Market Continues to Trend Sideways

Bitcoin Resumes Its Decline Yet Again

After a momentary spurt, which led to bitcoin (BTC) prices breaking a nine-week long downtrend, BTC has consolidated back to around $30,000. BTC jumped past the $32,000 resistance earlier this week before quickly retracing that move.

Based on the ongoing technical patterns, experts believe that if similar momentum persists, BTC prices may slide to even lower levels between $14,000 and $21,000 over the next six months.

The ongoing plunge in BTC prices is a direct reaction to slumping price action across the traditional finance ecosystem. Due to bitcoin’s increasing correlation with the S&P 500 (SPX) and the Nasdaq 100 Index (NDX), the largest crypto by market cap has been edging lower since the start of the year. 

That said, BTC’s dominance, or share of the total market capitalization across the broader crypto ecosystem, is on the rise – something that has emerged as a pattern during downward trending periods.

However, the decline in prices contrasts with a report by IntoTheBlock, highlighting a surge in long-term holders buying BTC since the LUNA crash, which prompted the Luna Foundation Guard (LFG) to dump around $1.5 billion worth of BTC.

According to the on-chain data company, wallet balances of addresses that have held BTC for more than a year have reached a new historic peak, now cumulatively holding 12.73 million BTC.

Altcoins Continue to Crumble

Except for a handful of tokens, most altcoins continued to lose ground, some even declining by double-digit values over the last seven sessions. Even though the highly-anticipated Ropsten Ethereum testnet is ready for the merge, ETH’s value has dropped 2.5% in the past week. According to on-chain data provider Santiment, more than $2.21 billion worth of ETH has moved back to exchanges over the past week.

Among the top 10 altcoins, the value of Solana (SOL) token experienced the steepest plunge. Over the past seven days, SOL’s value dropped by nearly 11%. This new downtrend comes on the heels of Solana network’s latest outage. A bug reportedly took out the Solana network for more than four hours, putting a halt to block production and forcing a rollback and restart by validators.

With over seven outages on the Solana network during the past 12 months, investor sentiment is souring as more participants view the network as increasingly unreliable.

Underperforming Tokens Stand Out

In spite of the weak backdrop, Cardano (ADA), the sixth-largest crypto by market capitalization, managed to outperform the broader market after rallying 13.18% this week. Amid the bearish market momentum, the price of ADA has recovered sharply. At the same time, development activity on the Cardano network is at its all-time high.

Total GitHub submissions and contributions for Cardano now stand close to 225,000, and more than five million native assets have been minted atop the chain, representing more than twice the comparable figure recorded last year. Another reason behind ADA’s upward rally is the upcoming Vasil hard fork, which is expected to improve the network significantly.

That said, one of the biggest gainers of the week was WAVES token. Ranked 51st in terms of market capitalization, the value of WAVES skyrocketed almost 89% in the past week, breaking the last two month’s downward spiral after dropping from an all-time high of $62.36 on March 31st to lows of $6.

WAVES’ price jump was primarily triggered by the Waves ecosystem’s Neutrino Protocol Stablecoin (USDN) revival plan after USDN was de-pegged from USD in April. 

Chipotle Adds Crypto Payments & Russia Rethinks Its Stance

In adoption news, Mexican fast-food chain Chipotle (CMG) has revealed that it is now accepting cryptocurrency payments by integrating with digital payments provider Flexa. Customers can now pay in select cryptos for their tacos and burritos across more than 2,950 restaurants across the U.S.

Meanwhile, Russian Central Bank Deputy Governor Ksenia Yudayeva recently stated that the bank is willing to permit the use of cryptocurrencies for international transactions. This change in heart was driven in part by the flurry of new sanctions being imposed on Russia in connection with the ongoing Ukraine conflict. 

As inflation remains untamed, many Argentinians are turning towards crypto to deal with soaring prices. According to the latest report by Americas Market Intelligence, crypto adoption in Argentina has touched 12% – double that of Peru, Mexico, and other Latin American countries.

Finally, MoneyGram International (MGI) and Stellar (XLM) have partnered to create a stablecoin-based platform for money transfers. Through this new service, Stellar wallet users can send USDC to recipients, who can then exchange USDC for fiat currencies using the MoneyGram network.

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