GB Market Commentary 07/05/2021
by Alex Clark
For the first time in weeks, bitcoin managed to gain over the weekend, which corresponds with the largest ever downward adjustment in bitcoin mining difficulty and a spike in daily accumulation by whales. Bitcoin mining difficulty fell by a staggering 28% this week and whales caused the biggest daily accumulation spike of 2021 with 60,000 BTC being purchased in one day.
Grayscale has rebalanced its portfolio in a way where Cardano (ADA) is now the company’s third-largest holding. As it stands, Bitcoin (BTC) accounts for 67.47% of the fund, Ethereum (ETH) 25.39%, Cardano (ADA) 4.26%, Bitcoin Cash (BCH) 1.03%, Litecoin (LTC) 0.99% and Chainlink (LINK) 0.86%. The firm also revealed it is exploring Solana, Polygon, and a range of DeFi tokens for single asset trust funds.
Algorand also presents exciting opportunities. Since its launch in 2019, it has secured hundreds of millions in funding for its development and has numerous third parties operating within its ecosystem. Whilst it is not yet a threat to Ethereum or Cardano, with its smart contract capabilities, solid transaction speeds, and focus on being a bridge between centralized and decentralized systems, it certainly looks promising.
Decentralized lending protocol Aave is planning to launch ‘Aave Pro’, a permissioned platform for institutional investors later this month. It is thought that Aave Pro will vastly expand the total value locked in the Aave ecosystem, which currently sits at around $17 billion. However, Fireblocks, the company responsible for Aave Pro’s anti-money laundering and anti-fraud controls, is in an ongoing lawsuit with staking provider StakeHound over the alleged deletion of private keys to a wallet that contained $72 million in ETH. If Fireblocks is prosecuted, this could be damaging for Aave’s reputation.
The Philippine Stock Exchange (PSE) is aiming to be first in line when financial regulators give the green light for crypto asset trading in the country. The President notes the exchange has the infrastructure for trading as well as the necessary investor protection safeguards, however the decision is in the hands of the country’s SEC.
Coinbase is looking to expand its operations in India despite regulatory uncertainty. This comes after a report by Chainanalysis which revealed that crypto investments in India this quarter have gone up 612% from $923 million in April 2020 to nearly $6.6 billion in May 2021. The Cayman Islands joins in the global regulatory attacks against Binance stating that the exchange is not registered, licensed, regulated, or authorised to operate from or within the Cayman Islands. Since last week, a total of four different financial regulators have issued notices referring to Binance.
U.S. Senator Cynthia Lummis has encouraged “people to buy and hold” bitcoin in their portfolios, adding that with Congress flooding the economy with trillions and trillions of dollars, “there’s no way” the value of the U.S. dollar will not be debased. As well as promoting bitcoin as a store of value, the senator also defended Bitcoin’s environmental record, inviting miners to the state of Wyoming.