Hello and Welcome to another week’s edition of Overbit News.
Though there have been some exceptions, it’s mostly been good news and good charts for the cryptocurrency community in the last year, especially so in the previous few months. That being said, the crypto community audience is due for some good old-fashioned FUD, and that’s precisely what one of the top stories of the day is.
For years critics of cryptocurrency have spoken out on cryptocurrencies’ ‘illegitimate uses’ like money laundering and terrorist financing, despite almost all blockchains having completely public records that any law enforcement agency could reasonably sift through. Regardless, people like Christine Lagarde, head of the European Central Bank, and Janet Yellen, the US Treasury Secretary, have continued to voice their concerns on the topic.
With cryptocurrency at all-time highs and entirely in the limelight, at least one cryptocurrency CEO is worried about all this attention. “I think there could be some crackdown,” Jesse Powell, CEO of Kraken, told CNBC in an interview. Many analysts are chiding the exact opposite, saying that with Coinbase set to debut on the stock market in just a few days, the industry stands near a crucial milestone of legitimacy.
Regardless, Powell still seems worried with all the varying regulations in different countries set to undercut cryptocurrency like in the United States and India. “I hope that the US and international regulators don’t take too much of a narrow view on this,” Powell said. “Some other countries, China especially, are taking crypto very seriously and taking a very long-term view.”
We’ve indeed said this in the post, but watching this trend of how varying regulators across different countries react to cryptocurrency will undoubtedly be one of the hallmarks of 2021 and years to come.
The Bitcoin Dominance market has hit a two-year low, which leads us to our next story of the week. After sharp rallies from some of the industry’s most significant altcoins, including $XRP and $BNB, Bitcoin’s share of the overall cryptocurrency market cap has plummeted to its lowest level in two years.
According to cryptocurrency research firms Messari and CoinGecko, Bitcoin’s market supremacy has fallen to about 55%, the lowest since April 2019. Since Bitcoin’s market cap has remained stable at around $1 trillion or slightly higher in recent weeks, the fall in Bitcoin Dominance has been led by strong rallies in cryptocurrencies or “alt-coins” such as Binance Coin ($BNB) and Ripple ($XRP).
With Bitcoin’s dominance dropping, this week is a meaningful week for crypto, as all eyes are on Coinbase, which is preparing for a public stock offering aimed at traditional-market investors.
That’s it this week for Overbit News, thank you for reading, and we’ll see you next week.