This article provides a quick overview of how the crypto markets have been doing—with the focus on Bitcoin (BTC), Ether (ETH), XRP, Litecoin (LTC), Binance Coin (BNB), and Stellar (XLM)—over the past 24-hour period.
Overall, September 18th has been a great days for altcoins, with 17 of the top 20 cryptoassets (by market cap) in the green at press time (around 17:20 UTC). And one of the three cryptoassets in the red is Bitcoin.
BTC-USD
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) announced on Tuesday (September 17) that Cboe BZX Exchange (“BZX”) had withdrawn a proposed rule change to list/trade SolidX Bitcoin Shares issued by the VanEck SolidX Bitcoin Trust; in other words, there is now no chance of seeing the VanEck-SolidX Bitcoin ETF getting approved any time this year.
Although this was obviously not good news for Bitcoin, the fact that the market has reacted to it with calm disappointment shows that, as economist/trader Alex Krüger points out below, the market seems to have priced in the very likely scenario that no Bitcoin ETF is going to get approved this year by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC):
Odds of the SEC approving a bitcoin ETF in the foreseeable future have always been extremely low. The market fully priced this reality in a while back. This ETF proposal withdrawal is irrelevant as far as $BTC price goes. https://t.co/p8kSONufiS
— Alex Krüger (@krugermacro) September 17, 2019
Earlier today, Jake Chervinsky, General Counsel for DeFi startup Compound, asked the following question on Twitter: “Does Bitwise stand a chance of approval even though VanEck presumably expected rejection?”
The final deadline for a decision by the SEC on the Bitwise Asset Management’s Bitcoin ETF proposal is October 13. Chervinsky estimates the chances of this proposal getting approved at 0.01%. Here is the reason for his pessimism:
To summarize the main problem: the SEC's view is that there *aren't any* regulated bitcoin markets of significant size. Needless to say, it's tough for ETF sponsors like VanEck and Bitwise to enter surveillance-sharing agreements with markets that don't exist.
ETH-USD
During the past seven days, the ETC price has gone up 16.68% against USD, and at press time, it is at the highest level it has been since 11 August 2019.
Crypto investor Spencer Noon published a Twitter thread yesterday that looked at some of the possible reasons for ETH price going above $200 for the first time since 20 August 2019. One of those reasons could be that Ether is overtaking Bitcoin in daily transaction fees:
2/10. Starting with the most bullish indicator. As @coinmetrics notes in their newsletter today, ETH is overtaking BTC in daily transaction fees. This suggests there is a strong demand for using Ethereum. pic.twitter.com/5mVVf8HnVe
— Spencer Noon (@spencernoon) September 17, 2019
XRP-USD
One piece of good news for XRP is that Binance.US opened for registration and deposits at 12:00 UTC today (September 18), and one of the seven supported cryptoassets is XRP.
LTC-USD
On Monday (September 16), Litecoin.com reported that David Burkett, the main Grin++ developer, is working with the Litecoin Foundation to add MimbleWimble support to Litecoin.
BNB-USD
At 11:00 UTC today, Binance.US made the surprise announcement that it was going to support one more cryptoasset: Binance Coin (BNB).
With registrations for https://t.co/AZwoBOy3iq opening today, we are proud to announce one addition to our Phase 1 digital asset offerings. $BNB deposits will open along with registrations today!#BinanceUS🇺🇸 pic.twitter.com/OonO9rSX1O
— Binance.US (@BinanceAmerica) September 18, 2019
Economist and trader Alex Krüger found this “bullish” for BNB:
Binance US has put $BNB back on the table. Bullish. The way they handled this should make the central bank of Zimbabwe flush though. Some US Binance users dumped their $BNB a while back due to the lack of clarity around the listing. https://t.co/e7hAQ4z3hN
— Alex Krüger (@krugermacro) September 18, 2019
XLM-USD
Among the top 50 cryptoassets (by market cap), the biggest gainer was Stellar Lumens (XLM).
Today’s pump had XLM reaching the dizzying height of $0.1021 by 14:10 UTC. Sadly, the euphoria did not last long. Within one hour, the XLM price had dropped to $0.07949. Still, a gain of over 22% in the past 24-hour period is not so bad!
Featured Image Credit: Photo via Pixabay.com
