Bitcoin, Ethereum Lose Steam Amid Ledger Controversy and US Market Uncertainty

Bitcoin and Ethereum lost some momentum over the past week, cutting a three-week flatline amid the Ledger Recover controversy and growing concern over the U.S. debt ceiling deadline.

Bitcoin, the largest cryptocurrency, saw a 3.5% loss over the past week and is currently trading at $26,328 dollars. ETH fell to $1,786, marking a 1.3% loss on the week, according to Coingecko.

Amid the top 50 cryptocurrencies, the market saw a lot of movement over the past seven days, with a few notable winners and some big losers.

The biggest gainer of the week is Render (RNDR), which has seen an impressive 19.3% growth on the week. In the past day alone, it has climbed 13.6%–currently trading at $2.82. The Render Network is a decentralized platform that enables users to contribute their unused GPU power to render motion graphics and VFX.

RNDR has been trending on Twitter this week thanks to its recent partnership with Apple and its integration with Solana. The big green candle could also be fueled by Render’s work on the new Pudgy Penguins toy line video. Last week, Pudgy Penguins CEO Luca Netz celebrated the project’s toy line launch on Amazon, saying “I want Pudgy Penguins to be the face of NFTs.”

The Sandbox game (SAND), a popular immersive Gamefi platform, commanded second place over the past 24 hours, gaining 5.4% and currently changing hands at $0.51. These gains come alongside recent partnerships announced by the team with BBC mainstays “Top Gear” and “Doctor Who.”

Not everything is green, however, with notable losses on both weekly and daily markers for other top 50 assets besides Bitcoin and Ethereum.

Somewhat expected after the unsustainable rocket ship it had become, meme coin superstar $PEPE has seen a not so impressive week, losing 10.5% of its value over the past seven days. But in the last 24 hours it saw a slight 3.3% jump, currently trading $0.00000143.

But Pepecoin isn’t alone in the red.

Not long after its official mainnet launch, Sui’s native SUI token was one of the biggest losers on the week with a 15.8% drop, trading at $0.98 cents. Ethereum scaling solution Optimism (OP) also had a rough week, seeing a 12.6% red candle and swapping hands at $1.60. And decentralized app platform Algorand (ALGO) also saw double digit losses, trading at $0.15 after an 11% loss over the past week.