News of the inadvertently published Treasury response to Biden’s crypto directive provided the impetus for the crypto market to rebound late yesterday. The surge continued overnight, with most cryptocurrencies seeing decent price gains during the European morning hours.
Altcoin markets rally as investors and traders gain confidence
The combined cryptocurrency market capital surged from $1.723 trillion (01:00 GMT+3) to $1.852 trillion (15:36 GMT+3) today.
Total market capital chart. Source: CoinMarketCap
Bitcoin price has, as of writing, moved by about 8.40% in the last 24 hours, placing the coin in a position to challenge 42K – a level it hasn’t revisited since last Thursday. The flagship crypto-asset set an intraday high of $42,352 earlier today as per CoinMarketCap data but has since retraced to just above $42,000.
Its rally, unsurprisingly, swayed altcoins with Terra (LUNA) among the standout crypto assets that have seen a dramatic price uptrend.
Terra (LUNA) brushes against $100 before retreating to $97
Terra’s LUNA token has seen an explosive run today. The native token on LUNA climbed from $79 yesterday to hit an intraday high (and weekly high) of $99.93 – a 26.5% price upswing.
LUNA/USD 3-month trading chart. Source: CoinMarketCap
Though the majority of the crypto tokens are trading in the green, none in the top 20 has posted double-digits. The only other major token with an equally large green candle is Near Protocol’s NEAR, ranked 22nd by CoinMarketCap in market capital.
LUNA/USD slightly grazed $100 on some exchanges, but the latest data indicates its momentum has cooled off as the token swings around $98.50. At its current price, the token is only 5.40% off its all-time high of $103.33. This is the closest it has come to eclipse the December peak since the start of the year.
Terra has now flipped Solana and Cardano to occupy seventh place following the rapid price rally. Its market capital of $35.785 billion as of writing also puts it within a distance of sixth-ranked XRP, which has an equivalent figure of $36.081 billion.
Ethereum and other top altcoins have risen as well
The premier altcoin Ethereum (ETH) has reclaimed $2,700 following a price surge of 5.54% in the last 24 hours. Despite the boost, Ether has struggled to overcome resistance at $2,760. The token briefly breached this level but quickly got rejected back to $2,735, where it is currently hovering.
ETH/USD 24-hr trading chart. Source: CoinMarketCap
Tenth-ranked Avalanche (AVAX) has accrued 9.07% gains in the same period and is now trading marginally above $78. Polygon (MATIC) and Solana (SOL) tokens have charted relatively smaller ascents. The former has cut above $1.50 on the back of a 4.12% boost. SOL/USD is still stuck below $88 despite seeing a 4.35% price surge on the day.
LUNA has the third-highest liquidation volume in the last 4 hours
Though the surge comes as a relief to many ailing crypto tokens, it has resulted in more than $135.40 million worth of orders being liquidated in the last 12 hours. Short trades have taken the biggest hit over the past 12 hours as they make up for the majority (84.61%) of liquidation. Coinglass data further shows that almost 50,000 individual trading accounts have been affected by the liquidation, bringing the 24 hr liquidation volume to $203.43 million.
The 12-hr time frame show Bitcoin futures account for the bulk of liquidation volume with $70.76 million worth of positions wiped out. Futures tracking LUNA have recorded the third-highest losses with $9.49 million wiped out, behind Ether’s $28.52 million worth of liquidated orders.
Liquidation Volmes. Source: CoinGlass
The current 24-hr liquidated volume, however, doesn’t come close to the highest 24-hr liquidation volume recorded this year. Early this year, on January 21st, almost $1 billion worth of leveraged positions were closed in a single day.
To learn more about Terra visit our Investing in Terra guide.