Markets: Bitcoin, Ethereum extend losses

Bitcoin and Ethereum fell on Thursday afternoon in Asia, along with all other top 10 non-stablecoin cryptocurrencies on market concerns that the U.S. Federal Reserve may increase interest rates further to tackle inflation.

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Fast facts

• Bitcoin fell 2.19% to US$20,832 on Thursday at 4 p.m. in Hong Kong, after gaining 14.89% over the past seven days, according to data from CoinMarketCap. Ethereum lost 3.37% to US$1,529 but increased 9.36% in the last week.

• Memecoin Shiba Inu fell 10.9% to US$0.00001111, after it gained 20% in the last seven days. Investors are awaiting the release of Shibarium, a layer-2 network that will run on top of the Ethereum blockchain.

• Solana dropped 7.16% to US$21.32, and gained 31.39% over the past week. Polygon’s Matic token lost 5.88% to US$0.9454 after it strengthened 6.5% on the week.

• Polkadot lost 4.56% to US$5.75 and Dogecoin fell 6.97% to US$0.08099.

• Asian equity markets were mixed on Thursday. The Shenzhen stock exchange rose 0.87%, the Shanghai Stock Exchange gained 0.49%, and South Korea’s Kospi rose 0.51%. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index dipped 0.12% while Japan’s Nikkei 225 lost 1.44%.

• “Although the likelihood for a challenging global outlook remains high in 2023, we are seeing more opportunities within the Asia Pacific,” Chloe Shea, investment director at global investment firm Schroders, wrote in a note shared with Forkast.

• “The positive moves by the Chinese policy makers, Asian markets gearing ahead of developed markets to end the tightening cycle, as well as attractive valuations relative to history and global peers are among the positive catalysts for Asian assets to perform well,” she added.

• See related article: CFTC commissioner calls for clearer crypto regulations