Adam Wyatt

Since our previous update, the market has moved down to a low of $750, stalled out in the low $800’s for awhile, then recently took out the $900 level once again.

Following a regional high of $1140, the price proceeded to sell off swiftly and violently into the low $800’s and is now treading water around $900.

Following a breakout over $700 last week, the market has since been on a tear to the upside as late longs struggle to re-enter below $1000.

Bitcoin continues to slowly push to the upside reaching new yearly highs once again over the weekend, defying the logic of many traders.

As we thought would be the case early last week, the Bitcoin markets indeed paused recently to consolidate within the $740 - 780 pivot zone prior to today’s attempt to push above those levels following what was a stagnant weekend for price action.

Last week Bitcoin continued its strong autumn rally as price broke above the $755 local high on the way to testing the June high of $778.

Last week Bitcoin exhibited relative strength in the marketplace when compared to precious metals, adding to the fundamental bull case, however the near term technicals are saying that perhaps the market is not yet ready for a breakout move higher.

The positivity in the Bitcoin market leading up to the US Presidential election was warranted in our opinion, as is the consolidation the market is currently ranging within.

Last week was the first down week for bitcoin in awhile, although we can’t say it wasn’t expected considering the technicals had been telegraphing a correction since we broke up through $700.

What has been a consistent and healthy rally up to the $717.99 local high over the past few weeks, has finally hit a wall. While many tops come on bearish news or fundamentals, this one was almost purely technical in our opinion.

Bitcoin has extricated itself from the seemingly never-ending trading range between $620 – 640, although the bulls did not quite have enough juice left to push sustainably above $650.

Despite the fact that volatility picked up early last week on a rally above $615, since the breakout the market has settle back into its old, stagnant ways.

While the Bitcoin price has been creeping to the upside recently, volatility has remained extremely low which means that trading opportunities has been limited.

Bitcoin looked poised for the return of at least some volatility last week, however none materialized. Now price is back above the $600 level.

Bitcoin did see a slight pickup in volatility immediately following the Labor Day holiday in the US, although more recently price has once again fallen into a contracting range.

Despite a relatively slow market over the past few weeks due to the “summer doldrums,” it now appears as though volatility is making a slow return on both the upside and the downside.

As we head into the unofficial last week of the summer, we continue to expect lackluster price action through the long holiday weekend in the US.

We are now in the slowest trading period of the year for both the legacy and cryptocurrency markets, which means volatility and volume should remain light until after the Labor Day weekend in the US.

Given a slow news cycle as well as mixed short to medium term technicals, the market has been under some pressure over the past few days following yet another failed attempt to break above $600.

The cryptocurrency news cycle was dominated last week by the announcement that Bitfinex was the victim of a theft to the tune of 119,756 BTC. The market continues to struggle with the implications of this event.

The combination of weak near term technicals, a dip in hash rate, questions over a secretive miner/Core dev meeting, and sustained interest in ETH/ETC has pushed Bitcoin’s exchange rate down more than $20 over the weekend.

Despite a somewhat more bullish outlook in last week’s report, once again the market could not get sustainably above the key $680 resistance level (or below the critical 640 $ support level).

As expected, the bitcoin markets have been relatively stable over the past week, although it now looks like a rally up to resistance is becoming more and more likely

As the Bitcoin community celebrates the 2nd successful quadrennial block reward halving, market participants seems less enthusiastic about the event.

Brexit, halving, auctions and exchange problems have dampened demand enthusiasm for Bitcoin over the near term.

While bitcoin treads water in the mid-$750’s following another bullish week, the Ether’s technicals are overwhelmingly bearish.

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