Bitcoin, Ether Extend Refusal Amid US Lawsuit Against Binance; Asian stocks mixed

by James · March 28, 2023

Bitcoin and Ether extended their decline in trading on Tuesday afternoon in Asia, along with most other top 10 non-stablecoin cryptocurrencies by market capitalization, after US regulators pulled up Binance, the world’s largest crypto exchange, for allegedly violating trading mandates. Asian markets were mostly higher on Tuesday, mirroring a rally in US stocks on Monday, as investor sentiment picked up after a series of positive announcements eased fears of a crisis in the banking sector.

See related article: Binance denies US accusations of violating trading rules, manipulating markets

Fast facts

Bitcoin, the world’s largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization, lost 3.06% to US$26,960 in the 24 hours to 16:00 in Hong Kong, according to data from CoinMarketCap, and fell 2.22% in the past seven days. Ethereum fell 1.61% to US$1,724, after losing 0.6% on the week.
BNB, the native token of the world’s largest crypto exchange Binance, saw the biggest decline among the top 10 cryptos. The token fell 5.19% in the past 24 hours to US$309, after the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission said on Monday it was filing a “civil enforcement action” against Binance and its top executives for allegedly violating trading rules.
XRP was the only token among the top 10 cryptos to gain in Tuesday afternoon trade in Asia, climbing 5.61% to $0.4843, and is up 25.47% for the week. The win comes as Ripple Labs, whose payment network is powered by XRP, expects to win a lawsuit brought against it by the US Securities and Exchange Commission for allegedly selling $1.3 billion in unregistered securities.
Global crypto market capitalization fell 1.96% to $1.13 trillion, while total crypto market volume increased 30.1% to $43.42 billion over the past 24 hours.
The Nasdaq 500 NFT index fell 0.54% to 4,004.93 on the day and fell 3.34% for the week. The index is a proxy measure of the performance of the global NFT market and includes 500 eligible smart contracts on a given day.
Asian stock markets mostly rose on Tuesday as concerns about a crisis in the banking industry eased. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index rose 1.11%, South Korea’s Kospi rose 1.07% and Japan’s Nikkei 225 rose 0.15%.
The Shanghai Composite lost 0.19% and the Shenzhen Component Index fell 0.72%, amid concerns that Covid-19-related disruptions continue to hamper China’s economic recovery.
Gold fell 0.24% to $1,951 an ounce, after falling 1% on Monday. The precious metal remains below the one-year high of $2,000 it touched last week.
European stock markets rose for the second day in a row. The benchmark STOXX 600 rose 0.34% and Germany’s DAX 40 rose 0.5%.
European Central Bank President Christine Lagarde will speak at the opening ceremony of the Bank for International Settlements’ Innovation Hub Eurosystem Center later Tuesday.
London’s benchmark FTSE 100 rose 0.43% on the day, after Bank of England Governor Andrew Bailey said the country’s financial system is resilient and has robust capital, but warned interest rates could move higher.
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