The week, leading digital assets showed ambiguous trading dynamics, and currently BTC quotes are around 26705.13 ( 0.33%), ETH – at 1596.76 (–1.96%), USDT – around 0.9999 (–0.03%), BNB is at 212.45 (–0.50%), and XRP is at 0.5105 ( 2.81%). The total market capitalization remained at 1.06B dollars, and the share of BTC on it reached 49.2%.

Investors focused their attention on the results of the US Federal Reserve’s monetary policy meeting, which took place on Wednesday: as expected, officials kept the interest rate in the range of 5.25–5.50%. The head of the department, Jerome Powell, said that he remains concerned about the high rates of inflation: we recall that the annual rate accelerated from 3.2% to 3.7%, 0.1% higher than analysts’ forecasts, and the monthly rate from 0.2% to 0.6%, while the core value, which does not take into account the increase in the most volatile energy prices, decreased from 4.7% to 4.3%. Monetary authorities adjusted their forecast for price growth from 3.2% to 3.3% and kept it at 2.5% for 2024, while the national economy is expected to strengthen to 2.1% the year and up to 1.5% – next relative to previous estimates of 1.0% and 1.1%, respectively. However, the largest cryptocurrencies by capitalization generally maintained positive dynamics after the announcement of the decision of the US monetary authorities: BTC first fell below 27100.00 but then regained the lost ground, returning to the area of 27200.00.

According to a study by analysts of the Bitfinex platform, the outflow of investor capital in August from both spot and derivative exchanges amounted to 55.0B dollars (the maximum since November 2022, when the quotes of the first cryptocurrency reached a local low). Against the backdrop of the development of bearish sentiment, the cost of “digital gold” dropped by 11.29%. Based on Glassnode statistics, analysts estimate that over the past month, 95.0% of coins did not take part in transactions, which can explain the low volatility in the markets: investors prefer to watch the situation develop without opening new transactions. Meanwhile, BTC mining difficulty, which determines the total hardware power required for mining, reached an all-time high of 57.12T, with an average hashrate of 424.14 EH/s.

The week, David Hirsch, head of the cryptoassets and cybercrimes enforcement department of the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), noted that agency specialists are actively examining the activities of DeFi protocols for compliance with national legislation. According to him, in addition to Binance and Coinbase, which are accused of trading in unregistered securities, officials are also focusing on other market participants – brokers, dealers, and clearing agencies. He emphasized that the Commission’s capabilities are limited: thus, in July, its head Gary Gensler, speaking before the House Committee on Financial Services, stated the need for additional funding for initiatives to protect crypto traders, noting that the 2.4B dollars allocated by legislators in the current economic climate the situation is not enough.

It also became known that the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) filed a lawsuit against the Bit Trade platform, accusing its owner, the Kraken crypto exchange, of providing clients with credit services when selling and buying certain digital assets. Users can significantly increase the amount of borrowing, up to five times the value of the assets used as collateral, which is contrary to legal regulations. The regulator indicated in the lawsuit the need for penalties against Bit Trade and a ban on further promotion of the product in Australia.

Meanwhile, investors hope that Ripple developers will announce an initial public offering (IPO) soon, and the driver for it will be the company’s final victory in the litigation initiated by the SEC. Against the backdrop of a positive fundamental background, cryptocurrency quotes may exceed 1.0000, analysts say. In addition, the upward rally may be supported by reports that large market players are again actively investing in the token: from July 30 to September 15, addresses with a balance of 1.0M XRP to 100.0M XRP increased by 690.0M XRP and the whales now have more than 345.0M dollars in digital currency.

The situation in the cryptocurrency market remains uncertain: next week, quotes of major digital assets may consolidate or go into correction.