By Francisco Rodrigues (all times ET unless otherwise noted)
Bitcoin rose above $88,000 even after the Bank of Japan raised interest rates to the highest in nearly 30 years, a move that would have been expected to strengthen the yen and make the carry trade less attractive.
Instead, the currency weakened on concerns that higher rates would jeopardize the spending plans of Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi, who took office in October. The yield on the 10-year Japanese government bond touched 2% for the first time since 2006.
Other cryptocurrencies are also advanced. Ether added 3.4% in the last 24 hours, although major altcoins including BNB and SOL rose less than 1%. The broader CoinDesk 20 (CD20) index rose 1.3%.
In the background are the cooler than expected US inflation numbers, published yesterday. That report boosted the chance that the Federal Reserve will cut interest rates in the future, a potential boon for risk assets, although prediction markets still largely point to no rate cut next month.
Beyond that, risk assets still face the potential relaxation of the AI trade.
“Capital is still aggressively flowing into AI infrastructure, but monetization issues are becoming harder to ignore,” analysts at QCP Capital wrote. “Major players like Oracle and Iren are ramping up capital spending, while AI-related revenue remains relatively flat.”
Valuations of risk assets could fall if revenues do not materialize, the analysts said. Several crypto firms are benefiting from the AI trade, particularly bitcoin miners, who have begun turning to AI infrastructure in multibillion-dollar deals.
The legislative development also supports the market development.
“The US is poised to strengthen the GENIUS Act’s regulatory architecture in 2026,” Ira Auerbach, head of Tandem at Offchain Labs and former head of digital assets at Nasdaq, told CoinDesk. “Stablecoin issuers that once relied on offshore regimes will find meaningful benefits in bringing reserves and operations back to US soil.”
Auerbach also said that some pension plan providers are preparing to test target date and balanced funds with 0.5% to 1% crypto exposure, potentially creating stable demand that is less tied to market cycles.
“It treats digital assets less as a swing factor and more as another risk component in long-term portfolio construction, which is how the structural demand starts to take shape,” Auerbach added. Pay attention!
Read more: For analysis of today’s activity in altcoins and derivatives, see Crypto Markets Today
What to see
For a more comprehensive list of events this week, see CoinDesk’s “Crypto Week Ahead.”
- Crypto
- December 19: Metaplanet Inc. sponsored ADRs begin trading over the counter in the US under the ticker MPJPY. They will replace existing non-sponsored OTC trading under the MTPLF ticker.
- Macro
- December 19, at 10: USA (finally) dec. University of Michigan study. Consumer Sentiment Index Est. 53.4; Inflation expectations Est. 4.1%.
- Earnings (Estimated based on FactSet data)
Token Events
For a more comprehensive list of events this week, see CoinDesk’s “Crypto Week Ahead.”
- Governance votes and calls
- Lido DAO is voting on a transformative package to pivot from a pure staking protocol to a diversified DeFi product package over the next three years. Voting ends December 19.
- CoW DAO votes to dissolve the Sprinter solver commit pool and return the deposited 500,000 USDC and 1.5M COW to the original funders. Voting ends December 19.
- Arbitrum DAO votes to enable the ArbOS 51 upgrade that introduces a 32M transaction gas limit, dynamic gas targets and a doubled minimum base fee to improve network scalability. Voting ends December 19.
- December 19: Avantis hosts a League of Leverage discussion.
- Unlocks
- December 20: to unlock 6.79% of its circulating supply worth $37.28 million.
- The token is launched
- December 19: ZkPass (ZKP) to be listed on Binance, MEXC, Bybit, BingX and others.
Conferences
For a more comprehensive list of events this week, see CoinDesk’s “Crypto Week Ahead.”
