European stocks trade near record high while crypto volatility hogs the spotlight

Bitcoin BTCUSD, +8.33% traded at $36,546 after falling as low as $31,133 over the weekend.

“We’ve seen crypto come under criticism from the billionaire Elon Musk, the Chinese national government, and now even top religious institutions with comments form the pope,” said David Grider, lead digital asset strategist at Fundstrat. “As a result we’ve seen normal mid market cycle selling pressure intensify to cause leveraged liquidations, a cascade of forced selling, lots of fear and capitulation with Bitcoin now down ~50% from its all time high.”

Ryanair RY4C, -0.27% shares eased 0.4%. A Ryanair flight from Greece to Lithuania was forced to land in Belarus over an alleged bomb scare, at which point the country arrested an opposition activist. The European Council said it would begin discussing sanctions against Belarus over the incident.

Shares of Solutions 30 dropped 66% as the auditor EY declined to sign off on its annual report. EY said it was not able to obtain sufficient and appropriate evidence supporting the nature, the substance, the value and the compliance with laws and regulations of certain transactions and to determine if these transactions were made with related parties including with members of management. The IT services firm said it’s considering a new auditor and possibly delisting.

Ted Baker TED, -0.39% shares slipped, after the clothing retailer delayed its full-year results, citing the consequence of disruption caused by COVID-19 on the audit processes. Ted Baker said the 2020 results would be in line with forecasts and that it is reiterating 2023 financial targets.