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First Mover Americas: Bitcoin Correction Could Be Approaching
The latest price moves in crypto markets in context for Feb. 26, 2024.
Updated Mar 9, 2024, 5:50 a.m. Published Feb 26, 2024, 1:01 p.m.
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This article originally appeared in First Mover, CoinDesk's daily newsletter, putting the latest moves in crypto markets in context. Subscribe to get it in your inbox every day.
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The bitcoin price was little changed Monday, in line with subdued weekend volatility, with one trader saying it could drop to as low as $47,000. "The price of bitcoin has fallen below $51K, which is near the bottom of the consolidation range of the last eight days," Alex Kuptsikevich, FxPro senior market analyst, told CoinDesk in an email. The CD20 broad market gauge has dropped 0.4% in the past 24 hours. Bitcoin hovered around the $51,500 mark, while ether regained $3,100 on the back of the relatively new narrative for spot ether exchange-traded funds (ETFs). After a buoyant week for artificial intelligence (AI)- related tokens, prices fell with and both losing around 4%. Tokens of Ethereum layer-2 platform Mantle zoomed 30% to a lifetime peak at 93 cents. There was no immediately apparent catalyst for the price gains, but it came on the back of mantleETH, a staked version of ether, crossing the $1.5 billion value-locked mark last week.
U.S.-based forex pioneer Oanda is opening a U.K. cryptocurrency trading platform registered with the country's regulator, the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), based in London and dubbed Oanda Crypto. It's the summation of last year's acquisition of a majority stake in FCA-registered Coinpass, and will offer trading in over 63 cryptocurrency pairs, including bitcoin, ether and XRP, with plans to add more tokens and features over the course of the year, the company said. While some crypto-focused companies tend to stay away from places like the U.S. and other heavily regulated jurisdictions, this was an attractive feature for Oanda, the firm's head of digital assets, Lucian Lauerman, said.
The core team behind decentralized finance (DeFi) protocol Frax Finance could soon follow the leading decentralized exchange (DEX) Uniswap's proposal to distribute a portion of protocol fees to stakers of its native token, Frax's CEO and founder Sam Kazemian told CoinDesk. The ecosystem's governance and utility token is (FXS). Users who lock their FXS receive veFXS tokens, allowing them to keep their utility and governance rights. The veFXS tokens can be staked on the Ethereum mainnet and natively on Frax Finance's layer 2, Fraxtal. The proposal will recommend sharing protocol revenue with veFXS stakers, Kazemian said in an interview. The community voted to stop revenue sharing in 2022.
Chart of the Day
- The chart shows the annualized funding rate for the top 25 cryptocurrencies by market value. The yellow bars represent an annualized percentage rate (APR) of nearly 50%, which indicates excess bullish leverage.
- The market for most coins looks overheated, with APR nearing 50%.
- Excess leverage often presages mass liquidations and rapid price corrections.
- Source: Velo Data
- Omkar Godbole
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KuCoin captured a record share of centralised exchange volume in 2025, with more than $1.25tn traded as its volumes grew faster than the wider crypto market.
What to know:
- KuCoin recorded over $1.25 trillion in total trading volume in 2025, equivalent to an average of roughly $114 billion per month, marking its strongest year on record.
- This performance translated into an all-time high share of centralised exchange volume, as KuCoin’s activity expanded faster than aggregate CEX volumes, which slowed during periods of lower market volatility.
- Spot and derivatives volumes were evenly split, each exceeding $500 billion for the year, signalling broad-based usage rather than reliance on a single product line.
- Altcoins accounted for the majority of trading activity, reinforcing KuCoin’s role as a primary liquidity venue beyond BTC and ETH at a time when majors saw more muted turnover.
- Even as overall crypto volumes softened mid-year, KuCoin maintained elevated baseline activity, indicating structurally higher user engagement rather than short-lived volume spikes.
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Bitcoin and ether volatility trading gets easier with Polymarket's new contracts
Polymarket has launched new prediction markets tied to Volmex's bitcoin and ether 30-day implied volatility indices.
What to know:
- Polymarket has launched new prediction markets tied to Volmex's bitcoin and ether 30-day implied volatility indices, allowing users to bet on how high volatility will get in 2026.
- The contracts pay out if volatility indices reach or exceed a preset level by Dec. 31, 2026, letting traders wager on the intensity of price swings rather than market direction.
- Early trading implies roughly a one-in-three chance that bitcoin and ether volatility will nearly double from current levels.
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