Market movements
- BTC is up 2.91% as of 16 ET Wednesday at $88,092.82 (24 hours: +0.73%)
- ETH is up 6.82% to $2,969 (24h: -3.87%)
- CoinDesk 20 is up 3.33% to 2,707.79 (24 hours: +1.22%)
- Ether CESR Composite Staking Rate is down 1bp to 2.86%
- BTC funding rate is at 0.01% (10.95% annualized) on Binance
- DXY is up 0.23% to 98.65
- Gold futures are unchanged at $4,360.50
- Silver futures are up 1.73% at $66.35
- The Nikkei 225 closed up 1.03% at 49,507.21
- The Hang Seng closed up 0.75% at 25,690.53
- The FTSE is down 0.10% at 9,828.28
- The Euro Stoxx 50 is unchanged at 5,745.04
- The DJIA closed up 0.14% at 47,951.85
- The S&P 500 closed up 0.79% at 6,774.76
- The Nasdaq Composite closed up 1.38% at 23,006.36
- The S&P/TSX Composite closed up 0.61% at 31,440.85
- The S&P 40 Latin America closed up 1.15% at 3,093.49
- US 10-year Treasuries are up 2.9 bps at 4.145%
- E-mini S&P 500 futures rose 0.27% to 6,849.00
- E-mini Nasdaq-100 futures are up 0.4% at 25,363.25
- E-mini Dow Jones Industrial Average Index futures are unchanged at 48,356.00
Bitcoin statistics
- BTC dominance: 59.94% (+0.13%)
- Ether to bitcoin ratio: 0.03347 (1.19%)
- Hashrate (seven-day moving average): 1,031 EH/s
- Hash price (spot): $37.57
- Total Fees: 2.74 BTC / $237,800
- CME Futures open interest: 120,865 BTC
- BTC priced in gold: 20.3 oz.
- BTC vs Gold Market Cap: 5.9%
Technical Analysis
- BTC/USD is currently sandwiched between $84,200 support and $90,500 weekly resistance. While the 0.382 Fibonacci level is lower at $84,200, current price action is holding above it, supported by a clear bullish RSI divergence, with momentum building despite the price consolidation.
- A decisive weekly close above $90,500 would validate this divergence, likely triggering a trend continuation towards the 0.236 Fibonacci target at $100,400.
Crypto stocks
- Coinbase Global (COIN): closed Thursday at $239.20 (-2.04%), +3.24% at $246.94 in premarket
- Circle (CRCL): closed at $80.99 (+2.26%), +3.04% at $83.45
- Galaxy Digital (GLXY): closed at $22.51 (-1.32%), +3.07% at $23.20
- Bullish (BLSH): closed at $42.88 (+1.73%), +1.28% at $43.43
- MARA Holdings (MARA): closed at $9.69 (-2.42%), +2.68% at $9.95
- Riot Platforms (RIOT): closed at $13.38 (+3.24%), +3.21% at $13.81
- Core Scientific (CORZ): closed at $14.56 (+7.3%), +3.71% at $15.10
- CleanSpark (CLSK): closed at $11.20 (-2.44%), +3.66% at $11.61
- CoinShares Valkyrie Bitcoin Miners ETF (WGMI): closed at $37.49 (+2.68%)
- Exodus Movement (EXOD): closed at $15.21 (+4.61%)
Crypto Treasury Companies
- Strategy (MSTR): closed at $158.24 (-1.33%), +3.71% at $164.11
- Semler Scientific (SMLR): closed at $17.11 (+1.06%)
- SharpLink Gaming (SBET): closed at $9.02 (-2.7%), +5.1% at $9.48
- Upexi (UPXI): closed at $1.88 (+0.53%)
- Lite Strategy (LITS): closed at $1.35 (-1.46%)
ETF Flows
Spot BTC ETFs
- Daily net flows: -$161.3 million
- Cumulative net flows: $57.55 billion
- Total BTC holdings ~1.31M
Spot ETH ETFs
- Daily net flows: -$96.6 million
- Cumulative net flows: $12.54 billion
- Total ETH holding ~6.15 million
Source: Farside Investors
While you were sleeping
