Bitcoin price today rose to trade above $20,000 after dipped below the level in the previous sessions as hawkish comments from the US Federal Reserve about inflation and the economic slowdown continue to weigh on riskier assets. The world’s largest and most popular cryptocurrency was trading about a per cent higher at $20,333. The global crypto market cap today was back above the $1 trillion mark, as it was up over 2% in the last 24 hours at $1.04 trillion, as per CoinGecko.
On the other hand, Ether, the coin linked to the ethereum blockchain and the second largest cryptocurrency, surged more than 4% to $1,595. Ether had been outperforming the broader crypto market in recent weeks amid optimism over a pending network software upgraded called the Merge.
Meanwhile, dogecoin price today was trading marginally lower at $0.06 whereas Shiba Inu rose to $0.000012. Other crypto prices’ today performance also improved as Chainlink, Apecoin, XRP, Uniswap, Tron, Binance USD, Polygon, Solana, Polkadot, Avalanche, Tether prices were trading with gains over the last 24 hours, whereas Litecoin, Stellar slipped slightly.
Riskier assets have been having a rough few days as traders digested comments from Fed Chair Jerome Powell, who reiterated that the central bank is willing to continue monetary tightening even at the risk of an economic downturn as US stocks also posted losses.
Cryptocurrencies mirrored global markets and declined after Jerome Powell warned against prematurely loosening policy. Powell, the Federal Reserve chairman, signaled the US central bank is likely to keep raising interest rates and leave them elevated for a while to stamp out inflation, and he pushed back against any idea that the Fed would soon reverse course.
Cryptos have struggled through the first half of the year as the Federal Reserve hiked rates to combat stubbornly high inflation. Following the collapse of a major pair of tokens, some cryptocurrency lenders froze customer withdrawals, and several crypto firms have cut jobs. The $20,000 level acted as support for Bitcoin when it hit lows in recent months, although the cryptocurrency had worked its way higher over the last few weeks.
(With inputs from agencies)
Download The Mint News App to get Daily Market Updates.