Has Bitcoin found its latest bottom? Uncertainty remains across the crypto market as we move into the weekend, but dip buyers are liking the movement of the Fear & Greed Index.

Meanwhile, Southeast Asia’s second-biggest bank could be setting up a crypto exchange. A bit more on that, further below.

As the US Dollar Index continues to rise, Bitcoin’s momentum stalled this week. However, there are positive signs the BTC bleeding may have stemmed (at the time of writing).

Could we therefore be in for a humdinger of a post-dip pump some time soon? Some analysts on Crypto Twitter certainly think so.

At press time, the OG crypto has reclaimed the US$57k level and is attempting to pick itself up and find some strength for the weekend. It’s still down about three per cent across the past 24 hours, though, and roughly 12 per cent over the past week.

Coin360.com

That said, we’re seeing a fair bit more green up and down the crypto lists, and overall, the total crypto market-cap valuation is up a tiny fraction from this time yesterday, sitting around US$2.69 trillion, according to CoinGecko data.

In the top 20, layer 1 smart-contract platform Avalanche (AVAX) is looking particularly strong, continuing its trend-bucking week and hitting another all-time high just now of US$110. It’s up eight per cent since this time yesterday, and 25 per cent over the past seven days.

Other standout daily performers as we scroll down CoinGecko include: metaverse token Decentraland (MANA) +11%; layer 2 scaling solution Loopring (LRC) +16%; Aussie-built DeFi protocol Maple (MPL) +23%; and gaming/metaverse ecosystem token SuperFarm (SUPER) 22%.

 

Crypto has the Fear

The Fear & Greed Index, the crypto market’s go-to sentiment tracker, has dipped back into the “Fear” zone for the first time in a little while. And just two days ago, it was showing Greed.

It only updates every 24 hours, so it might well be telling the opposite story again by Monday, but its current swing to the left is certainly indicative of the 20 per cent dip from Bitcoin’s all-time-high that we’ve seen over the past week and a bit.

Analyst Rekt Capital has been waiting for it to hit these levels, going by the thesis that “Fear” and “Extreme Fear” are potential indicators of a bottoming-out Bitcoin.

Judging by this indicator then, and the chart below, it would seem investors are now at their most fearful levels since the end of September. And that was right before Bitcoin began its most recent moon mission to its highest level – just over US$69,000.

Source: Alternative.me

Right… now if only there was a famous quote from some sort of famous old Bitcoin-hating investor with a surname that makes you think of all-you-can-eat restaurants. A quote that might give us a pointer on all this fear and greed stuff… Oh well, guess we’ll just have to make up our own minds about what to do with our fiat money and crypto…

Is a “Fear” rating of 34 low enough a level for a market reversal and decent bounce into Monday? Time will tell. And, of course, it doesn’t always correlate in this fashion anyway – it’s only one market indicator to consider among many.

 

In the news: OCBC Bank; Digital Currency Group

• The big Singaporean bank OCBC, Southeast Asia’s second largest, is looking into creating a crypto exchange to meet demand from its customers, according to the bank’s CEO Helen Wong.

The banker was speaking with Bloomberg Television today, and said: “We are looking at it seriously… there’s some work being done in the bank”, adding that the OCBC aims to address its customers’ crypto needs “in a safe manner”.

• Digital Currency Group (DCG), which owns crypto asset manager Grayscale, crypto lender Genesis and news outlet CoinDesk, has raised US$600 million in a new credit facility, with funding led by private equity firm Eldridge.

It marks DCG’s first foray into capital debt markets and now contributes to valuing the company over US$10 billion. “Probably nothing”, as they say in crypto.

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