First Mover Americas: Bitcoin Consolidates at $42K

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Bitcoin fluctuated around the $42,000 mark during the European morning as analysts set $43,000 as a key indicator for a surge above $50,000. Founder of 10x Research Markus Thielen, who predicted BTC's drop to $38,000, wrote that traders "should re-engage in long positions once bitcoin breaks above $43,000," in a note to clients. Bitcoin has been in a five-wave bullish pattern since early 2023, with the recent pullback constituting wave 4, he said. Wave 5 has now begun and could take prices up $50,000. The bullish outlook is consistent with the decline in selling pressure from investors taking profits from the Grayscale Bitcoin Trust (GBTC) crypto investment vehicle. The profit-taking was partially responsible for bitcoin falling into the wave 4 correction after the launch of U.S.-based spot ETFs on Jan. 11.

Hong Kong's Securities and Futures Commission has received its first bitcoin ETF application. Chinese asset manager Harvest Global Investments was the applicant, according to Tencent News. Hong Kong's regulators said they are ready to consider spot crypto ETF applications in December, just two weeks before the approval of bitcoin ETFs by the SEC in the U.S. Venture Smart Financial Holdings, a Hong Kong firm, said earlier this month it will file a spot bitcoin ETF application, and hopes to start trading during the first quarter. Venture and Harvest are also in discussions with Hong Kong's central bank about its planned sandbox for the development of stablecoins in the region, according to Bloomberg.

Solana-based trading aggregator Jupiter settled over $500 million in trades in the past 24 hours ahead of its planned token issuance on Wednesday, overtaking Uniswap v3 to become the biggest trading platform by that metric. Jupiter has 550 tokens and more than 5,550 trading pairs listed, CoinGecko data show. The USDC/SOL pair was the most active, with $166 million in volume. Meanwhile, the wen (WEN) meme coin issued last week by Jupiter developers chalked up about $150 million in trading volumes across two trading pairs. Jupiter’s JUP tokens are expected to be issued on Wednesday. Nearly 1 million Solana wallets have qualified for a slice of the unusually large airdrop: 40% of JUP's total supply, a size that reflects Jupiter's popularity with traders.

- Omkar Godbole