Vibrant crypto market

Market picture

The crypto market has added 1.5% in the last 24 hours, bringing the capitalisation back to the 1.44 trillion level, which has been acting as resistance for the last three weeks. The upward movement has intensified since the beginning of December.

Bitcoin rose 9.4% to $37.7K in November, strengthening for the third consecutive month. In terms of seasonality, December is considered a relatively neutral month of the year, adding half the time over the past 12 years. The average gain is 30.8%, while the average decline is 12.8%.

December started on the upside, returning BTCUSD to another test of highs near $38.4K. The price went up with the start of a new day and month before touching the lower boundary of the trading channel. Such dynamics look like an attempt to accelerate the growth trend. 

Ethereum is adding 3.8% over the day, having returned to test $2100 - a horizontal resistance which withstood the bulls' onslaught several times in November and was a turning point in April. A move above opens up a wide untraded range, giving ETH freedom of movement all the way to $3500. 

News background

SEC chief Gary Gensler said the agency is working closely on numerous applications for spot Bitcoin ETFs. Still, it is not helpful to comment on timing or anticipate future decisions on them. He reiterated the Commission's position that bitcoin is a commodity.

Coinbase's team has met with the SEC 30 times in a year and a half but has not received an answer to the question of whether certain assets belong to securities, said Brian Armstrong, the exchange's CEO.

MicroStrategy bought 16,130 BTC in November at an average price of $36,785. The company's total reserves reached 174,530 BTC. In total, the company has about 174.5K BTC on its balance sheet, with an average purchase price of $30.2K.

The U.S. Treasury Department has asked lawmakers to give the agency expanded powers to fight illegal financing through cryptocurrencies. Cryptocurrency services and mixers could be used for this purpose.

Bankrupt cryptocurrency exchange FTX received bankruptcy court approval and began selling $744 million worth of crypto assets to Grayscale Investments.

Mining pool AntPool, which received a record $3.1 million Bitcoin transaction fee, said it was willing to reimburse it.

By the FxPro Analyst team