The historic and hotly anticipated approval of a Bitcoin spot exchange-traded fund (ETF) this week basically blocked the sun from the rest of the cryptocurrency solar system and, quite frankly, caused a deluge of headlines. decryption.
All the theories and analysis about what approval means for the best cryptocurrency value have finally been tested. Up or down? Is there a price? Will Bitcoin enter the next phase of its evolution or will it simply be shrugged off? After all, Bitcoin spot ETFs are nothing new outside of the United States.
The answer to the question of going up or down is, by far, both. When the ETF was approved, the price of Bitcoin was flirting across the crowded room at $49,000. But a day later the price dropped back to $43,000. This neighborhood has been a neighborhood where people have been staying for quite some time.
Bitcoin, currently trading just below $43,000, is down about 2% from seven days ago. Over the past month, BTC has been completely flat. But hodlers are still delighted to see Bitcoin up more than 120% since this time last year.
In comparison, perennial “distant second” Ethereum has seen more green candles, partly driven by the rise of the “wen ETH ETF?” It is now speculated that a Bitcoin version exists. Ethereum hit an 18-month high of nearly $2,700 yesterday.
ETH is at $2,568 today, up about 1% from yesterday’s price. However, it rose more than 14% last week and more than 12% last month. The one-year rate of return is approximately 80%. The Ethereum scaling network also showed strength, with Arbitrum (ARB) rising 22% and Optimism (OP) rising 16%.
Rounding out the top five, Binance Coin (BNB) is down less than 2% this week, while Solana is up 2%. Other cryptocurrency bright spots include Tezos (XTZ) and Stacks (STX), both of which have recorded double-digit increases over the past week.
Interestingly, Ethereum Name Service and its ENS token, which are behind the top 100 cryptocurrencies by market capitalization, had their best week yet, up nearly 75% over the past seven days.
Editor: Andrew Hayward