Bullish Trendline Forming on BTC's Hourly Chart; SEC Investigates NFT Projects

Chart of the Day

On Thursday morning (Asian trading hours), the crypto market's strong upward momentum that kicked off on Monday was halted after the U.S. Federal Reserve confirmed that the planned interest rate hikes look set to commence this month. As it is still uncertain if said impending rate hikes and the rapidly escalating geopolitical situation in eastern Europe could further erode investors' confidence in the crypto market, these are situations that have to be monitored very closely indeed.

Although recent price movements, when viewed alone, are insufficient to definitively determine the crypto market's next direction, they do suggest that many major cryptocurrencies are now (as of the time of writing) stabilizing above their respective support levels. For one, BTC is currently consolidating its losses above the $43k support level after shedding 1.7% of its value within the last 24 hours. A bullish trendline with a base near the $42.5k level is also forming on BTC's hourly chart, though there is still a chance that the largest cryptocurrency by market cap could revisit its past support levels if it fails to clear the immediate resistance near the $44.2k mark.

Finally, and when we consult the on-chain data for the month of February, we can better understand just how gloomy the past month has been. The total adjusted on-chain volume, a proxy of economic throughput, is down 6% from a month ago, while the Bitcoin miners' total monthly revenue has also dropped by a significant 13% from January highs. Further, the rate of issuance of stablecoins has also decelerated, with the total stablecoin supply growing by a mere 9% since the beginning of 2022. 

Talk of the Town

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), which has always taken a hardline stance with regard to crypto regulations, is now probing into the NFT space and scrutinizing NFT creators for potential regulatory violations. According to the SEC, the focus of the investigation is to determine if certain NFT projects are being utilized to raise funds like traditional securities. To that end, SEC's enforcement unit has been issuing subpoenas to various NFT projects over the past few months in order to gather information about whether said projects should be defined as new variations of unregistered securities.