Decentral Block Post

Bitcoin’s bullish surge in January has helped the Nasdaq Crypto Index to register its third-highest monthly gain, with a 38% surge. The cryptocurrency market started the year on a bullish note, defying major bearish market outlooks. Bitcoin (BTC) and a number of altcoins touched new multi-month highs as inflation cooled off. 

NCI recorded its third-biggest monthly gain since its inception in February 2021. The crypto asset index was launched by Brazilian asset manager Hashdex in partnership with the United States stock exchange. The index consists of eight cryptocurrencies: Bitcoin, Ether (ETH), Bitcoin Cash (BCH), Litecoin (LTC), Chainlink's LINK, and Stellar's Lumen (XLM), among a few others.

BTC has the highest weightage in the index, with 69.8%, followed by ETH (27.08%). The rest of the other altcoins have a weightage of less than 1%.  Thus, the subsequent rise of BTC and ETH, which have surged over 35% in the past month, reflected on the index as well. The index weightage refers to the share of stocks invested in a particular digital asset.

Related: Bitcoin bulls must reclaim these 2 levels as 'death cross' still looms

With a prolonged crypto winter throughout 2022, Bitcoin ended the last year at around $16,500 and the majority of the altcoins also tested their yearly lows towards the end of the last year. Many market pundits had warned that the bearish sentiment might continue into the new year owing to the FTX saga folding out on a daily basis. However, the crypto market showed resilience and started the year on a bullish note and registering a market-wide double-digit gain for the past month.

Bitcoin (BTC) faces a sink-or-swim resistance test to confirm its “macro breakout,” a new analysis says.

In a tweet on Feb. 2, on-chain monitoring resource Material Indicators flagged key levels to flip to support after BTC/USD spiked above $24,000.

Bitcoin price gears up for trend line showdown

In what was ultimately a boon for Bitcoin bulls, the United States Federal Reserve delivered what risk-on traders wanted to hear on Feb. 1.

With Chair Jerome Powell using the word “disinflation,” hopes immediately began to bet on rate hikes ending sooner and easier monetary conditions returning in their place.

The mood was palpable across crypto, with BTC price action reversing an initial drop to see new six-month highs of $24,250 on Bitstamp.

A small-scale decentralized autonomous organization (DAO) has suffered a rather sizeable smart contract exploit leading to an estimated $120 million being stolen from its protocol.

BonqDAO, which is behind the Bonq protocol, told its Twitter followers on Feb. 1 that its protocol was exposed to an oracle hack that allowed the exploiter to manipulate the price of the AllianceBlock (ALBT) token.

An independent analysis from blockchain security firm PeckShield has estimated the loss from the Bonq hack to be around $120 million, comprising $108 million from 98.65 million BEUR tokens, and $11 million from 113.8 million wrapped-ALBT (wALBT) tokens.

While the exploit took effect over several transactions, the largest was $82.19 million at 6:32pm UTC time on Feb. 1, according to multi-chain portfolio tracker DeBank.

Most of the high-scale transactions took place on the Polygon network.

Bitcoin's (BTC) price has been trading above $22,500 for 12 days. Of course, this situation can change even if Federal Reserve chair Jerome Powell issues positive statements about the economy in today’s post-FOMC presser. 

Even if the decision matches the market consensus, the post-meeting statement should be investors' primary area of focus. Specific areas to focus on would be clues for the next meeting in March.

Troubling news for the largest stablecoin Tether (USDT), could also cause a meaningful impact after a Celsius bankruptcy examiner report showed that "Tether's exposure eventually grew to over $2 billion" in Sep. 2021. However, it is unclear if iFinex — Tether’s issuer — suffered any losses. iFinex CTO Paolo Ardoino denied exposure to Celsius and suggested that the examiner had "mixed up" prepositions in the report.

Is a strong correction in stock market ahead?

Legendary portfolio manager Michael Burry, known for being one of the most vocal critics of the subprime mortgage crisis in 2007 to 2008, posted a short note on Twitter on Feb. 1, suggesting that investors "sell."

While the message lacks a supporting thesis, one could conclude that Burry expects a meaningful correction in traditional markets. Considering the 40-day correlation between Bitcoin and the S&P 500 index at 75%, the odds of a BTC price retrace become evident.