Weekly Cryptocurrency News. May 3


Here comes Friday, May 3rd. As the ongoing week elapses, we can focus on the industry highlights over the past few days.

Spot Bitcoin ETFs hit record $564M daily net outflows

As early as May 1, negative flows from spot bitcoin-ETFs peaked at $563.8 million, the highest since the products were approved. BlackRock’s IBIT saw declines for the first time ever – $36.93m.

Customers withdrew $191.1 million from Fidelity’s FBTC – which is more than they did with Grayscale’s GBTC ($167.3m).

Ark Invest’s ARKB suffered an outflow totaling $98.1 million, the third largest on record.

Total cumulative flow into Spot Bitcoin-ETF dropped to $11.2b since they’ve been given green light, which is also down $343.5m through April.

At Bloomberg, they pointed out the formation of price discounts to IBIT and FBTC relative to NAV (Net Asset Value). The former amounted to 1.7%, while the latter – 1.1%.

Bitwise CIO Matt Hougan said the phenomenon appears to be “more an accounting quirk than a real issue” given the specifics of how BTC’s value is calculated in ETFs.

Binance CEO sentenced to 4 months in prison

Changpeng Zhao, the former CEO of the widely known crypto exchange is to spend the next four months in one of the correctional facilities in US.

CZ pleaded guilty only to violating anti-money laundering regulations, rather than committing money laundering itself or anything else. The SEC lawsuit is still being drafted – it is alleged by the agency that Zhao used Binance customer funds illicitly. However, Binance refutes this charge.

Is it by chance that the crypto market is witnessing a downturn today? BTC value slided back to $56,552 while the total amount of liquidations exceeded $160m. Altcoins followed the path taken by the top cryptocurrency – SOL, DOGE, TON, ADA are currently among the leaders in terms of downfall.

MicroStrategy takes a tumble 

The largest corporate holder of Bitcoin reported a net loss of $53.1m in the Q1 of 2024, even as it kept expanding its holdings by acquiring another 122 BTC for $7.8m in April.

The company posted a net loss of $191.6 million for the quarter in question, marking a 10-fold increase compared to the same period in 2023. However, CEO Michael Saylor is not really bothered by this. In early 2024, the company revealed a potential floatation of an additional $500 million of convertible bonds.

Saylor claims that bitcoin is a reserve and investment asset that allows businesses to protect their capital from the risks of fiat money inflation.

The latest acquisition brings MicroStrategy’s total Bitcoin holdings to 214,400 BTC, valued at $13.22 billion. The average purchase price was $35,180. Unrealized gains at current exchange rates stand at $7.5 billion.

Burgeoning institutional interest in Solana

Since the onset of this year, institutional investors have been adding altcoins to their portfolios. Surprisingly, as per the CoinShares recent survey, institutional investors favored Ethereum (ETH), Polkadot (DOT), Ripple (XRP) and Polygon (MATIC) throughout the January 2024. Things changed dramatically in April, however – Solana (SOL) is now ranked fourth in investments in crypto assets among institutional investors.

Solana came in third in terms of having the “most compelling growth outlook”. BTC and ETH took first and second place, indicating heightened interest in SOL.

According to optimistic scenario, it is not entirely clear what has sparked such an appetite among institutionы for this very asset. Since the start of the year, the value of SOL has skyrocketed by 40%, yet it’s not just a credit to the coin itself – the entire crypto space is booming at the moment.

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