5 Things to Know in Crypto Today: BTC Slips Under $24K, ETH Under $1.9K

Key Points

• Cryptocurrencies are pulling back from weekend highs amid a cautious tone to global macro trade following weak Chinese data.
• Bitcoin was last trading just under $24,000 and Ethereum under $1,900, with US Retail Sales, FOMC minutes in focus.
• Monero implemented a major hard fork upgrade this weekend.

BTC Slips Back to $24,000, ETH to $1,900

After a strong finish to last week, macro risk appetite has taken a modest turn for the worse on Monday, with a barrage of weaker than expected data points released out of China overnight weighing on sentiment in the global equity space. After hitting fresh multi-week highs above the $25,200 level overnight, Bitcoin recently pulled back  under $24,000.

Ethereum, meanwhile, recently dipped back under $1,900s, having surpassed the $2,000 mark on multiple occasions over the weekend. Other major altcoins are also trading in subdued fashion, with the likes of BNB, ADA, XRP, SOL, DOGE and DOT all flat to down about 2.0% in the last 24 hours, according to CoinMarketCap. Monday is set to be a very quiet session, with very little of note on the economic calendar. This week’s main events will be Wednesday’s US Retail Sales report for July and the minutes from last month’s FOMC meeting.

Monero Implements Major Hard Fork Upgrade

Privacy-focused cryptocurrency network Monero on Saturday implemented a major hard-fork upgrade, with improvements to its privacy features, performance and wallet functionality. The number of signers in a ring signature, which are used to make it impossible to trace the origins of a Monero transaction, has been increased to 16 for every transaction from 11 before.

Monero’s Bulletproof algorithm which also facilitates private transfers was upgraded to Bulletproof+ and is expected to improve performance by 5-7%. The upgrade is also expected to speed wallet syncing by 30-40% and reduce network fee volatility.

Scaramucci Urges Crypto Investors to HODL and Think Long-term

Crypto investors should “see through the current environment” and “stay patient and stay long term”, said the founder of well-known hedge fund Skybridge Capital Anthony Scaramucci in an interview with CNBC over the weekend. Scaramucci cited recent improvements in the Bitcoin Lightning Network, a layer-2 payment protocol built on top of the Bitcoin blockchain, and recent moves by Blackrock to expand its cryptocurrency offerings.

Recall that in the last few weeks Blackrock has 1) teamed up with Coinbase to offer crypto trading services to its institutional clients and 2) launched a spot Bitcoin private fund to offer its clients direct crypto exposure. “(Blackrock) CEO Larry Fink is seeing institutional demand for digital assets… Otherwise, he wouldn’t be setting up those products, and he wouldn’t be teaming up with Coinbase,” Scaramucci said.

Scaramucci also spoke about the upcoming Ethereum merge and how that has been boosting ETH’s price as of late, noting the risk of a “sell the fact” reaction once the merge goes ahead in mid-September. “A lot of traders are probably buying that rumor; they will probably sell on the news of that merger… I would caution people not to do that; these are great long-term investments”.

Sacrificing Tornado Cash Worth as Crypto Needs a “Rules Based Environment”, Say’s Kevin O’Leary

Speaking in a podcast over the weekend, famous shark tank investor and venture capitalist Kevin O’Leary spoke on the recent clamp-down by the US Treasury on the Ethereum-based privacy-focused payments service Tornado Cash and the recent arrest of its creator Alexey Pertsev in the Netherlands. “At the end of the day, it’s okay to arrest that guy,” O’Leary said.

“He’s messing with the primal forces of regulation… If we have to sacrifice him, that’s okay, because we want to have some stability in that institutional capital”. O’Leary is of the opinion that needs to operate in a well-regulated “rules-based environment” in order to attract substantial sums of institutional capital into the asset class.

O’Leary’s opinion on recent Tornado Cash developments differs substantially from many within the crypto community. The US government has bene lambasted for attacking the right of US citizens to privacy in its clamp down on Tornado Cash. And authorities in the Netherlands have faced severe criticism for the arrest of its creator, who they claim is not responsible for the actions of any bad actors using the service he created.

Acala’s aUSD Loses 99% of Value in Latest Stablecoin Depeg

Another Decentralized Finance (DeFi) stablecoin collapsed this last weekend. Polkadot-based platform Acala’s native USD-pegged stablecoin aUSD dropped 99% on Sunday after a hacker exploited a bug in a recently deployed liquidity pool to mint 1.28 billion new tokens out of thin air.

According to Polkadot’s official Twitter account, “a misconfiguration was found on Acala’s iBTC/aUSD liquidity pool which resulted in erroneous mints of significant amounts of aUSD”. However, the “Acala team reacted quickly through governance, pausing certain chain functions including transfers, thereby keeping over 99% of the minted funds on Acala”. “The Acala team will continue tracing on-chain activity, and will facilitate a community proposal to resolve the issue”.

Earlier today a misconfiguration was found on Acala’s iBTC/aUSD liquidity pool which resulted in erroneous mints of significant amounts of aUSD.

— Polkadot (@Polkadot) August 14, 2022