Bitcoin Surges Above $28,000 Amid Recession Concerns, Crypto Market Sees Broad Gains Ahead of Ethereum Upgrade
Bitcoin rose above $28,000 in Asia trading, maintaining its position despite higher interest rates and recession concerns, while other top cryptocurrencies like Ether and Dogecoin also posted gains
Bitcoin continued its upward trajectory, rising above US$28,000 in Monday morning trading in Asia. The world's largest cryptocurrency has maintained its position around this support level throughout April, despite higher interest rates, bank failures, and concerns about a recession in the United States. Meanwhile, other leading non-stablecoin cryptocurrencies, such as Ether, posted gains ahead of the Ethereum blockchain upgrade on Wednesday. Dogecoin also experienced a price increase, while U.S. stock futures showed mixed results following a three-day weekend.
Over the past 24 hours, Bitcoin's price increased by 1.40% to US$28,343 and showed a 0.57% gain for the week, according to Coinpaprika. The cryptocurrency has risen by 70% since the beginning of the year and has held steady around the US$28,000 mark this month, even as equity markets faced challenges stemming from higher interest rates, inflation, a series of bank failures, and indications that the U.S. economy could be heading for a recession.
Kadan Stadelmann, Chief Technical Officer of blockchain infrastructure development company Komodo, believes that Bitcoin could break through the US$30,000 threshold in the coming week. However, he also cautions that a recession may be looming. Stadelmann said, "Normally, we see risk-on conditions as something that drives up the Bitcoin price. But, over the last month with the banking crisis, we’ve actually seen risk-off be positive for Bitcoin. Right now, the price action is telling us the market is undecided."
In the meantime, Ether's price edged up by 0.55% to US$1,859, marking a 3.62% increase for the week. This comes ahead of Wednesday's Shanghai hardfork, also known as the Shapella upgrade, which will allow investors to withdraw their staked Ether for the first time.
Most other top 10 cryptocurrencies by market capitalization also recorded moderate gains. Dogecoin led the pack, adding 2.31% to reach US$0.08328, resulting in a 5.30% weekly increase. The meme-inspired cryptocurrency experienced a surge last week when Tesla CEO Elon Musk changed Twitter's blue bird icon to the Dogecoin dog icon, causing the token's price to briefly surpass US$0.10 on April 4. However, Dogecoin's price subsequently fell as the Twitter icon reverted to the blue bird.
Solana's price increased by 1.51% to US$20.33 but showed a weekly decline of 1%.Polkadot's price rose by 1.29% to US$6.22, but it too experienced a weekly drop of 0.87%.
The total crypto market capitalization increased by 0.95% in the past 24 hours, reaching US$1.19 trillion. Meanwhile, total trading volume rose by 8.19% to US$29.46 billion during the same period.
