Welcome to the fifth issue of the Broker’s Beat. Things are getting pretty exciting in the world of crypto right now as bears push back, and we’re glad to be able to provide you with some additional insight.
This week, we discuss some new news in the mining space and look at how Bitcoin seems to be consolidating strength (hopefully before another big breakout).
Almost every week is exciting in the world of crypto, and we hope that this digest can provide some extra colour and information for you to use in your own trading activities.
Bitmain Delays Delivery of Bitcoin Miners as Co-Founders Battle for Company Control
Source: Bitcoin.com
“The company is offering two options to its customers as compensation for delays. First, customers can write to Bitmain requesting that deliveries are fast-tracked. If they do not receive the equipment after 60 days of submitting the request, customers can ask for a refund.
The second option involves cash coupons equivalent to theoretical mining revenue between now and the actual delivery date. Those coupons could be used to pay for future orders. The two options cannot be exercised together.”
Cardano (ADA) will be operated by the community in 2021
Source: Crypto News Flash
“Cardano’s creator stated that the platform will grow beyond any expectations, summarizing some of Cardano’s accomplishments in recent months, Shelley’s deployment and the listing on 11 exchanges. Hoskinson also expressed his pleasure that Cardano is now a platform that allows people to build their dreams on. In that sense, he made a great announcement regarding the community and said he hopes it will become the custodian of Cardano’s protocol architecture.”
After Bitcoin ‘Betrayal,’ Goldman Sachs Is Suddenly Betting Big On Crypto And Blockchain
Source: Forbes
“McDermott has poached JPMorgan’s head of digital assets strategy, Oli Harris, CNBC reports, who helped the bank develop its JPM Coin. Unveiled last year, JPM Coin was the first digital coin from a major bank and is intended to speed up and lower the cost of international payments by using bitcoin’s distributed ledger blockchain technology.”
Coinbase Exits Industry Lobbying Group in Protest Over Recent Unspecified ‘Decisions’
Source: CoinDesk
Our sentiments regarding the price of Bitcoin has been changing nearly every week. We’ve gone from bullish to cautiously bullish, and are now feeling bearish about the short-term prospects for Bitcoin.
Bitcoin has been testing the $12k level for a while, and even though it is performing at a level far superior to other asset classes, we still can’t feel the push necessary to get through this level. At least right now.
Looking at the 1-month chart below, we can see how RSI is now around the 50 mark. This is a lot more stable than the supra-70 level we saw earlier this week, which indicated that Bitcoin has been overbought. Our hope was that this would have strengthened by this week in order to set up a big upswing in the coming months.
Relative Strength Index is a basic indicator, but is probably the most important one to keep in mind for such a volatile asset. It’s our expectation that BTC will continue to test the $12k resistance level for a while longer as it consolidates.
This week, we’ve decided to juxtapose the changes between last week and today to show you how much more the mining industry is stabilizing.
In the percentage breakdowns below, you can see that the “other” category has stayed at exactly 9.13%. The only noticeable change is that F2Pool has pulled into the lead over Poolin. However the difference in percentage is so miniscule that it can hardly be considered notable.
Mining Distribution on August 6th
Mining Distribution on August 13th
As we see continued geopolitical tensions mounting across the world, a few things will unfold that will likely affect the mining industry.
First, countries like India, which is trying to limit the use of Bitcoin in order to maintain control over its economy, will make it difficult or impossible to mine Bitcoin. This is part of an effort to maintain sovereignty and not have rogue internal economies operating within their nation.
But more importantly, Bitcoin mining has proven to be highly profitable, which could lead to a stretch from governments to tax Bitcoin mining in order to cover budget shortfalls during the pandemic. This is occurring right now in Kazakhstan, as they are proposing a new 15% tax on Bitcoin mining companies.
Things are pretty calm on the hash rate front, which makes sense after the pump. We’ve already talked a lot about how miners were able to continue running once Bitcoin went through the massive price run up.
Now, we’ll look at where hash rate is currently, and how that’s affecting mining revenue. As you can see in the 60-day chart below, hash rate is still quite high, but has moderated out for the time-being. At this price level, miners are comfortable enough for the near future.
The 1-year chart of miner revenue below shows exactly why the hash rate has stabilized. Revenue had been on a continued downward trend for a while and only in the last month has it started to pick up again. We can expect to see the hash rate increase as revenue increases, and often think of revenue as a leading indicator.
Logically, miner revenue is the amount of Bitcoin mined multiplied by the price of Bitcoin. With the recent halving, we know the only way revenue will go up is with an increase in the price of Bitcoin. As we said above, we are short-term bearish on Bitcoin, and therefore expect the hash rate to drop at least for a little bit in the next month.
As with last week, we don’t have much news on the macro front of trading.
But there are tons of smaller bits of news that will be exciting for those of you deeply ingrained in the trading world. Uniswap just announced that it has surpassed $100 million in liquidity last week. This is a positive signal for DeFi and crypto as a whole. More cryptocurrency being staked means larger liquidity pools, which is definitely a step in the right direction.
In addition to that, the Ethereum DEX just announced that it has had a $420 million day of volume. Trading nearly half a billion of ETH is a positive sign for decentralized exchanges. It should be noted that almost half of that volume is related to Uniswap, but this is still a positive for the community.
Finally, Canadian-based Wealthsimple has just announced that it is nearing full regulatory approval from Canadian watchdogs. Wealthsimple is a trustworthy and rapidly growing company that started off as a roboadvisor and has expanded in order to court the daytrading crowd.
Wealthsimple will not permit the movement of crypto in and out of wallets, which is counter to the crypto ethos, but will at least allow participants to relish in some of the gains in the crypto world. This type of custody management is one way in which companies will be able to get regulatory approval, since it reduces risks to the investor.
That concludes the fifth issue of the Broker’s Beat. Stay on the lookout for our upcoming DeFi market overview research. Watch out for this high-value report in your inbox. You won’t want to miss it!
