The cryptocurrency market in July was a rollercoaster of events. A major topic of discussion was the Greyscale unlocking which had investors at the edge of their seats with many predicting Bitcoin, the largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization, would drop to the $25,000 trading zone but the flagship cryptocurrency had other plans as a supply squeeze caused the cryptocurrency to rally above the $42,000 trading zone.
The cryptocurrency market capitalization started the month of July at approximately $1.41 trillion and it traded as low as $1.19 trillion but the market rallied, only to end the month at approximately $1.63 trillion, a 15.60% rally. Bitcoin moved similarly, starting the month trading at $33,500 and traded below the $30,000 zone at some point but a supply squeeze caused the flagship crypto to end the month trading at $41,600, a 24.18% gain for July.
The rally in Bitcoin rubbed off on other altcoins with the majority posting double-figure gains.
With the current momentum in the cryptocurrency market, here are 5 cryptocurrencies investors should watch out for in August 2021.
Bitcoin
Bitcoin has been having an impressive rally over the last 2 weeks and many market participants anticipate the flagship crypto to break through to the $50,000 trading zone before the end of the month. On-chain analytics data suggest very strong outflows of Bitcoin from exchanges. An example would be the Kraken exchange, which saw over 108,000 BTC (approximately $4.3 billion) leave its platform just last week. This leaves the current exchange balance of Bitcoin on the platform at roughly 62,859 BTC.
However, investors need to invest cautiously as regulatory FUD (Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt) especially surrounding the new U.S infrastructural bill may cause a sell-off in the market as news like this are known to affect the market adversely.
Bitcoin is currently trading at $39,600, down 5.48% for the day, as of the time of writing this report.
Ethereum
The Ethereum network is expected to get a London Hardfork upgrade on the 4th of August. The upgrade is expected to help reduce the high gas fees that are plaguing the Ethereum blockchain network and also make the token deflationary. When there is an uptick in the Ethereum blockchain activities, transaction fees also known as gas fees tend to be on the high side. On the day of the market crash in May 2021, the network gas fee went to as high as $1,500. This caused many network participants to abandon the Ethereum network and switch to other alternative networks such as the Binance Smart Chain (BSC) and Chainlink or EOS.
This upgrade will bring more demand to the network if investors see a significant decline in the network fees. Also, more projects will be encouraged to list on the network since potential customers are encouraged to participate due to low network fees.
Ether is currently trading at $2,600, down 0.08% for the day, as of the time of writing this report.
Polygon
Polygon in recent times has been locking down a lot of partnerships that help scale up the use of their native token. In a recent partnership announcement, Binance has fully integrated the Polygon mainnet onto its platform. This means that Binance traders can deposit and withdraw MATIC through their Binance accounts while also interacting with decentralized applications (DApps) like SushiSwap, Balancer and Aave. There has also been an increased volume of trade activity for the native token.
The native token MATIC is ranked #15 based on its transaction volume in the last 7 days with 9,530,786,924 MATIC ($10,028,859,949) traded. With continued partnerships like this, Polygon is looking at a significant price appreciation especially because of its use case which is to transform the Ethereum network into a full-fledged multi-chain system (a.k.a Internet of Blockchains).
This means applications listed on the Ethereum network could be accessed through other blockchains and at cheaper transaction fees.
Polygon is currently trading at $1.02, down 0.73% as of the time of writing this report.
Cardano
Cardano has been the talk of the cryptocurrency community especially with the coin now listed in Japan. Japan has extremely strict rules for cryptocurrency exchange listings with only a small number of tokens listed in the country. Cardano has been able to sway the regulatory powers in the country and is now part of that small list. Another thing of note for the #5 ranked cryptocurrency by market capitalization is the launch of its Smart Contract called “Alonzo.”
The platform has been taking a series of steps before the mainnet launch. In a huge step forward for the network, the Alonzo white hard fork upgrade has been completed which indicates that smart contract integrations are possible on the network. This innovative Alonzo network upgrade is a key step as the project moves towards the full launch release before the end of the summer. With the white fork integration completed, Cardano is now functional for integration with most DeFi applications, allowing the network to be a genuine alternative to Ethereum.
Alonzo White hard fork’s successful implementation has extended this feature to an even larger number of network users, 500 of whom have been given access to the feature as validators for the test net. This upgrade is a game-changer for Cardano and it should reflex on its token price.
Cardano’s native token, ADA, is currently trading at $1.34, up 2.25% as of the time of writing this report.
Axie Infinity
The axie infinity platform is looking to create an entirely new economy through gaming. Users or players of the axie infinity game enjoy a play-to-earn gaming service that rewards its users with tokens that can be converted to fiat currency for real-life use. This is why the axie infinity token is one of the top 10 trending coins according to coinmarketcap and many investors are trying to get their hands on the token.
Ark Invest analyst, Nick Grous stated in a note that Axie Infinity has the potential to “turbocharge” play-to-earn gaming. He also stated that the gaming ecosystem is “ever-evolving” and Axie Infinity has “introduced a new genre of games that are not free-to-play but play-to-earn.”
He ultimately concluded that “Enabled by the tokenization of in-game assets, we believe Axie Infinity is the foundation of an emerging economy.” With this much hype surrounding the token and with so many trying to start playing the game, the coin is looking to have one of its best price performances yet this month.
Its native token AXS is currently trading at $42.95, up 11.40% as of the time of writing this report.
