Investing.com–Bitcoin’s price rose slightly on Wednesday as an overnight decline in the dollar offered some relief, although lingering fears about higher long-term interest rates and waning hype around ETFs have kept the token comfortably within a trading range seen for over a year. month.
rose 1% in the past 24 hours to $67,001.7 as of 12:57 a.m. ET (04:57 GMT). The token has largely remained in a trading range of $60,000 to $70,000 after hitting an all-time high of over $73,000 in early March.
The world’s largest cryptocurrency also saw limited gains, although tech stocks – which it usually tracks – rebounded strongly this week.
The Bitcoin halving event, which resulted in a 50% reduction in mining rewards, took place over the weekend with little price movement. The launch of the “Runes” protocol, which sparked a surge in on-chain activity and pushed transaction fees to record levels, also resulted in little change in Bitcoin prices.
Data from earlier this week showed that crypto investment products, particularly Bitcoin exchange-traded funds, saw a second consecutive week of capital outflows, amid waning hype around the approval American ETFs earlier this year.
While the ETF approval had helped Bitcoin reach record highs in March, further gains in the token now looked doubtful.
Crypto Price Today: Limited Price Action as Rate Fears Persist
Broader cryptocurrency prices saw limited price action on Wednesday as the sector came under pressure from ongoing concerns over higher and longer U.S. interest rates.
rose 2.4%, while and added 0.3% and 2.2%, respectively.
While cryptocurrency prices had risen during the first quarter of 2024 due to expectations of early interest rate cuts from the Federal Reserve, optimism for such a scenario died down in April.
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High inflation figures and hawkish signals from the Fed have traders ruling out expectations of a rate cut in June.
Higher and longer interest rates bode ill for crypto, given that the sector generally benefits from increased speculation in an environment of low rates and high liquidity.
This week, the focus is on more data on the US economy, which is likely to influence the interest rate outlook.
first-quarter data is due Thursday, while the data – the Fed’s preferred inflation gauge – is due Friday.
