Market Update

Crypto is broadly lower today as geopolitical conflict continues to weigh on risk assets, with BTC 0.59% falling to $60k and ETH 0.36% approaching the low $2,300s. Aptos (APT N/A% ) is one of the few gainers in the top 100 tokens as they have strengthened their presence in Japan via an acquisition of HashPalette, a Japanese NFT service provider and developer of Palette Chain. AAVE 4.17% is also showing slight gains following a Grayscale announcement of a new single-asset trust for the defi protocol. Stocks are slightly higher on the day, reversing early morning losses after ISM Services PMI showed a large upbeat surprise (54.9 vs. 51.7 exp.), representing the highest reading since February 2023 and alleviating concerns about any rapid deterioration in the U.S. economy.

Visa Tokenized Asset Platform

Visa is diving into tokenization, unveiling its new platform, Visa Tokenized Asset Platform (VTAP). Visa’s goal is to bridge the gap between existing fiat currencies and blockchain technology, allowing financial institutions to issue and manage fiat-backed tokens. Although Visa has a global network of over 15,000 financial institutions across more than 200 countries, VTAP will focus on banks to start, allowing them to easily integrate with VTAP and mint, burn, and transfer tokenized deposits or stablecoins. VTAP requires minimal technical integrations, and institutions can leverage Visa’s existing APIs. Visa recognizes the importance of interoperability and is aware of the growing tokenization ecosystem across different blockchains. Visa’s vision is for VTAP to connect banks to multiple permissioned and public blockchains. VTAP is currently available in a test environment and plans to support live programs in 2025.

SEC Appeals XRP Verdict

The SEC is appealing a U.S. Court’s decision in a lawsuit alleging Ripple completed more than $1.3 billion in unregistered security sales via its token XRP 0.20% . The verdict ruled that programmatic sales of XRP did not violate securities laws, however institutional sales did, distinguishing that tokens are not inherently securities, but the manner in which they’re sold matters. The SEC stated their belief that the court decision goes against decades of Supreme Court precedent and securities laws. The appeal will go to the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. Ripple’s CEO and CLO both took to X to express their disappointment with the SEC’s appeal and reiterated their belief in the accuracy of the court’s decision. XRP 0.20% has fallen more than 12% over the past 24 hours following the appeal, and some of the broader altcoin weakness may be attributable to the appeal’s implications.

Technical Strategy

It’s thought that recent Altcoin weakness might very well be nearing an important area of support which should allow for a coming rally now that October is underway.  As this daily TOTAL3 chart shows which represents the total Crypto Market capitalization excluding BTC 0.59% and ETH 0.36% , the index did make a successful breakout in late September that rose to the highest levels since July.  Last month’s rally managed to exceed prior peaks from August, July and also June and surpassed the entire downtrend from late March.  The subsequent consolidation over the past week has not given back that breakout, but merely pulled back to test the pivot area from 9/20 which is thought to be important.  Thus, prices look to be at a key make-or-break area of support that bode well for some stabilization and a coming rally into next week.   Following four straight days of losses, the first positive day likely could mark the start of the Alt-coin rally in October, and the TOTAL3 index shows this to be close.

