Majority Cryptocurrencies See Gains as Ukraine Legalises Crypto Sector

Bitcoin rallied up on the price charts on Thursday. With a gain of 3.82 percent, the oldest cryptocurrency is trading at $42,172 (roughly Rs. 32 lakh) on Indian exchange CoinSwitch Kuber. The market opening for Bitcoin hasn't been shabby on international exchanges either. On Binance and CoinMarketCap for instance, BTC roped in gains of up to 4.20 percent. The price of this most valued crypto on global platforms is around $41,099 (roughly Rs. 31 lakh). Clearly, BTC has shown recovery in the last two days where previously its trading value was hovering around $38,000 (roughly Rs. 29 lakh).

Ether reeled-in even bigger gains than Bitcoin in terms of escalation in its trade values. ETH gained 4.14 percent, taking its value to $2,838 (roughly Rs. 2.15 lakh) as per Gadgets 360's crypto price tracker. On international exchanges like Coinbase, ETH price is up by 4.82 percent and its currently trading at $2,764 (roughly Rs. 2 lakh).

The gains for BTC and ETH come after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy legalised crypto in the country. Bitcoin and Ether along with other crypto assets brought in millions of dollars' worth of donations to the war-struck Ukraine, which is still under attack from Russia.

Ukraine has pledged governmental support for national and foreign crypto exchanges as part of its new crypto legalisation law, signed on March 16, 2022. The country, unlike El Salvador, has not adopted Bitcoin or any other cryptocurrency as a legal tender.

Majority altcoins including Binance Coin, Cardano, Solana, Avalanche, and Polkadot are also reaping gains from the market movement situation.

Dogecoin and Shiba Inu also saw small profits after days of laying low.

Industry experts, however, are waiting to watch the impact of US' revised interest rate order on the crypto market.

The US Federal Reserve has raised interest rates from 0.25 percent to 0.5 percent for the first time since 2018, in order to combat the surging inflation rate.

“In most cases, the rise of interest rates tends to signal uncertainty for the crypto market as investors have greater access to yield from low-risk avenues of the market,” the CoinDCX research team told Gadgets 360.

“Yet, in contrast, the past 24 hours have witnessed the crypto market responding atypically, trending further upwards. This could be a case of a lag in market reaction and investors may only begin to witness its true impact on crypto down the line. The interest rate hike may pose another hurdle for investors entering the digital asset market.”

Under the circumstances, stablecoins such as Tether, USD Coin, and Binance USD opened with small losses.

Stablecoins are those crypto assets that are collaterised alongside a stable reserve asset such as gold or a fiat currency like the US dollar.

Meanwhile, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) continues to show skepticism towards the crypto sector. The IMF has agreed to extend a debt repayment time for Argentina and has listed discouragement of crypto usage as one of the conditions.

The current market cap of the crypto sector stands at $1.82 trillion (roughly Rs. 1,38,57,131 crore), as per CoinMarketCap. On March 15, the same figure stood lower at over $1.72 trillion (roughly Rs. 1,31,73,856 crore).

Cryptocurrency is an unregulated digital currency, not a legal tender and subject to market risks. The information provided in the article is not intended to be and does not constitute financial advice, trading advice or any other advice or recommendation of any sort offered or endorsed by NDTV. NDTV shall not be responsible for any loss arising from any investment based on any perceived recommendation, forecast or any other information contained in the article.

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