The world’s biggest cryptocurrency briefly broke below a key support level on Thursday but managed to recover above $60,000, albeit briefly. Broader crypto markets were also mostly subdued.
Bitcoin rose 0.6% to $61,403.0 by 09:26 ET (13:26 GMT). The token was trading down 2.3% this week.
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission on Thursday charged crypto market maker Cumberland DRW with acting as an unregistered dealer for over $2 billion in crypto assets since 2018.
The move is the latest in the SEC’s long-running crackdown against what it perceives as multiple violations of securities law in the crypto industry.
The agency is currently engaged in lawsuits against exchanges Kraken and Coinbase (NASDAQ:COIN) over allegations of breach of security law, on the grounds that crypto tokens fall under securities law.
The case against Cumberland ramped up concerns over more regulatory action against the crypto industry.
Recent speculation over a mass token sale by the U.S. government- of the nearly 64,000 Bitcoin confiscated from the Silk Road website- had also dented crypto prices.
On the regulatory front, markets are now focused squarely on the 2024 presidential election, where pro-crypto, Republican candidate Donald Trump faces a tight race with Democratic nominee Kamala Harris. Harris is expected to likely continue the Biden administration’s crackdown against crypto.
In other crypto developments, cryptocurrency exchange Bitnomial has filed a lawsuit against the SEC, accusing the agency of overstepping its authority by attempting to regulate a proposed XRP futures contract in conjunction with the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC).
In a filing made on Thursday with the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, Bitnomial argued that the CFTC should have sole jurisdiction over the futures, and the SEC’s involvement would significantly increase its regulatory burden. The exchange had self-certified the XRP futures on August 9, confirming that they did not breach CFTC regulations.
“Bitnomial disagrees with the SEC’s view that XRP is an investment contract and, therefore, a security, and that XRP Futures are thus security futures,” the filing stated.
This lawsuit mirrors a similar action filed by Crypto.com earlier in the week. In that case, the exchange responded to an SEC warning about a potential enforcement action, describing its lawsuit as “a warranted response to the SEC’s regulation by enforcement regime which has hurt more than 50 million American crypto holders.”
Risk appetite was also dented by hotter-than-expected consumer price index inflation data released on Thursday, which furthered bets on a slower pace of interest rate cuts by the Federal Reserve.
Relatively higher for longer interest rates bode poorly for speculative assets such as crypto.
The dollar raced to two-month highs this week, further pressuring crypto valuations.
Still, markets maintained bets that the Fed will still cut interest rates, at least by 25 basis points in November. Some soft readings on the labor market furthered this notion.
Among broader crypto prices, most major altcoins tread water on Friday and were set for mild weekly losses.
World no.2 crypto Ether steadied at $2,420.56. SOL, ADA, and MATIC climbed between 1% and 3%, while XRP fell marginally.
Among meme tokens, DOGE added 1.5%.
Ambar Warrick contributed to this report.
Source: Cryptocurrency - investing.com
