Bitcoin and Ether Market Update: October 17, 2019

Total crypto market cap lost $6.2 billion of its value since Monday, October 14 and now stands at $217.3 billion. Top ten coins are all in red for the last 24 hours with Bitcoin SV (BSV) and Litecoin (LTC) being the worst performers with 7.1 and 5.3 percent of loses respectively. At the time of writing bitcoin (BTC) is trading at $7,984 on the Bitstamp daily chart, while ether (ETH) stands at $173 and Ripple’s XRP climbed up to $0.281.

BTC/USD

Bitcoin was trading in the wide range between $8,480 -$8,137 on Sunday, October 13 and registered a small loss to $8,277, still closing the week with a 5 percent increase.

The most popular cryptocurrency opened the new seven-day period on Monday, October 14 with another attempt at $8,300. It moved up to $8,364 and once again closed above the mentioned level.

As mentioned in our previous analysis, it is of critical importance for bulls to defend $8,300 and consolidate there.

On Tuesday, October 15, the BTC/USD pair lost 2.3 percent of its value and dropped to $8,152.

The move was followed by another red session on October 16 when the coin moved below $8,000 and closed at $7,994. If BTC bulls don’t regain their positions, we can expect another visit to the $7,800 -$7,500 area.

The government of Bermuda became the first in the world to recognize the USDC stablecoin as a legal tax payment method. The news was announced on October 16 by Circle, one of the two companies behind the CENTRE Consortium, the issuer of the USDC currency (the other one being Coinbase). Citizens of the small island country will be able to pay their taxes, fees and other government services using the digital asset.

The USDC was initially launched in late 2018 and is fully backed by the US dollar in a 1:1 ratio.

In the meantime, Ripple, the company behind XRP, announced a new investment round in the Mexican exchange Bitso. As reported on its official webpage, the San Francisco-based startup will help the local platform expand services to other Latin America countries and further develop its remittance business.

Bitso is the first and largest cryptocurrency exchange in Mexico with more than 750,000 customers. Its partnership with Ripple dates from 2014 and also includes support for the US – MXN in RippleNet.

ETH/USD

The Ethereum Project token ETH once again moved North on Sunday, October 13 and closed the week at $181 adding 6.4 percent for the period.

On Monday, October 14, the “ether” gained 3.3 percent and climbed up to $187 in its second straight day of the increase. Bulls continued to hold the uptrend channel and were already eyeing the $190 line.

On Tuesday, October 15, a similar candle was formed on the daily chart, but in the opposite direction, which resulted in the ETH erasing all of its gains from the previous session. It closed at $181.

The mid-week session on October 16 proved to be no different as the ether lost 3.3 percent and dropped to $174, breaking into a bear correction.