The crypto markets have hit new monthly lows of US$910bn, mainly due to an Ethereum that can’t seem to catch a post-Merge break.
Now changing hands at US$1,270, ETH has slashed over 20% from its market cap in the past week alone, with the bulls and bears fighting it out in equal measure throughout Thursday morning’s trade.
Though also slightly down, Bitcoin is showing more resilience at US$18,800, with traders hoping for a return above the key US$19,000 support line today.
Ripple (XRP) once again outperformed the market, having added another 4% to its market cap, and could be steering towards four-month highs.
Large-cap network altcoins including Cardano, Solana, BNB, Polkadot and Polygon continue to trade sideways more or less, while the mid-cap Algorand (ALGO) token was Thursday's top performer having added double digits.
A number of decentralised finance (DeFi) projects are having a good session.
Ethereum's number one decentralised exchange Uniswap is up over 5% to US$4.43bn, while Lido and Compound Finance are also trading firmly in the green.
Total value locked across all DeFi protocols is currently US$52.9bn.
In the news
Ethereum’s poor post-Merge performance could be due to a large-scale sell-off by ex-miners.
Data provided by OKLink shows that up to 15,000 ETH valued at around US$20mln was sold by miners between September 9 and 18.
The Nasdaq stock exchange looks set to expand into the crypto markets, initially by offering custody services for Bitcoin and Ether to institutional investors.
Ira Auerbach, former head of brokerage services at Gemini (the crypto exchange launched by the Winklevoss twins) has been scouted to head Nasdaq’s digital assets division.
Auerbach said: “We believe this next wave of the revolution is going to be driven by mass institutional adoption.”
“I can think of no better place to bring that trust and brand to the market than Nasdaq.”