Market Wrap: Bitcoin Returns to Above $46K Even as Indicator Shows Crypto Fear

Cryptocurrencies were mostly higher Tuesday as U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) Chairman Gary Gensler broadened his pitch for greater regulatory oversight of crypto markets. Bitcoin displayed little reaction to Gensler’s testimony to the U.S. Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs, and was up about 5% over the past 24 hours.

Gensler also warned that crypto exchanges like Coinbase should register with the SEC. “They haven’t yet registered with us, even though they have dozens of tokens that may be securities,” Gensler said.

As the SEC pushes Congress for more resources to regulate different crypto projects, large institutional investors are taking note.

“The institutionalization of digital assets means that cryptocurrencies will become more ingrained within the U.S. financial landscape,” Fitch Ratings wrote in a Tuesday report.

“The degree of clarity of regulatory guidance and oversight for digital assets is an important consideration when assessing credit implications for banks entering the space,” Fitch wrote.

Traditional banks are indirectly involved in the crypto industry by providing deposit and lending products to digital asset market participants, which could raise several compliance risks, according to Fitch. There are also client suitability, money laundering and cybersecurity concerns that need to be addressed for institutional investors to embrace cryptocurrencies at scale.

Bitcoin’s Fear & Greed Index moved sharply into “fear” territory after the crypto sell-off last week.

“For much of August, the market was in a state of extreme greed as prices rose across the board,” Joo Kian, a research analyst at Delphi Digital, wrote in a blog post. “September tends to be a negative month for crypto as a whole. While the month kicked off strong, sentiment has deteriorated rather quickly.”

Previous episodes of negative sentiment preceded price rises similar to last September and this July, as shown in the chart below.

“The importance of the bitcoin futures market is growing,” Arcane Research wrote in a Tuesday report. The daily trading volume in the bitcoin futures market has accounted for a growing share of total bitcoin trading volume, especially over the past few months.

BTC spot trading volume accounted for 20% of total trading volume at the beginning of the year, and now sits well below 10%.

“January until May saw a huge spot volume, with a slight drop in April,” Arcane Research wrote. “During this time, the institutional narrative was strong.”

Spot trading volume rose over the past few weeks as volatility increased, but it remains well below the levels seen in May.

The uptrend in alternative cryptocurrencies has improved relative to bitcoin over the past few months as some traders diversify their crypto holdings.

“Smaller cryptocurrencies have fallen out of favor over the past week, but we think only temporarily, noting the trajectory of the weekly RRG (relative rotation graph, seen below) is likely to continue turning in favor of the likes of Polkadot (DOT) and Chainlink (LINK),” said Katie Stockton, managing partner of Fairlead Strategies, a technical research firm.

The 12-week RRG chart (click here for animation) shows the intermediate-term cyclicality of altcoins relative to bitcoin. The graph’s clockwise rotation holds promise for altcoins in the intermediate term, although BTC could retain leadership over the short term, according to Stockton.

Most digital assets in the CoinDesk 20 ended the day --

Notable winners of 21:00 UTC (4:00 p.m. ET):

Aave (AAVE): +19%

Uniswap (UNI): +10%

Notable losers:

Algorand (ALGO): -9.7%

Cardano (ADA): 2.8%