Markets: Bitcoin dips but holds above US$23,000, Ether slips, Polygon biggest gainer in top 10

Bitcoin and Ether gave up some of their January gains in Friday morning trading in Asia, though both are still higher for the week. Trading was mixed with most of the top 10 non-stablecoin cryptocurrencies edging into the red with the exception of Polygon, which rallied on more partnership news. U.S. equities rose overnight as economic indicators showed stronger growth.

See related article: Regulators should not legitimize ‘purely speculative’ crypto activity: Singapore’s monetary authority chief

Fast facts

• Bitcoin dipped 0.36% to US$23,026 in the 24 hours to 8 a.m. in Hong Kong, but remains 9.21% higher for the seven days to date. Ether lost 0.53% to US$1,602 for a gain of 3.23% in the same weekly period, according to CoinMarketCap data.

• Most other top 10 non-stablecoin crypto tokens gave up some recent gains in the morning, but Polygon’s MATIC rallied 13% to US$1.12 after blockchain analytics firm Arkham Intelligence said Thursday it will begin supporting the Polygon blockchain in early 2023. MATIC has surged almost 50% since the start of the year on a series of bullish developments, such as a partnership with Mastercard, and NFT gaming platform Fractal expanding onto the Polygon network.

• The total crypto market capitalization grew 0.14% to US$1.05 trillion, while trading volume fell 10% to US$55.38 billion.

• U.S. equity markets finished higher on Thursday. The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 0.61%, the S&P 500 added 1.1% while the Nasdaq Composite gained 1.76% on signs the U.S. economy, the world’s biggest, is heading for a soft landing after a series of rapid interest rate hikes last year to try and brake a surge in inflation.

• U.S. gross domestic product (GDP) released overnight grew 2.9% in the last quarter, beating the 2.6% expected in a Reuters’ poll. Consumer spending rose 2.1%, while weekly jobless claims fell 6,000 to 186,000, the lowest since April.

• While some economists polled by Reuters still expect the U.S. to enter a recession in the second half of 2023, the view is it will be short and moderate because of the strong labor market.

• Last month, the U.S. Federal Reserve raised interest rates by 50-basis points to between 4.25% and 4.5%, the highest in 15 years. The Fed meets next week and the market consensus is it will raise rates again, but by a less aggressive 25 basis points.

See related article: Binance says it erroneously mixed customer funds with collateral for Binance-issued tokens