Welcome to the 36th edition of ‘The Digital Asset Digest’. Today we welcome you to the new year, talk about the new price levels we’re seeing and discuss the state of DeFi as we head into 2021.
Michael Saylor of the North? Canadian Firm NexTech AR Uses $2M of Treasury Funds to Buy Bitcoin
Source: Coindesk
“Canadian augmented reality (AR) company NexTech AR is jumping on the crypto bandwagon with plans to use its treasury funds to buy $2 million of bitcoin for “capital diversification. Announced Tuesday, the AR company said it plans on making an initial investment of $2 million in bitcoin (BTC, -6.08%) and may add more in 2021. As of Sept. 30, the company had C$16.39 million (US$12.79 million) cash on hand, making the investment roughly 15.6% of its available cash, assuming the $2 million investment is in U.S. dollars. An email to NexTech seeking clarification wasn’t immediately answered.”
XRP Fights Delisting Announcements, Cryptocurrency Price Stays above $0.20
Source: Finance Magnates
“Cryptocurrency XRP showed resistance against recent delisting announcements as the price refused to fall below $0.20. According to the latest announcement by Binance US, the cryptocurrency exchange will suspend XRP trading and deposits from 13 January 2021. Binance joined Coinbase, Bittrex, Crypto.com, Crosstower and other leading exchanges in XRP delisting. However, after crashing more than 60% in the last 10 days, the price of XRP discovered strong support holding its value at around $0.20.”
Ready, Set, Bitcoin – Marking the Birth of the World’s Most Popular Cryptocurrency
Source: Daily Hodl
“We’ve all been celebrating Bitcoin’s historic moments, and a birthday is always a good time to recount it all from the beginning. But when is Bitcoin’s birthday, actually? When did Bitcoin start? When marking meaningful milestones in the Bitcoin origin story, there is not just one, but two important dates. The first of these anniversaries falls on October 31st, which marks the publication of the Bitcoin white paper that started it all, describing Satoshi Nakamoto’s revolutionary vision of a decentralized digital cash system. This date can be viewed as Bitcoin’s conception.”
Ethereum surges above $850 as hash rate hits an ATH
Source: AMB Crypto
“Bitcoin’s performance has been unparalleled and as the market marvels at the performance of the world’s largest cryptocurrency, the second-largest crypto, Ethereum [ETH] has surpassed $800 and reached $851. This value of ETH was last seen in May 2018 and as the rally in the BTC market gains momentum, the alt season may kick-off with an ETH rally.”
Source: Daily Hodl
“Merchant bank GDA Capital, part of the GDA Group, and serial entrepreneur Scott Melker, known as The Wolf of All Streets, have announced a co-investment in the blockchain-based platform Elitium, to accelerate the buildout of their wealth management tools and global adoption of the native EUM digital asset. GDA Capital has already established a strategic alliance with Elitium and helped increase awareness of its native cryptocurrency EUM and add to the funnel of high value asset offerings to take place in the new year. ”
TOP GAINERS
TOP LOSERS
INDUSTRY WIDE SNAPSHOT
So as we enter 2021, it’s time to assess a bit of what happened last year, and what we see occurring in the year to come.
It’s almost pointless to comment on where Bitcoin’s price is, since it will likely have significantly changed by the time we publish this in a few hours. Suffice to say, everyone is excited about the price of Bitcoin. But we’re here to talk about DeFi.
DeFi’s total value locked skyrocketed from $680 million at the start of 2020 to the $17.87 billion it is currently sitting at.
A large part of this comes from the “set it and forget it” investment vehicle of DeFi. It is far less about active trading and far more to do with finding protocols that will survive while delivering great returns. These returns just so happen to be guaranteed.
The fact that the top 3 DeFi protocols are lending protocols (Maker, Aave, and Compound, respectively) is notable for a few reasons. It seems that lending really is one of the most in-demand use cases in the crypto world right now, and will likely continue to grow into 2021. On a macro level, although DeFi won’t threaten big banks anytime soon, we can’t exaggerate the importance of having alternatives as we head into perilous times with how credit has been artificially inflated over the last year (and decade, really).
Of course, gas prices have massively inflated since the beginning of 2020, but we expect to see some sort of solution present itself in the coming year. Or at least, we are hopeful.
And regarding sentiment, most of us viewed DeFi as the darling of the year that presented actual innovation in a way that differed from the more venture capital-like altcoin rush of 2017.
People were looking at an actual use case, and making bets based on whether the company could perform this use case. There was still an element of equity risk involved in whether the company in question would survive, but it wasn’t about buying nebulous tokens in a company that had little connection to a use case.
In that way, DeFi did a lot of good for the crypto space, while benefiting significantly itself.
Source: Messari
“Key trends, people, companies, and projects to watch across crypto, Bitcoin, and Ethereum, with predictions for 2021. I wrote this year-end piece – for the fourth year in a row, because I’m a masochist – to help you come up the curve, and start the new year with a clean mental model you can refer back to throughout the year ahead. To phrase a great American classic: “There are many like it but this one is mine.
The price of Bitcoin has been increasing since last Monday when it was sitting at $26,119 at its lowest point and has made a rise of 33% measured to its yesterday high at $34,760. Since yesterday’s high we have seen a decrease of 20% with the price spiking down to $27,800 level but has made a recovery and is currently sitting at $31,650.
Source: Trading View
On the hourly chart, you can see that the price made a five-wave increase as expected as we have seen the start of another impulsive move to the upside on the 21st of December. As the five-wave impulse of the higher degree count ended the impulsive spike to the downside indicates that the price is now likely undergoing a correction with an attempt to establish support.
If this has been the completion of the 5th wave of the Minor count and the 3rd wave from the higher degree one, we are now going to see a larger and a longer-term correction developing as the 4th wave from the Primary count is to develop.
This rise from the 21st of December is the final wave from the increase that started in March last year so now after the trend shifts we could see some indecisive sideways action before the sellers take control of the market.
This concludes another issue of the ‘Digital Asset Digest’. We hope you enjoyed this week’s edition. We are constantly making changes and are always open to feedback.
On another note, today our research team is publishing a report on the investment thesis for Bitcoin. It is very shareable and is perfect to pass onto any of your team or network who need a good introduction. To check out this free report, click here!
