the event and President Xi Jinping solidifying his authority.
However, China did release some delayed statistics that said GDP rose 3.9% on year in the third quarter of 2022 as well as a higher-than-expected balance of trade for September of US$84.74 billion. The unemployment rate for September was 5.5%, 0.3% higher than forecast.