Daily Important Metrics Crypto Size Bullish signal is tied to the crypto market growing Market cap 2.09T $-64.4B(-2.98%) BTC Dominance 56.94 % (0.72%) Stablecoins Increase in circulating stablecoins is a Bullish signal In Circulation +$120B (-0.01%) In Exchanges +$22B (0.03%) BTC Metrics A decrease in Bitcoin on exchanges is bullish, indicates investors are moving coins to cold storage # BTC Exchanges +$3.0M (-0.05%) Funding Rates Positive funding rates indicate traders are Bullish Aggregate +0.6733(0.1894) Binance +0.9581(1.1779) Bitfinex +1.6006(0.7766) Bitmex +0.5550(0.1877) ByBit +0.7774(-0.1090) Deribit +0.9077(0.9161) Huobi +1.0000(1.0000) Kraken +0.9057(1.1670) Mean +0.6733(0.1894) OKex +0.2930(0.4408) Sentiment BMI : 54 (100.00%) Futures A positive spread between Futures Prices and Spot Prices is Bullish CME Price $60,345(-2.63%) Spot Basis +$37(0.06%) Volume 745,470(-28.28%) Open Interest 295,522(-2.11%) Options all exchanges Higher open interest change in a bull market is bullish for the sector Volume 28,696(-44.29%) Open Interest 264,270 (4.10%) Vol. Put/Call Ratio 0.5844 (18.92%) OOI Put/Call Ratio 0.4918 (1.36%) All metrics as of 2024-10-03 13:25:55 All Funding rates are in bps Crypto Prices Symbol Market Cap Last Price Daily Change Year to Date Relative to BTC YTD BTC $1.20T $60,607 -2.11% 43.50% ETH $282B $2,339 -4.97% 2.78% -28.38% SOL $64B $136 -8.07% 33.30% -7.11% HNT $1.2B $6.94 -7.28% -81.61% -87.19% DOGE $159,738 $0.0002 -22.77% -99.82% -99.87% All prices as of 2024-10-03 12:03:12 Exchange Traded Products (ETPs) Symbol Prem. to Nav Last Price Daily Change Year to Date Relative to BTC YTD BITW -33.56% $29 1.05% 23.99% -13.60% ETHE 0.19% $20 -4.86% 2.94% -28.26% News Quick Bits The Block Swift set to begin live bank trials of digital asset transactions in 2025 It marks the first time Swift will move beyond experimenting with blockchain transactions in testing environments to real-world settlement. CoinDesk RWA Platform Credbull Rolls Out Up to $500M Private Credit Fund with Fixed High Yield on Plume Network Private credit, a booming market in traditional finance, is a fast-growing sector in the blockchain-based real-world asset sector as well with $9 billion of assets, data shows. Crypto Infrastructure Coin Telegraph LayerZero Labs, Eigen Labs raise the stakes on cross-chain transactions The two firms have co-developed the Cryptoeconomic DVN Framework, bringing more security to decentralized networks through economic incentives. The team behind Ethereum re-staking protocol EigenLayer and cross-chain messaging protocol LayerZero have introduced a new system to make cross-chain communication more secure. In a blog post on Oct. 2, LayerZero Labs announced the partnership with Eigen Labs and introduced a framework for “CryptoEconomic Decentralized Verifier Networks” (DVNs).The system combines technical verification with financial incentives to ensure secure cross-chain messaging.Read more Regulation The Block SEC appeals Ripple case ruling, citing conflict with Supreme Court precedent "We believe that the district court decision in the Ripple matter conflicts with decades of Supreme Court precedent and securities law," an SEC spokesperson said. CoinDesk CFTC Subcommittee Sends Up Recommendations for Letting Firms Use Tokenized Shares as Collateral: Bloomberg The likes of BlackRock and Franklin Templeton could see tokenized shares of their money-market funds pledged in trading after a major group under the aegis of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) approved guidelines for their use, Bloomberg reported on Thursday. Fundraising and M&A Coin Telegraph Aptos Labs enters Japan through HashPalette acquisition Aptos Labs’ acquisition of HashPalette positions the company to integrate Japanese businesses into its blockchain ecosystem and expand Web3 innovation. Aptos Labs, developer of the Aptos Network, signed an agreement to acquire Japanese non-fungible token (NFT) service provider HashPalette to expand its presence in Asia.On Oct. 3, HashPalette announced its decision to migrate to a wholly-owned subsidiary of Aptos Labs following an agreement with its previous owner, HashPort. The Palette Chain blockchain and existing HashPalette applications will be migrated to the Aptos Network as part of the acquisition.Source: HashPalette Read more Product Updates and Partnerships Coin Telegraph Visa launches platform for tokenized digital asset management Visa announced its tokenized asset platform for issuing and managing digital assets, including stablecoins and CBDCs, to meet growing demand in the blockchain space. Visa unveiled its new Visa Tokenized Asset Platform (VTAP), a service designed to enable the issuance and management of digital assets.On Oct. 3, the financial services giant revealed its VTAP, which it said is built to support a wide range of tokenized assets, including stablecoins and central bank digital currencies (CBDCs). The platform will cater to institutional investors and central banks, offering end-to-end infrastructure for securely minting, transferring and settling digital assets across public and permissioned blockchains. Read more