GB Market Commentary 19/01/2022
by Marcus Sotiriou
After Bitcoin reclaimed the $42,000 level, it dropped off again this morning to a low of around $41,100. The risk off attitude can mainly be put down to the sell pressure on traditional markets. Yesterday the S&P 500 was down by almost 2% whilst Bitcoin held up very well relatively. However, I think we are now seeing the effect of weakness in equities spill over to the crypto market. I expect this drop to be short lived though, due to $40-41k being a key region of support for Bitcoin, and with some relief in the equity markets being due. Technicals also look strong for Bitcoin with a bullish divergence on the RSI indicator on the 1-hour, 2-hour and 4-hour time frame.
Fundamentals for Bitcoin could not be stronger right now. Intel, one of the largest computer processor manufacturers, have announced that they will be revealing a new energy efficient Bitcoin mining ASIC at the upcoming IEEE International Solid-State Circuits Conference next month. The fact that a $200+ billion tech firm is providing solutions for Bitcoin mining is more confirmation of big players entering the crypto space. Intel’s system proposes to reduce overall power consumption by approximately 15%. This increase in energy efficiency will help more institutional investors enter the space as environmental friendliness is one of their key priorities.
Furthermore, Block (formerly known as Square) is finally integrating Bitcoin into its Cash app, after originally being promised in 2019. The feature is said to be available to all U.S. Cash App users, except those in New York State, in the coming weeks. This will allow Cash App customers to send Bitcoin for free to any compatible wallet that accepts Lightning Network payments. After Jack Dorsey stepped down from Twitter, he remains the CEO of Block and continues his goal of making Bitcoin more accessible to all. If successful, this will dramatically increase Bitcoin’s use case as a means of exchange, rather than just a store of value - this would result in significantly more adoption and hence help Bitcoin reach price figures of over $100,000.