Following a long period of sideways trading last week, the cryptocurrency markets posted decent gains over the weekend and into Monday. The widespread green trading is likely a result of Bitcoin’s price showing $6,200 to be a strong support level.

Following Bitcoin’s relatively minor drop into the $6,200 region last week, investors were keen to see how the cryptocurrency responded to hitting the bottom of its long-established trading range between $6,200 and $6,700. Although the volume was low, bulls defended the $6,200 region and have since pushed Bitcoin’s (BTC) price back into the middle of the trading range at its current price of $6,430.

Altcoins Trade Up, Led by XRP

Bitcoin’s stability above the $6,200 region has led to an influx of investor funds into various altcoins, with the market rise being led by XRP.

At the time of writing, XRP is trading up nearly 6% over a 24-hour trading period at its current price of $0.487. It is currently up over 10% from its 7-day low of approximately $0.43, with the majority of its 7-day gains being posted early on Monday.

Ethereum (ETH) is also performing quite well today, up 3.6% over a 24-hour trading period, currently trading at nearly $210. ETH is currently trading up from its 7-day low of $195 and seems to have found stability at its current price.

Markets Seeing Unprecedented Stability

Despite seeing some positive trading activity today, the cryptocurrency markets in general are seeing an unprecedented level of low trading volumes, with recent XBT (Bitcoin) futures trading being the least volatile it has been since the inception of the product nearly one year ago.

Kevin Davitt, a senior instructor for The Options Institute at Cboe Global Markets, wrote to MarketWatch regarding the low futures trading volumes, saying:

“As it turns out, [bitcoin] XBT futures and cryptos in general are moving with very little speed. The week ending Oct. 26th was the least volatile since futures were introduced nearly a year ago. Furthermore, the average weekly [volatility] for XBT futures in October was around 6.6%, which is way below the average of 15.65% since inception.”

Tether Temporarily Drops to $0.95

Just previous to the surge in multiple altcoins’ prices, the controversial stable coin, Tether (USDT), saw another temporary price drop, this time falling from approximately $1.00 to $0.95, before rebounding back to $0.99.

Tether’s latest drop was once again the result of a client (or clients) redeeming a significant amount of USDT units at one time, leading to a sharp, albeit temporary, sell off. The funds from the redemption of these units could have been moved to other, less controversial, stable coins or could have been used to directly purchase various cryptocurrencies.

Since its drop to well below $0.90 in mid-October, Tether has failed to reach, and consistently maintain, a price at the ever-so-important $1.00 level, which will likely degrade investor confidence and perpetuate a gradual sell-off as investors look towards other, less volatile, stable coins.

All the cryptocurrencies mentioned in this article are available to trade on covesting.io