The end of the weekly candle could soon give way to a more pressing $42,400 target should the market move significantly overnight, one trader says. Bitcoin (BTC) was on the cusp of making a new higher weekly close on Feb. 13 as bulls kept the market above $42,000.
Bitcoin: Potential CME gap to come
Data from Coin telegraph Markets Pro and Trading View tracked fairly stress-free conditions for BTC/USD over the weekend, with the weekly candle set to conclude in under 12 hours. The pair had briefly dipped below the $42,000 mark before recovering, this setting it up to challenge last week's close of $42,400 on Bit stamp. Should it succeed, the close would be a three-week-high, Bitcoin nonetheless keeping traders guessing as a matter of a few hundred dollars separated the upcoming close from the last. Others were focused elsewhere, among them coin telegraph contributor Michaël van de, who argued that Monday's CME futures open would likely dictate a near-term price target regardless. "Don’t be fooled by any move of Bitcoin during the weekend. In the end, the price will come back to CME close of Friday," he reiterated.
CME futures ended Friday at $42,390 — almost exactly at the point of last week's spot price close.
XRP stands out in flat market On altcoins, the calm conditions for Bitcoin played out in a broad lack of action for out-of-hours traders. Related: 2 key indicators cast doubt on the strength of the current crypto market recovery out of the top ten cryptocurrencies by market cap, only XRP managed significant gains, climbing over 6% in the 24 hours to the time of writing to cap weekly returns of more than 25%. The move came amid an ongoing legal saga between Ripple, the major XRP token holder, and United States regulators over its status as a security.
On-chain metrics detect strong "sophisticated passive buying" on spot exchanges and a rise in the movements of Bitcoin to whale wallets. "Sophisticated passive buying" on Bitcoin (BTC) spot exchanges coincides with the trend of BTC leaving exchanges to cold storage.
The price recovery witnessed in the Bitcoin market across the last two weeks coincided with a rise in hodlers and speculative investors selling their coins, according to data provided by researcher Willy Woo.
Nonetheless, BTC's price ability to withstand the selling pressure meant there was buying pressure coming from elsewhere. As Cointelegraph reported earlier this week, so-called Bitcoin whales are accumulating BTC at current price levels.
"This selling is contrasted by exchange data showing sophisticated passive buying on spot exchanges and movement of coins to whale-controlled wallets," wrote Woo, adding:
This view is supported by coins moving away from exchanges to cold storage. Meanwhile, whales who hold more than 1,000 BTC ($45m) are accumulating. This hints at institutional money deploying capital.
Despite the price of Bitcoin retreating going into the weekend, the rise in whale addresses controlling 1,000 to 10,000 BTC has also not gone unnoticed by on-chain data resource Ecoinometrics.
Hunain Naseer, a researcher at OKEx, said Bitcoin would need more time to consolidate ahead, given its recent rejections and deviation from its 20-day moving average, as shown in the chart below. Nonetheless, reclaiming $46,000 would likely have BTC's price test $50,000 next.
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