Bitcoin Rallies on Strategic Reserve Rumors, Galaxy Acquires Additional Staking Assets
Crypto Market Update
U.S. equities are continuing this week’s sell-off, with the SPY 0.42% and QQQ 0.47% both declining approximately 0.28%, while the DXY N/A% and treasury yields inch upwards. In contrast, BTC 0.31% 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 2.73% is trading at $3,450 ahead of potential S-1 approval after market close today, and SOL -1.32% is displaying relative strength, gaining over 5% to just under $170. Solana-related names are following suit, with BONK -1.47% , WIF -3.09% , 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 -1.32% breaking $169 should help its recent advance to extend.
Daily Important Metrics
All metrics as of 2024-07-19 12:00:24 All Funding rates are in bps Crypto Prices
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