It’s been a sea of red in the cryptocurrency spaces over the last week, causing the market capitalization to fall below its $1.8 trillion mark to currently stand at $1.76 trillion as of the time of this writing. Flagship cryptocurrency Bitcoin posted a weekly decline of 2.95% losing a little over $1,000, from $39,740 at the start of the week, to currently trade at $38,565 as of the time of this writing.
The declines seen in the market during the week were as a result of a stronger dollar. During the week, the dollar index, which is the measure of the strength of the U.S. dollar currency, traded as high as 103.945basis points, which represents a 20-year high.
The U.S. GDP contracted 1.4% in the first quarter of 2022. Because of this, Fed policymakers are now ever more aligned around plans to accelerate the pace of interest rate hikes in 2022. In Fact, in May, the Fed Reserve is expected to increase rates by 50 basis points.
As you would expect, with Bitcoin posting declines, so has the altcoin market, with the majority of the top 50 cryptocurrencies losing 10% and more. The biggest decline of the top 50 comes from FTM, the native token of Phantom, a directed acyclic graph (DAG) smart contract platform providing decentralized finance (DeFi) services to developers using its own bespoke consensus algorithm.
The reason for the decline is due to FTM price action showing that the price has broken through the middle trendline of a parallel channel that developed on its three-day chart. Since early January, FTM has dipped toward the pattern’s lower boundary every time such market behaviour has occurred. Similar price action could see the token dive to $0.75 or $0.63 in search of support.
Although we saw declines for the week, these coins APE, STEPN and NEXO defied the natural trend as they posted gains for the week. Here’s why:
ApeCoin APE (36.20%)
- The rally in the price of ApeCoin during the week saw the token overtake Decentraland’s MANA token, to become the largest metaverse token with a market value of $6.55 billion. In fact, the token has become the focus of the metaverse sector of the cryptocurrency space, as it leads in terms of traction, volume of transactions and number of holders.
- Just a little over a month after its launch, the ApeCoin, the native token of one of the world’s most prestigious NFT collections, the Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC), has made its way into the top 30 by market capitalization, ranking #22 as of the time of this writing.
- The reason for the bullish momentum seen in ApeCoin is as a result of excitement and anticipation seen last week, as the platform’s developer community, Yuga Labs, hinted at debuting its major metaverse project, ‘Otherside’. The metaverse is scheduled to launch today, with ApeCoin, being the native token of the virtual reality space.
- During the week, APE became the most traded token by the top 100 ETH whales with that group accumulating over 2.3 million APE tokens worth $52.9 million as of the time of this writing. The Yuga Labs team explained that the APE token collected from the auction events will be locked up for one year. It added that no further voting will be organized in the ApeCoin DAO either. Users will also need to do the KYC to join the minting event.
- The team specifically mentioned that the mint will be done in ApeCoin while the gas fees will be paid in the Ethereum (ETH). It was also mentioned that the starting price for the auction will be revealed later this week. According to the announcement, BAYC and MAYC holders will be able to claim the NFT for 21 days just after the auction.
STEPN GMT (20.37%)
- STEPN is a self-styled “Web3 lifestyle app” with GameFi elements on the Solana blockchain. It combines aspects of a play-to-earn game with a fitness app to create a new category coined “move-to-earn.” Users buy NFT sneakers, which they can use to earn in-game currency while walking, running, or jogging.
- Move-to-Earn (M2E) is a relatively new phenomenon that includes a variety of products and services that pay users for being active. They generally aim to incentivize fitness, helping to reduce obesity and sedentariness, and giving users an opportunity to earn an income for improving their health.
- STEPN’s governance token, Green Metaverse Token (GMT), has appreciated 24,500% since its token sale on Binance on March 9. Venture capital firm Sequoia Capital and other Web3 investors have also invested in STEPN, purchasing $5 million worth of GMT in a seed funding round back in January.
- The reason for the bullish price action seen during the week was as a result of Coinbase, one of the biggest cryptocurrency exchanges, announcing plans to list GMT and GST, STEPN’s native tokens. Although M2E are relatively new, they are still drawing the attention of the cryptocurrency space as the market capitalization now stands at $2.4 billion.
Nexo NEXO (16.41%)
- Nexo is a blockchain-based lending platform that offers users instant cryptocurrency-backed loans. Users deposit accepted tokens such as Bitcoin (BTC), Ether (ETH), Litecoin (LTC) or XRP (XRP), as collateral to receive a loan in the form of a fiat currency or stablecoin.
- Nexo has a native token, NEXO, that when locked in the platform grants users benefits such as discounts on interest accumulated on loans and the opportunity to receive interest payments on funds deposited. Token holders also receive dividends from Nexo’s profits.
- The rally in Nexo’s native token was as a result of the token’s listing on Binance, one of the biggest exchanges by market volume. On the listing day, the launch was postponed by 4 hours after it had already jumped 20% in anticipation of the listing.
- On the listing, Antoni Trenchev, Co-founder and Managing Partner of Nexo commented, “Nexo has had synergies with Binance from the very inception of our business through the addition of BNB to our Instant Crypto Credit Lines and the BEP2 version of the NEXO Token. Binance listing our token is a prime example of two of the biggest names in crypto working together to boost the ecosystem and bring improved market opportunities to users. What’s exceptional here is the mutual contribution to the future of finance.”
