Forex Forecast and Cryptocurrencies Forecast for April 26 - 30, 2021
First, a review of last week’s events:
- EUR/USD. The US economy is showing impressive growth. Europe, on the other hand, is in a widespread lockdown and, apparently, is experiencing a second recession. The share of those who received at least one COVID-19 vaccine in the EU is 25.1%, while in the United States there are 2.5 times more of them, 63.2%. Can the euro grow in such a situation? Only 25% of experts answered positively to this question last week, and they turned out to be right: the pairEUR / USD reached the level of 1.2080 on Tuesday, April 20.
The majority of analysts (50%) believed that the bulls and the bears would be engaged in “tug of war” across the 1.2000 line. And they also turned out to be not far from the truth: the pair fluctuated up/down in the range of 1.1995-1.2080 from Tuesday until the end of the week. Although, of course, the victory remained with the bulls, since the last chord of the trading session sounded near the high of the last seven weeks at 1.2100.
There are two main reasons for these dynamics. The first one is in America, the second one is on the other side of the Atlantic, in Europe.
On the one hand, the yield on long-term US Treasury bonds continues to fall, and along with it the US currency continues to weaken. The dollar index against a basket of six major currencies (DXY) declined to 91.0, down 230 points from this year's high of 93.3. This fuels the risk sentiment of investors and continues to push the major US stock indexes up. This happens even despite the proposal of US President Joe Biden to almost double (from 20% to 39.6%) the capital gains tax for citizens with income of $1 million or more.
On the other hand, the euro was supported by positive forecasts for the rate of vaccination in Europe, in particular the news that Pfizer will increase the supply of vaccines to the EU by 100 million doses. The yield on German bonds is growing, which are beginning to catch up with their competitors from the United States. Stronger than expected statistics on business activity in the Eurozone helped the bulls on EUR/USD as well. Analysts polled by Reuters expected on average the PMI to decline from 53.2 points to 52.8. However, it rose to 53.7 in April;
- GBP/USD. First, a few words about another pair, GBC/USD, which may appear in the foreseeable future. While in some countries, regulators ban cryptocurrencies (for example, in Turkey), in others they are trying to put them at their service. The Bank for International Settlements (BIS) has recently conducted a survey and it has turned out that of 66 central banks, 52 are thinking about their own digital currency. And one of these reflective regulators is the Bank of England, backed by one of the country's largest financial conglomerates, Barclays.
The digital pound has already received a playful name "Britcoin", which makes those who know what "Brit Milah" smile. For those who are not in the know, let us explain: this is a rite of circumcision among religious Jews. However, if Brit Milah is rooted in the deep past, then Britcoin is the digital future of the UK that has broken away from the EU.
But until the GBC/USD pair has appeared in the list of trading instruments, let us return to its “older sister”, the GBP/USD pair. It went up at the beginning of the week, thanks to the weakening dollar, like EUR/USD. The pair reached a height of 1.4010 on Tuesday, having added 170 points. However, it did not manage to fix above the 1.4000 horizon: the pound lost all its advantage two days later, and the pair dropped to the level of 1.3825. At the very end of the trading week, the pound was helped by strong statistics on business activity in the services sector: the Markit index rose from 56.3 to 60.1 (against the forecast of 59.0) over the month, thanks to which the pair grew slightly and completed the five-day period at 1.3885;
- USD/JPY. Recall that we talked in the previous review about the fact that one of the reasons for the fall in the yield of 10-year US Treasury bonds, and with it the strengthening of the yen against the dollar, may be the return of Japanese buyers to the market. They were actively getting rid of American bonds at the end of the financial year, but they began to replenish their investment portfolios with them now.
The majority of analysts (70%) voted seven days ago for the fact that the growth of the Japanese currency and the decline of the USD/JPY pair will continue, and this forecast turned out to be absolutely correct. The level 107.50 was indicated as a support, which became the local bottom of the week. This was followed by a correction and a finish at 107.85;
- cryptocurrencies. While the task of the bulls on Friday, April 16 was to prevent the BTC/USD pair from falling below $60,000, they are struggling seven days later to gain a foothold in the $50,000 area. After the explosive growth to $64,800, which took place on the eve of the American exchange Coinbase' IPO, we are witnessing an equally rapid collapse now. The price of bitcoin was falling to the level of $47,545 on Friday April 23, showing a 26.6% drop.
It is difficult to single out any one reason for what happened. Prominent analyst Willy Woo said the drawdown was triggered by massive power outages in Xinjiang province, one of the largest regions in China where bitcoin mining is concentrated. According to the BTC Cambridge Energy Consumption Index, Xinjiang accounts for about 25% of the coin's total hashrate. Due to the fact that most of the miners were temporarily out of order, the hash rate of the asset began to decline, and the average transaction fee on the bitcoin network exceeded $50, which has not been the case since 2017.
According to Woo, bitcoin should have returned to growth after the electricity supply situation stabilized. Electricity returned to Xinjiang, but bitcoin continued its decline.
We have repeatedly written that the crypto market is heavily influenced by regulatory risks. And in this case, it is possible that panic has been fueled by the rumors that an investigation may begin in the United States regarding a number of financial institutions on suspicion of money laundering using cryptocurrencies. Additional pressure on the market was made by two news stories. The first is the news that the US Congress has approved the creation of a SEC and CFTC working group to develop cryptocurrency regulation. The second is the plans of US President Joe Biden to raise taxes on capital gains, which could limit investment in digital assets.
The total cryptocurrency market capitalization decreased by 17% over the week, from $2.2 trillion to $1.825 trillion. Meanwhile, bitcoin continues to lose ground. If its share in the total capitalization on January 2 was 72.65%, then it is only 50.70% on April 23. This suggests that investors are looking for more profitable assets for their investments among altcoins, of which there are currently more than 8,000. Just look at the Ethereum quotes. Despite the April 18 crash, this leading altcoin managed to renew its all-time high last week, reaching $2,635. Of course, a wave of sales did not pass it, but the fall in the price of ETH over the week was only about 11%. As for the participation of Ethereum in the total capitalization of the crypto market, its share has grown from 10.79% to 14.49% since the year started.
Summing up the past week, we note that the bitcoin price dropped below the 50-day average, which is quite an alarming factor and may provoke further sales. The BTC dominance index, as already mentioned, is also going down. However, it is still far from the lows of early 2018, when it fell to 32%. Another index, Crypto Fear & Greed Index, dropped from 78 to 55 points during the week and approached the neutral zone.
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