Over $500m in Liquidations as Market Speculates on ETFs, Etherscan Acquires Solscan
Market Update
- U.S. equity indices are continuing their slide to start 2024, with the SPY dropping -0.65% and the QQQ falling -0.86%, while the DXY (+1.24%) has pushed up to $102.6. Crypto assets are experiencing significant volatility as BTC (-4.65%) briefly dropped more than 9% to the mid-$40,000s amid fears of the SEC rejecting spot bitcoin ETF applications. Despite most altcoins suffering large losses on the day, ARB -0.15% is showing strength, rising 13.77% today as it surpassed $2.5 billion in TVL. Additionally, MKR is outperforming this week, gaining 10.64% after co-founder Sam MacPherson tweeted his outlook for the year and announced a 1:24,000 “token split” in an effort to improve Maker’s “meme-ability” and increase popularity within the retail crypto community.
- Matrixport analyst Markus Thielen expects that the SEC will reject all spot Bitcoin ETF applications this month despite many industry experts forecasting the opposite. Thielen’s report was widely circulated among news outlets and the crypto community, potentially catalyzing the $526 million liquidation cascade this morning, marking one of the largest crypto liquidation events in the last year (see below). As mentioned in yesterday’s Crypto Market Update, funding rates across crypto assets have been extremely elevated. The recent flush, which saw many altcoins sharply drop over 20%, wiped out significant open interest and has helped bring funding rates back to more neutral levels. It has since been reported that the SEC is meeting with exchanges today to finalize comments on applicants’ 19b-4s, a move that supports upcoming approvals.
Source: Coinalyze
- Etherscan, the primary block explorer for the Ethereum network, has acquired Solscan, one of the main block explorers within the Solana ecosystem. Solscan was founded in 2021, serves over three million monthly customers, and offers features similar to Etherscan, such as wallet addresses, transaction data, APIs, and dashboards. Solscan will join in Etherscan’s mission of providing credible, neutral, and equitable access to blockchain data, integrating new features, and offering a more seamless user experience for blockchain users. Some of the new features will include new interfaces, enhanced navigation, and new analysis capabilities for both platforms, resulting in a mutually beneficial outcome for both ecosystem’s users.
Daily Technical Strategy
Mark L. Newton, CMT
Head of Technical Strategy
Wednesday's above-average percentage selloff shouldn't be considered all that damaging, technically speaking, and sets up for buying opportunities for a push back to new highs. Many cryptocurrencies have gradually joined the weakness that's been seen in risk assets to kick off the new year following a better-than-expected December. However, with regards to Bitcoin, daily charts show Wednesday's weakness to have successfully held exactly where needed before beginning a mid-day bounce. Specifically, strong support lies near $41,450 which adjoins an area of mild uptrend support since mid-December. Despite having given up its breakout above the recent triangle consolidation, the larger uptrend remains very much intact, and this retracement is seen as being helpful towards eliminating some of the recently overbought momentum readings. A push back above early January highs at $45,922 is likely in the days/weeks to come, which should help BTC reach near-term technical targets at $48k-$48,650 which is near the 61.8% Fibonacci retracement from the 2021-2022 decline. Overall, BTC appears like an attractive risk/reward on recent weakness.
Daily Important Metrics
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All metrics as of January 3, 2024 11:57 AM
All Funding rates are in bps
Crypto Prices
| Symbol | Market Cap | Last Price | Daily Change | Year to Date | Relative to BTC YTD |
 BTC | $841B | $42,949 | ↓ -4.75% | ↑ 159% | |
 ETH | $267B | $2,222 | ↓ -5.91% | ↑ 85% | ↓ -74% |
 SOL | $42B | $98.01 | ↓ -9.18% | ↑ 890% | ↑ 731% |
 ADA | $20B | $0.5604 | ↓ -8.75% | ↑ 127% | ↓ -32% |
 DOGE | $12B | $0.0825 | ↓ -10% | ↑ 18% | ↓ -142% |
 DOT | $9.8B | $7.73 | ↓ -8.45% | ↑ 78% | ↓ -81% |
 MATIC | $8.3B | $0.8661 | ↓ -12% | ↑ 14% | ↓ -146% |
 LINK | $8.0B | $14.08 | ↓ -7.44% | ↑ 154% | ↓ -5.68% |
 NEAR | $3.7B | $3.72 | ↓ -4.75% | ↑ 192% | ↑ 33% |
Exchange Traded Products (ETPs)
| Symbol | Premium to Nav | Last Price | Daily Change | Year to Date | Relative to BTC YTD |
| GBTC | ↓ -8.40% | $35.13 | ↓ -4.67% | ↑ 324% | ↑ 165% |
| BITW | ↓ -33% | $23.00 | ↓ -6.35% | ↑ 328% | ↑ 169% |
| ETHE | ↓ -14% | $19.15 | ↓ -1.59% | ↑ 302% | ↑ 143% |
| BTCC | ↑ 0.19% | $7.81 | ↓ -4.52% | ↑ 158% | ↓ -1.50% |
News
QUICK BITS
CoinDesk Goldman Sachs Eyeing Bitcoin ETF Role Via BlackRock and Grayscale: Sources Goldman Sachs is in talks to play the key role of being an "authorized participant" for BlackRock and Grayscale's bitcoin ETFs, if the SEC approves them, accord... |
The Block Non-crypto owners more likely to invest if spot bitcoin ETF gets approved, poll shows According to a poll, 21% of people not currently owning crypto said they will be more likely to invest if a spot bitcoin ETF gets approved. |
MARKET DATA
CoinDesk Arbitrum Token Sets Record High as Value Locked Crosses $2.5B Transaction volumes on the network overtook those for Solana-based applications, which boomed after a meme coin-led frenzy in December. |
CoinDesk Bitcoin Slumps as $400M Liquidated in Two Hours Bitcoin slid 8% from a 20-month high on Wednesday as jitters around the anticipated approval of a spot BTC ETF began to enter the market. |
FUNDRAISING AND M&A
The Block Etherscan acquires Solscan to expand blockchain data services The block explorer plans to integrate useful features across Etherscan and Solscan to offer enhanced support. |
HACKS, EXPLOITS, AND SCAMS
CryptoSlate Radiant Capital suspends DeFi lending on Arbitrum after $4.5 million ETH exploit Decentralized finance (DeFi) lending protocol Radiant Capital temporarily paused its operations on the Ethereum layer2 network Arbitrum after it was exploited f... |
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