Today, the price of BTC has returned above $122,000, which is just a step away from the all-time high recorded in mid-July just above $123,000.
The price of ETH has also risen, surpassing $4,300 for the first time since November 2021.
The all-time high of ETH is nearly $4,900, therefore it is still 12% below, but given that the current price level is the highest of the ongoing cycle, the probabilities that ETH might also update the all-time high are increasing considerably.
The rise of BTC price
The most significant thing about this very recent rise in the price of BTC is that it seems to have occurred without an apparent specific reason.
BTC/USD price chart, Bitstamp market. Source: TradingView { “lineWidth”: 2, “lineType”: 0, “chartType”: “candlesticks”, “fontColor”: “rgb(106, 109, 120)”, “gridLineColor”: “rgba(242, 242, 242, 0.06)”, “volumeUpColor”: “rgba(34, 171, 148, 0.5)”, “volumeDownColor”: “rgba(247, 82, 95, 0.5)”, “backgroundColor”: “#0F0F0F”, “widgetFontColor”: “#DBDBDB”, “upColor”: “#22ab94”, “downColor”: “#f7525f”, “borderUpColor”: “#22ab94”, “borderDownColor”: “#f7525f”, “wickUpColor”: “#22ab94”, “wickDownColor”: “#f7525f”, “colorTheme”: “dark”, “isTransparent”: false, “locale”: “en”, “chartOnly”: false, “scalePosition”: “right”, “scaleMode”: “Normal”, “fontFamily”: “-apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, Trebuchet MS, Roboto, Ubuntu, sans-serif”, “valuesTracking”: “1”, “changeMode”: “price-and-percent”, “symbols”: [ [ “BITSTAMP:BTCUSD|1D” ] ], “dateRanges”: [ “1d|1”, “1m|30”, “3m|60”, “12m|1D”, “60m|1W”, “all|1M” ], “fontSize”: “10”, “headerFontSize”: “medium”, “autosize”: false, “width”: 800, “height”: 500, “noTimeScale”: false, “hideDateRanges”: false, “hideMarketStatus”: false, “hideSymbolLogo”: false }
Simply in recent days, the selling pressure has decreased, but not the buying pressure, and this first caused the price to rise, and then the same rise triggered an increase in buying pressure.
To tell the truth, today the selling pressure also increased, due to the fact that with the price near historical highs, many take profit by selling, perhaps also for fear that a so-called “double top” might occur, after which the price could fall.
It is important to highlight that the fear of the double top this year has already been disproven twice, because there have already been two instances of a double top after which the price did indeed fall, but only slightly and for a short time, before rising again and reaching new highs.
Note that this is a situation quite similar to what happened in 2017, which was the very first year of Donald Trump in the White House. That year eventually saw the inflation of a gigantic speculative bubble, which culminated with the listing on the stock exchange of the first futures on the price of Bitcoin in mid-December.
This year in the Bitcoin market there is still no sign of a speculative bubble, and there is still time until the end of the year for one to inflate.
The bull run of the ETH price
Until a couple of days ago, the rise in the price of ETH was progressing independently from that of BTC.
ETH/USD price chart. Source: TradingView { “lineWidth”: 2, “lineType”: 0, “chartType”: “candlesticks”, “fontColor”: “rgb(106, 109, 120)”, “gridLineColor”: “rgba(242, 242, 242, 0.06)”, “volumeUpColor”: “rgba(34, 171, 148, 0.5)”, “volumeDownColor”: “rgba(247, 82, 95, 0.5)”, “backgroundColor”: “#0F0F0F”, “widgetFontColor”: “#DBDBDB”, “upColor”: “#22ab94”, “downColor”: “#f7525f”, “borderUpColor”: “#22ab94”, “borderDownColor”: “#f7525f”, “wickUpColor”: “#22ab94”, “wickDownColor”: “#f7525f”, “colorTheme”: “dark”, “isTransparent”: false, “locale”: “en”, “chartOnly”: false, “scalePosition”: “right”, “scaleMode”: “Normal”, “fontFamily”: “-apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, Trebuchet MS, Roboto, Ubuntu, sans-serif”, “valuesTracking”: “1”, “changeMode”: “price-and-percent”, “symbols”: [ [ “BITSTAMP:ETHUSD|1D” ] ], “dateRanges”: [ “1d|1”, “1m|30”, “3m|60”, “12m|1D”, “60m|1W”, “all|1M” ], “fontSize”: “10”, “headerFontSize”: “medium”, “autosize”: false, “width”: 800, “height”: 500, “noTimeScale”: false, “hideDateRanges”: false, “hideMarketStatus”: false, “hideSymbolLogo”: false }
In fact, the price ratio between BTC and ETH at the end of July was slightly below 0.032 BTC per ETH, while on Saturday it had even risen above 0.036 BTC.
Today, instead, it has dropped back to 0.035 BTC, which makes it evident both how today’s rise is driven by Bitcoin, and how Ethereum has stopped moving independently and has resumed following Bitcoin.
All this is made even more evident by the altcoin season index of CMC, which rose to 43 points last week and fell back to 37 today.
In other words, Bitcoin has returned to dominate the crypto markets after a few weeks of brief dominance by Ethereum.
The spot BTC and ETH ETFs
Note that the USA stock exchanges have not yet opened, therefore the ETF crypto spot have not played any role in today’s rise.
However, they played an important role in the rise of the past weeks, especially regarding Ethereum.
Except during the sessions on the first and fourth of August, it has been since July that all other stock market sessions close with significant net daily inflows for ETF su ETH spot.
In fact, the day on Friday ended with the highest daily net inflow of the past few weeks, even though it was BTC that later led the rise.
The thing is curious, because on Friday the daily net inflows on BTC spot ETFs were lower than those on ETH, and so was the day before.
Perhaps at this point it is possible to hypothesize that over the weekend a mini-cycle of clear growth in ETH dominance has indeed concluded, and that now we have returned to a classic period of clear BTC dominance.
The forecasts of the crypto markets
Up to this point, the picture seems remarkably fantastic.
However, the increase in selling pressure due to profit-taking could also end up triggering a correction.
The fact is that the buying pressure has increased, while the selling pressure remained very low, and this pushed the price up, but it is not certain that the buying pressure cannot decrease again now.
What is certain is that the selling pressure has increased, and this means that if the buying pressure does not increase, the price should end up falling.
To tell the truth, it is not even certain that the selling pressure will not decrease, but at such high price levels, it seems quite plausible that profit-taking may continue.
Moreover, August is often a month with very limited volumes, and this could mean a limit to the growth of buying pressure. Therefore, it is possible to imagine that at this point sooner or later there will be a decrease in the latter, and with selling pressure that has increased, the consequence should be a price correction in the short term.
