Crypto Week At A Glance: Bitcoin consolidates below $20K as ETH sell-off ensures post Merge

economictimes.indiatimes.com:

Bitcoin (BTC) has dropped by more than 6 per cent this week and has failed to hold support at $22,000 after successfully breaching $22,600 mid-week. BTC continues to consolidate in the range of $19,400-20.100 which has held as support for months now. If stocks recover their losses next week, there is a likelihood of BTC gaining back $22,000. This week also scripted an historic day for the crypto world as Ethereum (ETH) completed its Merge, meaning the network will no longer rely on a proof-of-work (PoW) consensus mechanism. Ethereum, the world’s second most valuable crypto, has completed its massive software upgrade with promises of massive environmental benefits. The Merge is set to reduce Ethereum’s energy consumption by nearly 99 per cent. ETH, post the Merge, has dropped nearly 18 per cent this week as a sell-off event ensured. This can be attributed to short-term traders who bought ETH leading up to the event to gain on the positive momentum and to acquire new forked tokens. Once their motives were established, they sold their positions. Total crypto market cap is now below $1 trillion.

Did you Know?

Jobs in crypto, blockchain, and NFTs have grown by 804% in India between April 2020 and April 2022 according to a report by Indeed

Given September is traditionally a red month for Bitcoin and crypto markets, investors are anticipating further pain in upcoming months before the final bottom is discovered. As this bear market plays out, we look at some positives in terms of adoption and other stories of the week below. Norwegian central bank uses Ethereum to build digital currency With the publication of the open-source code for the nation's central bank digital currency (CBDC) sandbox, Norway's central bank