Quick Take

• Bitcoin’s September price performance this year was the best since 2013; PayPal completed its first business payment with PYUSD; Bitwise filed for the first spot XRP ETF with the US SEC.

• US spot Ether ETFs saw a US$25 million net outflow last week, while spot Bitcoin ETFs had a weekly net outflow of $274 million.

• On the macro side, US Fed Chair Powell mentioned that the Fed is not on any “preset course” in terms of rate cuts and economic policy. If the US economy performs as expected, there will likely be two additional rate cuts in 2024 and a total of 50 bps more. US nonfarm payrolls increased by 254,000 in September, much higher than the 150,000 Dow Jones consensus, easing concerns about the labour market. The latest CME FedWatch Tool showed a 97% probability of a November rate cut in the US, a slight decrease in probability compared to last week (100%). In Japan, Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba said Japan is not in an environment that would require further interest rate hikes. 

• Notable updates: The Crypto.com App listed EigenLayer (EIGEN) and Fwog (FWOG). 

• Notable events in the coming week: US FOMC Minutes and Consumer Price Index, New Zealand’s RBNZ interest rate decision 

Weekly Market Index

The price index decreased by -5.86% last week. Volume and volatility indices increased by +11.64%, and +62.04%, respectively. The volatility increase was led by APT (+175.11%) and SOL (+113.67%). This coincided with Aptos Labs’s acquisition of Japanese NFT service provider HashPalette to expand into Asia. 

Check price

Chart of the Week

Bitcoin’s price increased by 7% in September 2024, the highest recorded monthly returns in September since 2013, according to data from Coinglass. It recorded negative monthly returns in eight Septembers from 2013 to 2024, making it historically a ‘bad’ month for BTC. 

Looking forward, October is known as ‘Uptober’ (a portmanteau of ‘up’ and ‘October’), as it’s historically associated with BTC’s strong performance in October. BTC recorded nine years of positive returns in October from 2013 to 2023, with an average return of 22.9%. 

Weekly Performance

BTC and ETH decreased by -4.7% and -8.5%, respectively, in the past seven days. Prices for all other selected top market capitalisation tokens decreased. LDO (-19.8%) and XRP (-18.8%) led the drop.

Key categories were all down in market capitalisation in the past seven days. The gaming category led the decrease.

Notable Token Updates

News Highlights

Investment Vehicles

• CME Group launched Bitcoin Friday Futures (BFF) on 1 October. BFF saw more than 31,000 contracts on the first day, making it the company’s most successful crypto futures product launch. 

• Cryptocurrency asset manager Bitwise filed for the first spot XRP ETF with the US SEC. The ETF is subject to approval from the SEC and will provide exposure to the value of XRP. 

• Grayscale launched Grayscale Aave Trust to give investors exposure to Aave's AAVE token. The company currently offers over 20 different crypto investment products. 

Adoption

• PayPal completed its first business payment with its USD-pegged stablecoin PayPal USD (PYUSD). The payment was made to accounting firm Ernst & Young through SAP’s digital currency hub. 

• Visa unveiled its Visa Tokenized Asset Platform (VTAP) in a sandbox phase for digital asset issuance and settlement. The company said the platform is built to support various tokenised assets, including stablecoins and central bank digital currencies (CBDCs). 

• Swift will start testing live digital asset and currency transactions on its network in 2025. This aims to enable the over 11,500 financial institutions using Swift to transact using digital currencies on its network.

• Australia and New Zealand Banking Group (ANZ) joined Singapore’s Project Guardian to explore real-world tokenisation in financial markets. The bank is interested in exploring the movement of Australian dollar-backed A$DC stablecoin between blockchains. 

• MHC Digital and Circle announced plans to cooperate to expand USDC’s distribution to institutional investors in Australia and the Asia Pacific. MHC Digital will launch an over-the-counter trading service targeting high-net-worth individuals and hedge funds in the region. 

• Brazil’s central bank is including DeFi elements in its development of a synthetic CBDC named Drex. The CBDC aims to address the ‘trilemma’ of decentralisation, privacy, and programmability. 

Regulations

• A subcommittee of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission’s (CFTC) Global Markets Advisory Committee reportedly voted to recommend allowing digital assets as collateral in commodities and derivatives trading, according to Bloomberg. The proposal is still subject to approval from the main committee before being formally submitted to the CFTC. 

• Taiwan’s Financial Supervisory Commission (FSC) allowed professional investors to engage with foreign virtual asset ETFs. This aims to expand product choices and investment channels for professional investors. In addition, the FSC said all virtual asset service providers (VASPs) in Taiwan must comply with the newest anti-money laundering regulations on track to be launched on 1 January 2025. VASPs must register with FSC by the end of September 2025 or potentially face up to two years’ imprisonment. 

• United Arab Emirates (UAE) exempted cryptocurrency transfers and conversions from value-added tax. According to auditing firm PwC, the exemptions will be applied retrospectively from 1 January 2018. 

Recent Research Report

• Research Roundup Newsletter [August 2024]: We present to you our latest issue of Research Roundup, featuring our deep dives into asset allocation with crypto, the decentralised perpetuals market, and the prediction market.

• Alpha Navigator: Quest for Alpha [September 2024]: Cryptocurrencies, equities and fixed income were all up in September and BTC led the rise. US and Eurozone reduced interest rates; Australia, China, Japan and UK kept interest rates unchanged.

• Asset Allocation With Crypto: Adding BTC to portfolios helps increase yield by up to 2% annually without significant impact on volatility. The Modern Portfolio Theory is adopted to compile portfolios including TradiFi, BTC, and ETH.

Recent University Articles

• Popcat: What It Is and How to Buy POPCAT: Find out how POPCAT, a cryptocurrency based on a popular cat meme, became one of the best-performing meme coins in the Solana ecosystem.

• Solana vs Ethereum: An In-Depth Comparison: Ethereum or Solana? In this detailed comparison, find out which chain exceeds the other in transaction speed, fees, dapps, and interest from investors.

• What Is Bittensor (TAO)?: Bittensor (TAO) is changing how machine learning trains AI models. We explain the fundamentals and explore how the TAO token plays a key role.

Catalyst Calendar

We’re all ears.

Your feedback helps make our reporting more insightful. Tell us how we can improve this newsletter by taking the survey below. It will take less than a minute of your time. Thank you!

Take the survey now

Author

Research and Insights Team

Disclaimer:

The information in this report is provided as general market commentary by Crypto.com and its affiliates, and does not constitute any financial, investment, legal, tax, or any other advice. This report is not intended to offer or recommend any access to products and/or services. While we endeavour to publish and maintain accurate information, we do not guarantee the accuracy, completeness, or usefulness of any information in this report nor do we adopt nor endorse, nor are we responsible for, the accuracy or reliability of any information submitted by other parties.

This report is not directed or intended for distribution to, or use by, any person or entity who is a citizen or resident of, or located in a jurisdiction, where such distribution or use would be contrary to applicable law or that would subject Crypto.com and/or its affiliates to any registration or licensing requirement.

The brands and the logos appearing in this report are registered trademarks of their respective owners.

Thank you for reading! We hope you find Market Pulse, our new weekly market insights newsletter enlightening!

Hungry for more? Visit our Research Hub and University to access other insightful crypto research! 

Share with a friend if you like our email!

Share