BTC is currently trading around $54,700 and ETH around $4,150. Notable gainers in the last 24 hours are BAT, GALA, and KDA. The global crypto market cap is $2.61T, down 6.6% over the last day. DeFi Total Value Locked is ~$253b and BTC dominance is around 43%.
Risk assets around the globe are down on fears of a new Covid variant found in South Africa. South African scientists have said the new B.1.1.529 variant contains more than 30 spike protein mutations, many of which are linked to increased antibody resistance and could affect the variant’s behavior with regard to vaccines, treatments and transmissibility. Crypto markets have not been immune, with the global cryptocurrency market cap down 6.6% over the last 24 hours, causing over $765m of liquidations. BTC dipped below $53,600 not long ago, as it flirted with the $1.0T market cap mark.
Other crypto news today includes: The Bitcoin network is processing more volume by dollar value than PayPal and could outstrip MasterCard as early as 2026, per a new report by Blockdata; Bank of England governor Andrew Bailey expressed concern over El Salvador’s adoption of BTC as legal tender, citing BTC’s volatility; an extremely rare piece of virtual land in play-to-earn game Axie Infinity sold yesterday for 550 ETH, or ~$2.5m; Shiba Inu (SHIB) reached a milestone by surpassing one million holders despite the memecoin trading 50% below its ATH; and Moonbeam, an Ethereum-compatible smart contract platform, has won the second parachain auction on Polkadot.
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