More Banks in Trouble, Fed’s Latest Interest Rate Hike, and Bitcoin’s New 9-Month High: This Week’s Crypto Recap

The cryptocurrency space rejoiced recently when several large US banks halted services, and the FDIC, as well as other regulators, had to intervene to stop the contagion. However, the crisis expanded to Europe this week, with two of the most prominent names facing significant problems.

Credit Suisse was acquired by the largest Swiss bank – UBS, for almost $3.3 billion, which was more than 60% less than what the former was worth days ago. This propelled another leg up in terms of price action for bitcoin, which took it to a new nine-month high of almost $29,000. Deutsche Bank is the other name making the headlines recently, as its stock price tumbled 10% daily on Friday and is down by over 25% in a month.

More volatility followed in the next few days as the Federal Reserve was expected to make a move in regard to its interest rate policy. With so many struggling banks due to the record-high rates, many experts believed the central bank will stop raising them or even start lowering them. However, that was not the case, and the Fed hiked the key interest rates by another 25 basis points.

This triggered an immediate price drop for BTC and other risk-on assets. The largest cryptocurrency fell by $2,000 in hours, but the bullish sentiment as of late came back almost immediately. Even Binance’s temporary issues on Friday couldn’t affect bitcoin for long, as the asset briefly spiked above $29,000 earlier today, marking yet another multi-month peak.

Despite retracing just as rapidly, it’s evident that bitcoin has been on an impressive run in the past 10 days or so. The Fear and Greed Index suggests the same, as the metric went to its highest levels in well over a year.

Market Data

Market Cap: $1,220T | 24H Vol: $67B | BTC Dominance: 44.8%

BTC: $28,284 (+12.2%) | ETH: $1,790 (+6.2%) | BNB: $325 (-2%)

This Week’s Crypto Headlines You Better Not Miss

Bitcoin Soared Above $28K After UBS Agreed to Buy Credit Suisse. As mentioned above, perhaps the biggest news from the global financial industry in the past decade or so came from Switzerland, as the nation’s largest bank agreed to buy Credit Suisse, but shareholders might not receive the full amount of shares they owned ahead of the deal.

Arbitrum (ARB) Begins Trading: Here’s What the Airdrop is Worth. The long-anticipated airdrop of Arbitrum’s new token finally happened on Thursday. As expected, it arrived with a lot of price fluctuations. ARB skyrocketed to almost $9 at one point before retracing to $1.45 now.

SEC Issues Wells Notice Against Coinbase for Listing Unregistered Securities. The US Securities and Exchange Commission doesn’t seem to stop tightening its grip on the cryptocurrency industry. This time, the US regulator went after Coinbase, sending a wells notice that alleged it of listing unregistered securities.

Fed Hikes Interest Rates By 25 Points, Prompting Bitcoin Volatility. The second yearly FOMC meeting took place on Wednesday, and all eyes were on the Federal Reserve following the banking crisis in the States. While the expectations varied on whether the central bank will actually continue increasing the key rates, its decision to hike them by another 25 basis points resulted in massive BTC volatility.

Terra’s Do Kwon Reportedly Arrested in Montenegro. After months of being on the run, reports emerged on Thursday that Terra’s infamous Co-Founder was finally apprehended in Montenegro. Shortly after, US prosecutors accused him of operating a cryptocurrency fraud.

Telegram Integrates Tether (USDT) Payments on Tron Network. On the crypto-adoption front, the giant messaging service Telegram started allowing users to send Tether (USDT) to each other on its platform. Interestingly, the payment capabilities with the stablecoin are supported only on Tron for now.