Bitcoin
This Week in Coins: Bitcoin Battered But Rebounds as Meme Coin Mania Remains
Illustration by Mitchell Preffer for Decrypt.
It was a difficult week for Bitcoin– and the broader crypto market – but as of yesterday, things were looking better.
O Bitcoin price it is now at $63,107. In fact, it is where it was seven days ago, down just a fraction of a percent, according to data from CoinGecko. This is an improvement from when it traded below $57,000 per coin at the start of the week.
Bitcoin’s Mid-Week Drop Was Exacerbated by Spot Bitcoin Exchange-Traded Funds (ETFs) posting your worst day on record on Wednesday. And that was after a bad week last week too.
Even BlackRock’s hugely successful iShares Bitcoin Trust experienced outflows for the first time since its launch in January, putting downward pressure on the price of Bitcoin.
The sell-off came at a time when investors were spooked by news that the Federal Reserve was in no rush to cut interest rates. On Wednesday, the central bank president confirmed exactly that – saying there would not be another increase, even though inflation was persistent. The Fed decided to keep its benchmark interest rate stable.
But it wasn’t all bad news: On Friday, the U.S. government’s Nonfarm Payrolls report showed that the unemployment rate in April was higher than expected, leading to a jump in the price of Bitcoin.
When unemployment is high, the Federal Reserve is more likely to cut interest rates. Low unemployment typically means people spend more, leading to rising prices – or inflation. Lower inflation could lead to a cut in interest rates, stimulating investor appetite for risky assets like cryptocurrencies.
The employment numbers may have been what brought BTC out of its depression. Investors betting against the leading cryptocurrency saw their short positions liquidated yesterday to the tune of $100 million.
Elsewhere, meme coins continued their runbased on Ethereum PEPE making big gains and Solana-based BONADO having a good week too. Despite a busy seven days, they were up more than 20% and 15%.
Other alts such as ordinal-based ORDI It is Toncoinstarted a demonstration on Friday. ORDI is now $41, a 10% jump in 24 hours, and Toncoin, at $5, is up 9%.
Perhaps more interesting – certainly more shocking – was when a boy and his mother performed a sordid live show to pump Solana-based meme token MOTHER LIVE for a market value of US$300,000 before disappearing in what appears to be a classic rug-pulling stunt.
Even after the pair disappeared, the coin’s market value exceeded $500,000. There is never a dull moment in the crypto world.
Edited by Ryan Ozawa.