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Coming off last week’s lull, bitcoin traders hoped the market would provide them with some direction. That wasn’t been the case.
The No. 1 digital currency is on track to top last weeks’ record tight range for 2018, having not traded outside of the $7,300 to $7,800. In fact, as of late Friday, the bottom-to-top range for bitcoin this week is just 5.3%.
A single bitcoin last changed hands at $7,640.54, down 0.3%, since Thursday 5 p.m. Eastern Time on the Kraken crypto exchange.
The pain isn’t over
While many bulls believe the recent quiet run is the formation of a base for another move higher, one perennial bear, who called the move lower from $9,000, thinks the worst is yet to come. “This cryptocurrency had a very ugly May and it looks like things will only get worse,” said Jani Ziedins in a Friday blog post.
“This is a long-term downtrend and lower lows are still ahead of us. Breaking $7K support will trigger to another wave of selling, but the fear won’t strike in earnest until we undercut the $6K lows.”
A break of the $6,000 low would represent another 20% fall.
Can improving regulatory outlook lift bitcoin?
Still holding on to his $25,000 year-end target price, Tom Lee, managing partner at Fundstrat Global Advisors said the regulatory outlook could be the impetus for digital currencies to move out of the bear market.
“In our view, the fact that Coinbase and Circle, two major crypto players, are moving closer to SEC regulatory reach, suggests implicitly, that the crypto regulatory outlook is on balance, improving,” said Lee in a June 7 research note.
“Think of it this way, why would two major players take deliberate steps that bring them deeper into the regulatory reach, unless they felt agencies were moving towards providing better clarity,” he said.
Mixed day for altcoins and futures
Major altcoins, or coins other than bitcoin, are mostly lower in late Friday New York trading. Ether the second largest digital currency by market cap, is down 082% at $596.89, Bitcoin Cash is holding above $1,000, trading at $1,114.10, down 1.8%, Litecoin is lower by 0.3% at $119.91 and Ripple’s XRP coin is up 0.5%, at 67 cents.
Bitcoin futures finished lower Friday. The Cboe June contract closed down 0.5% at $7,650, while the CME June contract finished the day down 0.6% at $7,655.