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Bitcoin is growing amid low retail demand. Why is this happening?

Bitcoin is currently trading around $44,000. The price of the first cryptocurrency has risen more than 16% over the past week and 25% over the past month, returning to levels not seen in the market since the collapse of the Terra ecosystem in May 2022. The current rise in cryptocurrency prices has not been accompanied by a corresponding activation of retail traders, says Konstantinas Sizovas, a well-known analyst and CFO of the ASTL investment project.

The decline in the price of the first cryptocurrency after reaching a peak of $69 thousand in November 2021 has already lasted 755 days, and as a percentage of the current rate it is about 36%. Analysts estimate that after the end of the bull market in 2013, it took Bitcoin 1,178 days to reach a new high, and after its peak in 2017, it took 1,092 days. “In none of the past cycles has institutional demand been comparable to the current one, with large financial institutions both participating in the sector themselves and publicly speaking out in favor of Bitcoin,” says the analyst. “In 36 days, ETFs in the US should receive a final verdict, and the market is already showing significant demand and accumulation of the asset ahead of the expected launch of the funds.” It should be added that the current growth of the crypto market is “provoked by a real and compelling narrative.”

The US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has not yet approved any Bitcoin spot ETFs in the US market, but has approved several futures-based funds for the first cryptocurrency in 2021. The next deadlines for the regulator to make a decision on whether to approve, reject or postpone a decision on applications from companies such as BlackRock, Bitwise, VanEck, WisdomTree, Invesco, Fidelity and Valkyrie are set for mid-January. Bloomberg ETF market analyst James Seyffarth recently stated that the potential approval window for spot Bitcoin ETFs is likely to be between January 5 and 10.

As for altcoins, Ethereum has risen in price by 10% over the past week to more than $2.2 thousand, which represents an 86% increase since the beginning of the year. Solana (SOL) is up 5% over the same period, with the token’s year-to-date growth exceeding 500%. Meanwhile, Binance’s BNB traded flat last week amid the exchange’s woes with US regulators that led to the token’s price falling in 2023; since the beginning of the year, BNB has fallen in price by 6%.

Key metrics of the derivatives market for cryptocurrency assets indicate growing interest among speculators in Ethereum (ETH). That is, according to Konstantinas Sizovas, the gap between Ethereum and Bitcoin in terms of growth dynamics may soon be greatly reduced. To date, the price of Ethereum significantly lags behind Bitcoin in terms of growth dynamics, which is especially noticeable over large time periods: over the year, ETH grew by 89%, while the first cryptocurrency showed an increase of 163%. However, this gap may soon be greatly reduced. According to the analytical service Velo Data, over the past five days, Open Interest in Ethereum futures on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME) has grown by 30%, to $711 million, ahead of Bitcoin (19%). We are considering this particular indicator because on November 10, 2023, CME for the first time surpassed Binance in terms of open interest in Bitcoin futures and took first place among all trading platforms in this indicator. On December 1, the open interest in Bitcoin futures trading on the CME was $4.17 billion, which was a record and also the highest among all trading platforms.

In mid-November, the world’s largest investment company BlackRock submitted an application to the regulator of the American state of Delaware and the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to place a spot ETF on Ethereum. Currently, there are only Ethereum futures ETFs on the market. It is a spot ETF that gives investors exposure to the asset itself, while an investment in a futures ETF is effectively just a bet on a later price of the asset without any impact on the market. “It may be too early to talk about it, but it seems that market participants are already starting to speculate on the news of the approval of the Ethereum-ETF,” says Konstantinas Sizovas.

Against the backdrop of such trends, one of the legitimate and stable forms of investment in cryptocurrency mining is the ASTL investment project (Hong Kong), which allows investors to have the opportunity to directly invest fiat and cryptocurrency assets into stable passive income, which obviously exceeds inflation expectations and is not subject to any sanctions or blocking and confiscation. The ASTL project is a simple and elegant solution for potential investors – an investment in the development of the real sector of a diversified portfolio of cryptocurrencies, with a fairly high APR (up to 14%) with payments in stablecoin (USDT) and the possibility of a full return on investment through the subsequent sale of accrued ASTL tokens on leading crypto exchanges . Details can be found at https://astl.world

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