Cryptocurrencies Rebound As Investors Assess Sanctions Against Russia

Equities and digital assets rose Wednesday as the U.S. and its European allies announced a range of sanctions against Russia after Moscow’s recognition of two separatist regions in Ukraine as independent entities. 

An initial set of measures targets Russia’s sovereign debt, its elites, and two major banks. Additionally, Germany has halted the Nord Stream 2 pipeline, an $11 billion project meant to ferry natural gas directly from Russia to Germany.

As of 7:08 AM E.T., bitcoin is changing hands at $38,866 after dropping to a multi-week low of $36,350 yesterday. Cryptocurrency analytics firm Glassnode noted in its report this week that “bitcoin investors appear far more likely to hold on for dear life (HODL) and use derivatives to hedge risk, rather than selling spot to reduce exposure.”

Ether is posting even stronger gains, returning over 5% over the past 24 hours.

 Leaders and Laggards: Featuring the best and worst-performing assets of the past 24 hours among the 85 largest cryptocurrencies by market capitalization tracked by Forbes. For more information, read this quick Forbes Digital Assets guide.

Spearheaded by the heavyweights, most major cryptocurrencies are rallying. Among Forbes’ leaders of the day are LUNA, the token of the Terra blockchain protocol which uses fiat-pegged stablecoins (+13.26%), Crypto.com’s coin CRO (+9.75%), and Decentraland’s MANA (+8.92%).

Yesterday, the Luna Foundation Guard (LFG), a Singapore-based nonprofit organization supporting the Terra ecosystem, announced a $1 billion token sale of the LUNA token led by Three Arrows Capital and Jump Crypto. Proceeds from the sale will help establish a bitcoin-denominated forex reserve for Terra’s biggest stablecoin, UST.

Further leads:

JPMorgan crypto exec Christine Moy is leaving the firm

Canada Regulator Reportedly Flags Crypto CEO Tweets to Cops

NYSE Parent ICE Takes Stake in tZERO in Potential Move Toward Tokenized Stocks