Last week, our Convert Portal experienced a surge in trading demand for the meme coin ConstitutionDAO ($PEOPLE). ConstitutionDAO was a crowdfunding campaign to purchase a first-edition copy of the United States Constitution. The $PEOPLE token represents a share of the ConstitutionDAO. Since the bid for the document failed, the PEOPLE token now represents a DAO movement of historical significance.
In the most recent development, the Fantom Foundation has revealed more information about its new Layer-1 blockchain Sonic Network, which connects to Ethereum via Layer-2 bridge. This will enable Sonic to access a large number of users, liquidity, and other protocols. The Foundation will introduce $S tokens on Sonic network to match the supply of $FTM. Users will be able to exchange their $FTM tokens for $S tokens on a 1:1 basis. By connecting to Ethereum, the Sonic network ecosystem will gain the full benefits of a layer-1 blockchain while also providing native access to ETH.
GALA Games, a play-to-earn blockchain platform, was hacked on Monday, and the hacker minted 5 billion GALA tokens to a private address. The hacker exchanged 600 million GALA for 5.913 ETH afterward. The $GALA price dropped over 22% in two hours due to a large dump on Uniswap. The price stabilised after the platform noticed the system compromise and froze the remaining 4.4 billion tokens in the hacker's wallet.
PENDLE, a leading restaking project, saw significant trading demand in response to rumours of potential ETH ETF approval. $PENDLE, which has a high beta profile compared to ETH, was heavily bid on the market after ETH took off on Monday. Last week, the $PENDLE price rose by 60.7%, with the majority of the increase occurring on Monday.
Overall Market
The above chart shows the BTC price movement in the last three months.
As we mentioned to our readers last week, our desk saw bullish sentiment on BTC following the cooler CPI data in the United States. Furthermore, the risk reversal on the options market indicates that the market's sentiment has shifted from bearish to neutral.
Last Thursday, the United States Senate joined the House of Representatives in repealing the controversial Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) cryptocurrency policy known as Staff Accounting Bulletin No. 121. SAB 121, issued by the agency in 2022, held that a company that holds a customer's cryptocurrencies must record them on its own balance sheet, which could have significant capital implications for banks that work with crypto clients.
Furthermore, we saw a net inflow from US Bitcoin ETFs for six consecutive days beginning last Monday, when Bitcoin traded above the $61k key level. The strong inflows from Bitcoin spot ETFs demonstrated strong demand from investors seeking Bitcoin exposure.
On Monday, the US SEC requested amended 19b-4 filings for spot Ethereum ETFs within a short timeframe, signalling an abrupt turn on potential ETH ETF approval. Following the news, Bloomberg analysts estimated a 75% chance of approval by the end of May, up from 25% a week earlier. The ETH price increased by more than 20% due to strong demand on the spot market, pushing the Bitcoin price above $71k, just inches away from the all-time high of $73,777 set in March.
Because of the large gains on BTC and ETH in the last two days, our desk expects some consolidation here, as traders take profits. If the BTC price surges above the green zone above with high volume, we may see the next leg up for Bitcoin towards the $100k mark by the end of the year.
Options Market
The above chart shows the 25-delta skew of ETH options with different tenors.
On Monday, the US Securities and Exchange Commission asked for amended 19b-4 filings for spot Ethereum ETFs within a short time frame. In response to the news, the ETH price chart showed a vertical k-line, indicating a strong bullish market with increased demand.
The 25-delta skew for ETH options increased by more than ten points in response to the heavily bidding ETH spot price. This indicates that options traders were also rushing for ETH calls, either opening long or closing short positions, or both. The SEC's unexpected action on ETH spot ETFs boosted the implied volatility of ETH options.
However, the risk reversal on ETH options retraced quickly following the initial move-up because of the increasing odds of a potential approval of ETH ETFs by the SEC. Currently, the risk reversal indicates a very negative skew on ETH options with short tenors, whereas options with longer tenors continue to show positive risk reversals.
The negative risk reversal signal on ETH options with short tenors indicates that options traders would rather pay a higher premium for puts to cover the downside risk than buy calls for potential upside gains. The observation supports our forecast for the market to consolidate around the current level in the coming days, with some profit-taking.
Macro at a glance
Last Thursday (24-05-16)
US initial jobless claims increased from 232k the previous week to 222k last week, exceeding the expected 219k. The US labour market is cooling, increasing the likelihood of a rate cut by the Federal Reserve in September.
Last Friday (24-05-17)
In April, Eurozone CPI growth was 2.4% year on year, aligning with the rate seen in March. The monthly CPI growth rate decreased from 0.8% in March to 0.6% in April. The annualised core CPI growth rate decreased from 2.9% in March to 2.7% in April. The Eurozone's inflation rate is around the European Central Bank's target rate of 2% and trending lower, indicating a high likelihood of the ECB's first rate cut in June.
On Tuesday (24-05-21)
According to Statics Canada's CPI data, prices rose 0.5% monthly and 2.7% annually, as expected by economists. The cooler CPI data comes after March's 0.6% MoM and 2.9% YoY readings. The lower inflation rate makes it more likely that the Bank of Canada will cut interest rates for the first time this cycle in June.
Later this week, we have
The April CPI readings in the UK this Wednesday
The FOMC Meeting Minutes will be released this Wednesday
Convert Portal Volume Change
The above table shows the volume change on our Convert Portal by zone.
This week, our trading volume on Convert increased significantly, with the Monitoring zone showing the greatest percentage increase.
Last week, the two tokens with the highest trading demand were Unifi Protocol DAO ($UNFI) and Cream ($CREAM), which contributed significantly to the Monitoring zone's volume increase of 66.0%.
The Metaverse zone saw a 35.6% increase in trading volume on Convert last week. FLOKI ($FLOKI) is the primary driver of volume growth in this zone.
During the same time period, volume in the gaming zone increased by 30.9%. Following the hack news, our desk observed a surge in trading demand for GALA ($GALA).
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