Bitcoin Pushes Upward After Weekend Dip

Bitcoin was pushing back up Monday after experiencing a price dip below $60,000 over the weekend, down from the all-time high near $67,000 reached last week.

As of press time the cryptocurrency was up 4% over the last 24 hours, trading around $62,900.

The drop in funding rates is the most notable indicator seen over the weekend, according to Matthew Dibb, chief operating officer at Stack Funds.

“This is extremely bullish given where we are,” said Dibb.

Funding rates across major exchanges were lower over the weekend, making it cheaper for traders to take more long leverage on bitcoin. Funding rates are payments to long or short traders based on the difference between the perpetual contract market and the current price, according to the crypto exchange Binance.

When funding rates drop, it’s generally a sign there’s less demand from traders for leverage (borrowed funds) to bet on price gains – an indication the market is becoming less overheated. The lower funding rates also make it cheaper for traders to put on new leveraged positions.

Dibb said he sees the rally continuing from here and that the recent pullback was needed to cool down speculators.

Bitcoin is still down 6% from its all-time high reached last week on Oct. 20, at $66,974.77.

In contrast to Dibb’s bullish take, Laurent Kssis, director of CEC Capital, an independent crypto financial services firm, thinks a downward trend is more likely around the $50,000 channel before the market starts to appreciate again.

The increase in price comes ahead of the expected launch on Tuesday of the third bitcoin futures exchange-traded fund (ETF), from VanEck, which will trade under the stock ticker XBTF.

ProShares was the first to secure the long-awaited approval of a bitcoin futures ETF by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and started trading last week. Another bitcoin futures ETF, from Valkyrie Investments, launched on Friday.

Alternative cryptocurrencies such as ether (ETH), solana (SOL) and Cardano’s ADA are all up between 1% and 11% on the day.

CORRECTION (Oct. 25, 14:33 UTC): This story has been modified to show that the VanEck Bitcoin Strategy ETF is expected to launch Tuesday, Oct. 26, not Monday as previously reported.