HYPE, MOVE, BGB bucked market trend as Bitcoin crashed to low 90s this week

It’s been a volatile week for Bitcoin, with the leading cryptocurrency rallying to a new all-time high of $108,135 before crashing to a low of $92,805 on Friday.

Over $400 billion was wiped out from the overall cryptocurrency market capitalisation, with the drop accelerating late last week amidst bearish macroeconomic events.

As of December 20, the market cap stood at a little over $3.5 trillion, down from after almost hitting $4 trillion on December 17.

The altcoin market lost most of the weekly gains towards the end of the week as Bitcoin slipped below the $100,000 mark as bears took control.

The pre-Christmas altseason failed to materialise, with the Altcoin Season Index dwindling to the low 40s from the 65 seen last week.

Only three top altcoins managed to retain weekly gains: HYPE, MOVE, and BGB secured the top spots on this week’s gainers list, while most other tokens posted losses.

Why is Bitcoin going down?

Bitcoin initially rallied to an all-time high this week, driven by optimism over a potential Bitcoin strategic reserve and strong participation from both retail and institutional traders.

However, hawkish remarks from the Federal Reserve spooked the market, pushing it below the six-figure mark.

On December 18, the Federal Reserve delivered its third rate cut of the year, lowering its key interest rate by a quarter-point.

However, revised core PCE inflation projections for 2025, rising from 2.2% to 2.5%, coupled with a more hawkish outlook limiting 2025 rate cuts to just two instead of four, came as bad news for the crypto space, driving the market-wide sell-off.

Adding to the bearish sentiment, Fed Chairman Jerome Powell said on Wednesday that the Federal Reserve isn’t allowed to hold Bitcoin and that they were not looking to amend laws that would allow such a provision.

The situation was further catapulted by escalating tensions between Russia and Ukraine, with both countries having launched missile strikes this week.

With these bearish catalysts in play, Bitcoin ETFs saw $680 million in outflows on Friday.

Over $1.4 billion was wiped out of the crypto market on December 20, and a lot of the sell-side pressure originated on centralised exchanges. 

However, some metrics suggest Bitcoin’s rally isn’t over, as price corrections are perceived as a common occurrence during an ongoing bull run.

For instance, the market value to realized value (MVRV-Z) score, which typically spikes during major corrections, peaked at 2.89 earlier this week.

This remains significantly lower than the 5.25 seen during the March 2021 correction, suggesting there could still be room for further upside as the market stabilizes.

Additionally, several businesses, led by US-based MicroStrategy and Japan’s Metaplanet, increased their Bitcoin holdings.

Meanwhile, data from Into The Block revealed a surge in late-week activity, with significant inflows into whale wallets.

Long-term projections for BTC remained well beyond $100,000.

Ark Invest CEO said on Friday that BTC could be valued at $1 million within the next five years, citing its fixed supply as the key driver.

More predictions put Bitcoin between $120,000 to $180,000 by the end of 2026.

Multiple analysts noted that Bitcoin’s current price action mirrors patterns from previous bull runs, where the price corrected after reaching a new high before rallying to even greater levels.

Analyst Lark Davis predicts a 10-15% pullback before Bitcoin resumes its upward trajectory, which could push it to a new all-time high.

Meanwhile, pseudonymous analyst EtherNasyonal pointed to the 2020-2021 bull run, stating that this is just the start of a new cycle.

He projected Bitcoin could exceed $120,000 during the 2024-2025 season if history were to repeat.

The crypto fear and greed index is near 75, indicating that the bullish sentiment hasn’t completely faded, with BTC seeing a surge in market dominance to 57.5% from the 55% seen last week.

With most altcoins losing gains accumulated over the past week, the top performers were:

Hyperliquid

Hyperliquid (HYPE) led the highest gains in the last 7 days among the largest 100 crypto assets tracked by CoinGecko.

Source: CoinMarketCap

The altcoin was exchanging hands at its all-time high of $30.12 at press time, up over 68% in the past week, while its market cap was seated at $10.3 billion.

HYPE’s price rally also coincided with an almost 2,550% surge in daily trading volume, which hovered over $600 million.

Most of the gains came after news that Bitget Wallet, a web3 non-custodial wallet, added support for the HyperEVM testnet.

The integration gives users access to the Hyperliquid platform.

With HyperEVM, the HYPE token will now be used for gas fees and can also support lending, staking, and other DeFi activities, thus boosting its utility and demand, which has likely attracted the attention of investors.

Movement

Over the past week, Movement (MOVE) surged 37%, hitting an intraday high of $0.877 on December 20 while its market cap was standing at $1.85 billion at press time.

Source: CoinMarketCap

The altcoin’s price rally came with a 47% spike in daily trading volume, surpassing $2 billion.

CoinGlass data also showed futures market open interest hit a record $100 million on Dec. 20, nearly double the previous day’s $56.03 million, highlighting growing trader demand.

The altcoin’s gains seem largely driven by its collaboration with BitGo, a top digital asset custody and security firm, to integrate WBTC into Movement’s mainnet.

The integration is set to expand Movement’s DeFi capabilities, offering users greater opportunities for asset use, liquidity provision, and participation in decentralized financial services.

Bitget Token

Bitget Token (BGB) rose 28.7% over the past week, exchanging hands at $4.22 at the time of writing and extending its monthly gains to over 200%.

The altcoin’s market cap was sitting at $5.7 billion, while its daily trading volume was around $519 million.

Source: CoinMarketCap

BGB’s weekly surge has pushed its yearly gains to above 500%, making it one of the top-performing altcoins of the year.

Although there doesn’t seem to be a clear reason for the token’s rise, much of the momentum appears to stem from the exchange’s strong performance in recent months.

More recently, the BGB token gained investor attention after the crypto exchange Bitget announced a partnership with Tron, which includes a $10 million purchase of Tron’s native token, TRX.

Through the partnership, Bitget demonstrated its commitment to expanding the BItget ecosystem, boosting investor interest in BGB and driving its price higher.

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