Could January’s crypto ‘winter’ actually be here to stay

The month of January has spooked the market amid a larger sell-off that has kept the sentiments damp. As per the latest CryptoCompare report, Bitcoin and Ethereum fell by 23.3% and 36.9%, respectively, during the month until 27 January.

The downward spiral of price

Most of the tokens were trapped in a downward spiral after their November peaks. Several reasons are thought to be behind the prolonged winter in the crypto-space. The Fed’s tapering announcement and fear of interest rate hike followed by the Bank of Russia’s anti-crypto stance, the SEC’s clampdown on spot ETFs, and wider market weakness. The report stated,

“Macro sentiment around risk-assets has been the leading narrative in the markets, with expectations of significant tapering of quantitative easing following a record 7.0% annual CPI inflation figure coming out of the US in December 2021.”

Galina Likhitskaya, Vice President of Operation & Products at HashEx, told AMBCrypto that the current situation is very different from the events preceding the last crypto-winter. However, she did note that we have already seen a similar fall in 2021 back in May, June, and July. Following the same, Likhitskaya mentioned, “an even more rapid growth of the crypto industry began.”

Outflows continued

It is worth noting that the fund flows have also been negative since late December. The report found that the average weekly outflows reached $88 million. And, January saw the highest outflow to the tune of $207 million in the first week against the outflow of $238 million in the first week of June. While BTC led the outflow chart, Solana managed inflows during the period, the report noted.

If we look at the CoinShares’ weekly flow report till 21 January, altcoins like Cardano, Polkadot, and Solana saw inflows totalling $1.5 million, $1.5 million, and $1.4 million respectively. Bitcoin saw an inflow totalling $14 million during the same time, reminding of a possible recovery after five weeks of outflows.

Trading volumes dipped

When we talk about the average daily trading volume, it fell across the month as well. FTX.US President Brett Harrison had previously noted in an interview with Bloomberg that in the period of decreased volume, subdued trading activity is seen following a drop in price in general. In January, the average daily trading volume reportedly fell 14.5% to $481 million.

CryptoCompare’s report also noted that the largest decreases in individual product volumes came from VanEck’s VETH and Grayscale’s ETHE Ethereum funds that fell by 38.9% (to $3.91 million) and 34.8% (to $139 million), respectively. This was in line with the fall in AUM or Assets Under Management.

We had previously reported that Grayscale’s second-largest fund Grayscale Ethereum Trust reported an AUM of $11.6 billion on 31 December. By 21 January, the AUM fell to $8.9 billion. By 31 January, it fell further to $ 7.5 billion.

Having said that, David Marcus, the former crypto head at Facebook (Now Meta), seems to believe that it is indeed “Crypto Winter.”

It’s during crypto winters that the best entrepreneurs build the better companies. This is the time again to focus on solving real problems vs. pumping tokens.

— David Marcus – dmarcus.eth (@davidmarcus) January 24, 2022