Cryptos Rally Again As War Fears Ease

Crypto markets have regained vigor with market capitalization reaching a tad below the $2 trillion mark. The global positive sentiment triggered by easing tensions in eastern Europe too helped the digital currencies trod deep into green territory.

While Asian equity markets closed mixed, European equity indices are in firm positive territory. American futures too point to positive opening. Bond prices also dropped as yields hardened in anticipation of the interest rate tightening cycle. Safe-haven gold as well as crude oil prices too declined from Monday’s levels.

Bitcoin has gained 4.99 percent overnight and is trading at $44,256.79. With a market capitalization of $840 billion, BTC commands 42.3 percent of the overall crypto market.

Ethereum is trading at $3,099.24, having gained 7.81 percent in the past 24-hours. The $371 billion market capitalization has gained ETH a dominance of 18.7 percent.

The massive surge in the prices of the two leading crypto currencies have pushed altcoins to 39 percent share of the overall market.

Smart Contracts have increased more than 7 percent in the past 24 hours to record a market capitalization of $558 billion, implying a market dominance of more than 28 percent. Brilliant rallies in Ethereum (7.8%), BNB (8.2%), Cardano (5.6%), Avalanche (12.8%), Chainlink (7.8%), Algorand (6.3%), Stellar (4.6%) and Fantom (10.0%) have powered the surge in the Smart Contracts category.

With a market capitalization of $180 billion, stablecoins dominate 9.06 percent of the overall crypto market.

The DeFi space is currently at $140 billion, commanding a market dominance of 7.05 percent. The top ranked cryptos of the category are Terra (LUNA) aggregating $22.5 billion, Avalanche (AVAX) totalling $21.7 billion, and Wrapped Bitcoin (WBTC) adding up to $11.6 billion.

Total value locked (TVL), the overall value of crypto assets deposited in all of the functions that DeFi protocols offer including staking, lending and liquidity pools is $208.45 billion.

Curve (CRV) with a TVL of $19.75 billion, Maker DAO (MKR) with a TVL of $17.55 billion and Convex Finance (CVX) with a TVL of $13.66 billion are the toppers in the category.

To get a perspective on how the various assets have moved in 2022, we have analyzed the non-annualized year-to-date returns of the top 10 global equities, the top 10 cryptocurrencies (excluding stablecoins) as well as Gold and Silver, the top 2 precious metals.

Among the top10 cryptocurrencies, XRP(XRP) is the best performer, with the lowest decline of 3.49 percent. Market leader Bitcoin (BTC) follows with a decline of 8.03 percent. Meme-coin Dogecoin (DOGE) has slipped 14 percent.

Cardano (ADA), Ethereum (ETH), BNB(BNB) have all declined around 20 percent, closely followed by Avalanche (AVAX) which has shed 25 percent.

Polkadot (DOT) declined close to 30 percent whereas Terra (LUNA) declined 37 percent since December 31. Solana (SOL) is the worst performer, with a 43 percent decline in 2022.

In contrast, among the top 10 global equities, Berkshire Hathaway and Saudi Aramco have gained more than 4 percent till date in 2022. TSMC follows with a marginal decline of 0.45 percent. Apple (AAPL), Alphabet (GOOG), and Amazon (AMZN) are next with declines between 4 percent and 7 percent.

Microsoft (MSFT) has suffered a loss of more than 12 percent till date in 2022. Tesla (TSLA) and NVIDIA (NVDA) have slipped close to 17 percent. The worst performer in the pack is Meta (FB) which has slipped 35 percent.

Gold has gained 2 percent till date in 2022 amidst geopolitical tensions in Eastern Europe spurring safe haven demand for the yellow metal. Silver too has gained 2 percent during the period.

The return of momentum to the crypto market after several days of whipsawing prices is a welcome relief for crypto enthusiasts.

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