Bitcoin was
down 1.7 per cent on Wednesday, ending the day at around $20K amid a retreat in stock indices and
a stronger USD. BTC corrected downwards after a two-day rise.

The
cryptocurrency Fear and Greed Index was up 1 point to 26 by Thursday and
stepped up from “extreme fear” into “fear” status.

The $20.3K
mark has been acting as local resistance for over three weeks. On Thursday
morning, we continue to see selling pressure at this level. In other markets,
it is also easy to see the doubts among the players whether the risk demand has
started to recover. Investors and traders are waiting for signals from the Fed
or other central banks to start the rally. Either a clear sign that “this
time is different” and that the weak economy will not cause regulators to
soften.

Those with
the glass half-full note that the active phase of price declines has dried up,
and we are speculating about when the price will start to rise, but not how
deep the plunge will go.

According
to CryptoQuant, miners sharply reduced bitcoin sales in September after the
August reset, shifting to holding reserves.

News background

Galaxy Digital
head Michael Novogratz said that in the current environment, bitcoin could
still be a good store of value but was unlikely to exceed $30,000 by the end of
the year. According to him, BTC has fallen under the sledgehammer of the Fed’s
fight against inflation, and only a softening of this policy could cause the
market to grow.

The
international payments system SWIFT has reported a successful test of a
full-scale Central Bank Digital Currency Deployment (CBDC).

According
to Chainalysis, the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region has led the way
over the past year in adopting cryptocurrencies in various areas of life. Latin
America and North America follow with 40% and 36% respectively.

In the
third quarter, the crypto industry lost $428 million from hacks and scams,
experts at bounty platform Immunefi calculated. There were 39 incidents, of
which 30 were actual hacking attacks with a total loss of $399m.

This article was written by Alexander
Kuptsikevich, FxPro senior market analyst