Binance Australia: Market update for February 2022

Welcome to our February monthly newsletter from Binance Australia, where we discuss the news impacting crypto markets.

Markets

In a rapidly evolving situation, Russian President Vladamir Putin has ordered targeted attacks across Ukraine in an operation to demilitarise the country, drawing immediate condemnation from global leaders, including U.S. President Joe Biden. Biden has released sanctions targeting Russia’s sale of sovereign debt abroad, Western nations have agreed to exclude some Russian banks from the international SWIFT messaging system and the EU has approved 450 million euros to aid Ukraine for lethal weapons. Closer to home, Prime Minister Scott Morrison has imposed sanctions against Russia, placing financial and travel bans on Russian officials, as well as banks linked to state and military. The geopolitical risk is causing further uncertainty in global markets as Russia supplies 45.6% of Palladium and 15.1% of Platinum to the globe. Furthermore, Russia supplies almost one third of all natural gas to Europe, binding their energy dependency to Russia. 

Market volatility continues to be a presence since the Feds release of minutes from the FOMC last month. Inflation was the driver to raise rates in March and shrink the balance sheet in an attempt to tighten credit conditions. Despite the volatility and geopolitical crisis, the NASDAQ is reasonably flat on the month. 

BTC

February has proved to be another interesting month for Bitcoin and the entire crypto market. The first two weeks of the month saw prices rally off the January lows at $33K to about $45k, dipping to the lower end of the range at the time of this report at $37.6k. BTC is still struggling to rid itself from multi-month sell pressure. The weekly chart is proving to leave wicks on the upside, indicating sellers are still in control.

ETH

Last month we saw ETH being slower to recover from its lows in comparison to BTC. ETH has been experiencing larger drawdowns than BTC. ETH has been unable to reclaim any significant resistance labels during the month apart from two short instances of poking above $3k, which were not sustained. 

TVL

Total Value Locked is still holding strong, indicating good demand for DeFi applications. ETH still accounts for ~55.82% of TVL, followed by Terra, BSC and Fantom at 10.2%, 6% and 5.6%, respectively. 

In the news

• Fidelity as kickstarted the process with the SEC to launch two ETFs to track crypto + metaverse companies 

• Reddit tests allow users to set any NFT as their pfp

• Visa states crypto-linked card usage to hits $2.5B in first quarter, over 70% of 2021 volume. 

• Diem, the ambitious crypto project from out of Meta (Facebook), is officially over 

• Jump Trading backstops Wormhole’s $320M hack 

• Sequoia Capital is launching a $500m crypto fund to invest in digital assets. 

• Metaverse Lambos are here > buy NFT > get lambo > sell lambo > buy an NFT lambo. Lamborghini releases its first NFT project. 

And that’s all folks. 

All values are in USD

Disclaimer

This content is for general information purposes only, not investment advice. Cryptocurrencies including Bitcoin are volatile and fluctuate on a day to day basis, thus trading such requires proper diligence and sound judgement in order to evaluate the risks associated. Nothing in this newsletter constitutes an investment or legal recommendation, nor should any data or content mentioned in the newsletter be relied upon for any investment activities.You should consider seeking independent legal, financial, taxation or other advice to check how the newsletter information relates to your unique circumstances. 

Binance Australia is not affiliated, associated, endorsed by, or in any way officially connected with any individual or organisations mentioned in the newsletter. Binance Australia is not liable for any loss caused, whether due to negligence or otherwise arising from the use of, or reliance on, the information provided directly or indirectly, by use of this newsletter and expressly disclaims any and all liability for any loss or damage you may suffer.