Crypto Market Update

U.S. equities are continuing this week’s sell-off, with the SPY 0.41%  and QQQ 0.19%  both declining approximately 0.28%, while the DXY and treasury yields inch upwards. In contrast, BTC is moving sharply higher, trading at $65.8k, with rumors circulating that former President Trump will unveil plans to add Bitcoin as a strategic reserve at next week’s Bitcoin conference. ETH is trading at $3,450 ahead of potential S-1 approval after market close today, and SOL is displaying relative strength, gaining over 5% to just under $170. Solana-related names are following suit, with BONK, WIF, and JUP increasing 7.1%, 4.7%, and 4.5%, respectively, over the last 24 hours.

Galaxy Digital Acquires Cryptomanufaktur Node Assets

Galaxy Digital has acquired almost all of node operator CryptoManufaktur’s assets in an effort to expand the firm’s staking and infrastructure capabilities. CryptoManufaktur was founded in 2020, initially focusing on Chainlink price feeds, but later expanded into Ethereum PoS nodes as well as for Polygon and Optimism. Although terms of the deal were not disclosed, the acquisition increases the amount of staked ETH under Galaxy’s control from $2.3 billion to $3.3 billion. Galaxy reportedly wants to improve its infrastructure and staking capacity to provide further enterprise-grade expertise to crypto institutions. In addition to acquiring node assets, CryptoManufaktur’s three-person engineering team will join Galaxy’s infrastructure team. Galaxy (GLXY) shares have gained 3.55% in morning trading.

Kraken Custody Expands to U.K. and Australia

Kraken Institutional has expanded its custody business to U.K. and Australian clients after successfully launching in the U.S. in March. Kraken Custody was launched via Kraken Financial, a U.S. state-chartered bank that silos client digital assets from its exchange assets and allows institutions to store and manage digital assets securely in a single interface. Coinbase remains the market leader in custody as most of the Bitcoin ETF managers selected Coinbase as their qualified custodian, but demand for reputable custodians remains a pressing issue for institutional capital. Kraken hopes to win market share as institutional interest scales with the industry. The expansion comes as Kraken is reportedly seeking to raise up to $100 million in a private funding round prior to seeking an IPO in 2025.

Technical Strategy

Solana’s gains from early July have reached the first meaningful area of upside resistance at $169 after a nearly 35% advance in the last two weeks. This area adjoins trendline resistance of a four-month triangle pattern from March and will need to be exceeded to have hopes of a push back to new highs getting underway. Upside targets once $169 is broken would come into play near $188, then $210 near March 2024 peaks.  Thereafter, I suspect some consolidation might unfold into the month of September given the current structure. Downside support lies at $155 and appears like the first meaningful area of support on pullbacks.  However, in the days ahead, SOL breaking $169 should help its recent advance to extend.

Daily Important Metrics Crypto Size Bullish signal is tied to the crypto market growing Market cap 2.34T $-28.8B (-1.21%) BTC Dominance 53.97 % (0.16%) Stablecoins Increase in circulating stablecoins is a Bullish signal In Circulation +$114B (0.06%) In Exchanges +$19B (-0.43%) BTC Metrics A decrease in Bitcoin on exchanges is bullish, indicates investors are moving coins to cold storage # BTC Exchanges +$3.0M (1.61%) Funding Rates Positive funding rates indicate traders are Bullish Aggregate +0.6266 (0.4776) Binance +0.9989 (0.0000) Bitfinex +0.2633 (0.1263) Bitmex +0.5429 (0.4175) ByBit +0.9492 (0.7025) Deribit +0.0430 (-0.2112) Huobi +1.0000 (1.0000) Kraken +0.6176 (0.3218) Mean +0.6266 (0.4776) OKex +0.2715 (0.2773) Sentiment BMI : 54 (100.00%) Futures A positive spread between Futures Prices and Spot Prices is Bullish CME Price $64,110 (-1.20%) Spot Basis +$100 (0.16%) Volume 491,701 (-23.14%) Open Interest 290,996 (1.08%) Options all exchanges Higher open interest change in a bull market is bullish for the sector Volume 20,819 (-40.47%) Open Interest 260,917 (2.02%) Vol. Put/Call Ratio 0.5114 (3.53%) OOI Put/Call Ratio 0.4904 (0.09%) All metrics as of 2024-07-19 12:00:24 All Funding rates are in bps Crypto Prices Symbol Market Cap Last Price Daily Change Year to Date Relative to BTC YTD BTC $1.30T $65,724 3.11% 55.62% ETH $417B $3,466 1.90% 52.32% -2.12% SOL $78B $168 7.22% 65.60% 6.42% DOGE $343,814 $0.0003 -1.42% -99.61% -99.75% All prices as of 2024-07-19 11:51:36 Exchange Traded Products (ETPs) Symbol Prem. to Nav Last Price Daily Change Year to Date Relative to BTC YTD BITW -32.38% $37 -0.27% 57.64% 1.30% ETHE -1.01% $29 2.43% 51.93% -2.37% News Quick Bits The Block Winklevoss twins donate $1 million in bitcoin to Sen. Warren’s rival Following political donations to former President Donald Trump, crypto billionaires Tyler and Cameron Winklevoss are supporting Republican candidate John Deaton. The Block BlockFi to begin processing crypto distributions via Coinbase this month However, BlockFi's non-U.S. clients are not eligible to receive funds at this time due to regulatory requirements, the firm said. The Block Lens targets Q4 for mainnet on ZKsync, with end goal of AI monetization Social network Lens wants to give users more control over their data and let them profit by sharing it with AI models. The Block Hong Kong to trial stablecoin with participants including Standard Chartered Bank, Animoca Brands The Hong Kong Monetary Authority has announced the participants of the first batch of its stablecoin sandbox. Market Data The Block More high-risk leveraged crypto ETFs hit the market Demand is growing for these high-risk crypto trading instruments that have the potential for high rewards. Fundraising and M&A The Block Crypto investment platform Truvius raises $3.2 million pre-seed led by Galaxy Ventures Crypto investment platform Truvius has raised $3.2 million in a pre-seed funding round led by Galaxy Ventures. The Block Galaxy Digital acquires assets of blockchain node operator CryptoManufaktur The deal is designed to expand the firm’s role in Ethereum staking and blockchain infrastructure more broadly. Hacks, Exploits, and Scams CoinDesk WazirX, Liminal Custody Blame Each Other as $230M Crypto Exploit Leaves Customers Stranded The dispute centers around multisig wallets.