Bitcoin (BTC-USD) prices, alongside the broader crypto market, faced a substantial pushback this week amid growing market volatility and the U.S. Federal Reserve’s latest minutes hinting that interest rates may rise further to curb inflation.
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The value of BTC dropped by 1.45% over the last seven trading sessions, with the legacy token now trading back below the critical level of $24,500. This downturn follows the U.S. Consumer Price Index (CPI) data released on February 14, which reflected higher-than-expected inflation. Another reason behind the latest reversal lower is heightened SEC regulatory enforcement activity focused on centralized exchanges.
Meanwhile, a fresh on-chain report from Glassnode indicates that BTC miners and short-term holders are on a selling spree while long-term holders and whales continue accumulating. Per the experts, BTC is poised for more unprecedented swings in the coming weeks as macroeconomic volatility sparks turmoil across financial markets.
Stacks (STX) Charges Higher as Altcoins Defy Market Volatility
While the broader market, especially the top altcoins by market capitalization, extended their consolidation phase throughout the week, Stacks soared by about 150% over the week, primarily due to the growing hype surrounding Bitcoin Ordinals NFTs. With investors seeking more exposure to Ordinals, there has been a massive surge in overall network activity on the Stacks chain, helping the project reclaim its $1 billion market cap.
Besides Stacks triple-digit gains, Conflux (CFX), a new “high throughput” layer-1 blockchain network that uses a Tree-Graph consensus algorithm, also experienced major upward momentum.
The value of the CFX token surged by 119.50% over the last seven sessions due to a series of announcements. These include CFX’s integration with Little Red Book — the Chinese version of Instagram, a partnership with China Telecom and the Shanghai government to develop blockchain SIM (BSIM) cards, and steps by the Hong Kong government to accelerate crypto adoption.
Filecoin (FIL) was another major outperformer after registering a seven-day uptick of 46.5% as investor interest across “shared storage protocols” continues to strengthen. That said, one of the key reasons behind the surge in FIL’s value this week is the official launch date of the much-hyped Filecoin Ethereum (ETH-USD) Virtual Machine (FEVM).
Another major mover was Tezos (XTZ), which managed to sustain the reversal higher that began at the beginning of the year. The value of XTZ rose 21.70% over the last seven trading sessions thanks to its latest partnership with Google Cloud and Rarible ‘s new support for Tezos NFTs.
Aptos and Hedera Pull Back amid Market’s Mixed Performance
Although altcoin momentum largely shook off the Fed’s interest rate comments, not all tokens escaped the latest dip among major cryptos. Layer-1 proof-of-stake (PoS) blockchain Aptos and its native token APT faced a significant downturn despite the network securing a spot in the upcoming California-based accelerator program hosted by Outlier Ventures. The value of the APT token dropped by 15.6% over the week, with the total value locked (TVL) in the Aptos chain shrinking to $54.11 million.
Hedera (HBAR) also found itself mauled by bears throughout the week. HBAR dropped by 10.3% over the last seven trading sessions, even amid a surge in its total value locked (TVL). The 24-hour trading volume of HBAR also registered a sharp decline, further impacting the token’s value.
However, investors are optimistic that HBAR will rebound sharply, primarily because the HBAR Foundation – Hedera’s development arm – aims to disrupt the e-commerce content creation ecosystem with its new dApp called Unthink.ai.
Fantom (FTM), Mina (MINA), and ImmutableX (IMX) were among the other biggest losers this week. Much of the lackluster performances from these tokens can be attributed to the increased selling pressure due to uncertainty revolving around interest rate hikes.
Titanic NFTs, $100 Million Web3 Grant, and More
Although the market backdrop was more volatile over the last seven sessions, the industry continues to gather momentum across multiple vectors. Among the developments, Artifact Labs, Venture Smart Financial Holdings from Hong Kong, and RMS Titanic (RMST) formed a new partnership to tokenize artifacts and memorabilia from the wreckage of the Titanic. This initiative aims to generate funds for the sunken ship’s future research, recovery, and preservation efforts.
In the meantime, amid the expanding Web3 landscape, PayPal (NASDAQ:PYPL) and Galaxy have raised $20 million in seed funding for Chaos Labs, a New York-based cloud platform focused on securing blockchains and protocols. This funding round was joined by 23 organizations and six angel investors.
Finally, Bosch and Fetch.ai have joined forces to establish the Fetch.ai Foundation to drive industrial adoption of advanced software, artificial intelligence (AI), and Web3 technologies. The initiative began with a $100 million grant to facilitate the continued growth of Web3-based solutions and services in the mobility, industrial technology, and consumer industries over the long term.
