This article provides an overview of how Bitcoin (BTC), Ethereum (ETH), and XRP have been doing over the past 24-hour period, covers recent news that might have affected their prices (or might do so in the future), and looks at interesting tweets about these cryptoassets from prominent members of the crypto community.
To give you a rough idea of how well the crypto markets are doing today, 14 out of the top 20 cryptoassets (by market cap) are currently in the red (against the dollar).
All market data used in this article was taken from CryptoCompare around 11:50 UTC on 15 May 2020. Please note that all time information in this article is in the British Summer Time (BST) unless explicitly stated otherwise.
Bitcoin (BTC)
Bitcoin is currently trading at $9,583, which means that it is down 1.06% in the past 24-hour period:
According to data from CryptoCompare, since Halving Day (i.e. May 11), Bitcoin’s price has gone up from an intraday low of $8,488 on that day to $9,583, where it is now, which means an increase of 12.90%.
As for Bitcoin’s hash rate, although it reached an estimated high of 137.57 EH/s on Halving Day (prior to the halving event, which occurred around 19:23 UTC), since then, it has dramatically (but not too surprisingly) fallen.
Per data from BitInfoCharts, the estimated hash rate for Bitcoin fell to 87.19 EH/s yesterday (May 14), which means a decrease of 36.62%:
What this third having event means for miners is that the total block mining reward per day, i.e. the amount of new bitcoin minted each day, is now 900 BTC rather than 1800 BTC, which is probably why some miners who using inefficient hardware or not having access to super cheap electricity are being forced to stop their mining operations, which is why Bitcoin’s hash rate has gone down.
This mean we should expect an increase in Bitcoin’s mining difficulty (which is programmatically/automatically adjusted every 2,016 blocks, i.e. roughly every two weeks) on Monday (May 18), after which more miners will come, thereby boosting Bitcoin’s hash rate (although we don’t know how much higher it will go).
As for how much higher Bitcoin’s price could go in the medium term, Bitcoin bull Anthony Pompliano (aka “Pomp”), Co-Founder and Partner at crypto-focused investment firm Morgan Creek Digital, said during an interview with Yahoo Finance on Wednesday (May 13) that he expected Bitcoins price to reach $100,000 by December 2021.
Ethereum (ETH)
Ethereum is currently trading at $200.72, which means that it is down 0.94% in the past 24-hour period:
In the year-to-date period, Ethereum, the second-most valuable cryptoasset by market cap, has gone up from $128.91 to $200.72, which means an impressive 55.70% (against USD) increase in value.
On Wednesday (May 13), social news platform Reddit announced (via a slide presentation) “Community Points”, which is “a way for Redditors to earn a piece of their favorite communities.” Reddit explained that users “earn Points by contributing to the community, for example by submitting quality posts and comments.”
Interestingly, Community Points exists on the blockchain (“independently of Reddit”) and that blockchain is Ethereum.
Here is how this will work:
- “Community Points are stored as standard ERC-20 tokens on the Ethereum blockchain, so they’re interoperable with existing blockchain tools.”
- “On Ethereum, Community Points are run by a suite of smart contracts that manage balances, distribution/claiming, and purchasing memberships.”
- “Community Points are currently in beta (through summer 2020). During that time, they will be on the Rinkeby testnet, and balances, transactions, and memberships may be reset.”
- “After the feature leaves beta, Community Points will be migrated to the Ethereum mainnet. Points balances will be carried over (though will need to be reclaimed).”
XRP
XRP is currently trading at $0.2026, which means that it is down 0.88% in the past 24-hour period:
In the year-to-date period, XRP, the fourth-most valuable cryptoasset by market cap, has gone up from $0.1927 to $0.2026, which means a 5.14% (against USD) increase in value, which does not sound too impressive until you consider that during the same period the S&P 500 has gone down 13.08%.
On Wednesday (May 13), Ripple published a blog post that featured an interview with Curis Wang, Co-Founder and CEO of Singapore-based crypto exchange Bitrue. What is interesting about Bitrue is that it has supported XRP as a base currency since the day that its trading platform was launched (i.e. 19 July 2018).
Wang told Ripple:
“For any blockchain project to be successful, it has to be practical and scalable… XRP’s role in solving problems with cross-border payments is a perfect use case that will drive growth, which is why Bitrue decided to make it the central asset of our exchange.
“In addition, our connection to XRP’s highly-engaged community differentiates us from the thousands of other exchanges out there.”
Featured Image by “WorldSpectrum” via Pixabay.com.
