JPEX observed events across the crypto finance industry during the second week of November. The collapse of FTX, one of the biggest cryptocurrency exchanges by volume, headlined the week’s activities. This was followed by regulators in The Bahamas seizing assets belonging to FTX.
Aside from FTX, the unprofitability of the cryptocurrency market buoyed by a bearish engulfing led crypto firm Coinbase Global, Inc. to further reduce the number of employees on their payroll.
Aside from Coinbase, Meta Platforms Inc., owners of Instagram, WhatsApp, and Facebook announced massive layoffs that could see around 11,000 people lose their job. This was down to Meta losing a significant amount of money after entering the Metaverse.
Moreover, the Chair of the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) in the United States, Gary Gensler cautioned investors in the US and abroad against throwing their money behind crypto since the industry is not well-regulated by agencies in the country. The EU also set its sights on taxing crypto across its 27 member countries with full taxation coming into effect in 2026 or 2027.
Due to negative market sentiment which triggered withdrawal requests across the industry, there was a plunge in total value locked (TVL) by $9 billion. Despite the negatives, the Middle East, Asia, and Africa made a bold move to become a crypto powerhouse by launching a crypto and blockchain association.
Over the period, many cryptocurrencies shed a huge percentage of their prices. With that said, JPEX chose Solana (SOL), FTX Token (FTT), EthereumPoW (ETHW), Internet Computer (ICP), and Avalanche (AVAX) as some of the worst-performing cryptocurrencies within the week.
Solana Plunged by 58%
Solana is a decentralized blockchain built to enable scalable and user-friendly applications for the world. Launched in 2020, Solana has been one of the most patronized blockchains for the building of decentralized applications (dApps) by thousands of developers.
Its native asset SOL was not spared during the week due to an industry-wide bloodbath brought forth by the collapse of the FTX project.
SOL opened on Sunday, 6th November with a price of $36.77, reached a weekly high of $36.90 on the same day, tested a weekly low of $14.92 on Saturday, 12th November, and exchanged hands for $15.50 in the afternoon hours of 12th November.
The trading volume of SOL rose from a low of $1.65 billion to a high of $6.12 billion within the period. Overall, there was a 58% plunge in SOL’s price within the week.
FTX Token (FTT) Went Down by 91%
Within the week, Chanpeng Zhao tweeted that Binance was going to liquidate its FTX Token (FTT) holdings due to hidden problems in the FTX setup that was not known to FTT holders. After liquidating more than $500 million in FTT holdings, the majority of FTT holders started dumping the token. This led to a soaring trading volume from a weekly low of $600 million to a weekly high of $3.3 billion. At the beginning of the week on Sunday, 6th November, the token had a trading price of $24.06 and reached a high of $24.83 on the same day. Activities over the week led FTT to go down to a weekly low of $1.90. The token was trading for $2.23 in the afternoon hours of 12th November. Overall, there was a 91% decrease in FTT’s price over the week.
Ethereum Proof-of-Work (ETHW) Tanked by 36%
Ethereum Proof-of-Work (ETHW) was created out of Ethereum’s transition from a Proof-of-Work (POW) blockchain to a Proof-of-Stake (PoS) in September.
EthereumPoW has also created a new source of revenue for crypto miners due to its reliance on energy to validate and verify transactions.
FTX is one of the biggest names in the industry and the entire market followed its token into reaching new lows.
ETHW opened on Sunday, 6th November with a price of $6.46, and this remained the coin’s high for the week. ETHW reached a weekly low of $3.58 on Wednesday, 9th November, and was trading for a coin at $4.16 during the early afternoon hours of Saturday, 12th November.
A significant rise in activity led to a soaring trading volume from $53 million to $137 million. Overall, ETHW dipped by 36% and wiped substantial gains off the portfolio of its holders.
Internet Computer (ICP) Dipped by 31%
When Internet Computer was launched in May 2021, many analysts forecasted that the project will become one of the primary challengers of Ethereum. Unfortunately, the project that wants to decentralize everything on the internet has not fared well in the markets in the last 11 months.
ICP opened on Saturday, 6th November with a trading price of $5.56, and the price remained the coin’s high during the week. The coin reached a weekly low of $3.68 on Wednesday, 9th November, and was trading for a coin at $3.85 in the late hours of the afternoon of Saturday, 12th November.
Withdrawal requests by ICP holders led to a spike in trading volume from $54 million to $107 million. Overall, ICP’s price descended by 31%.
Avalanche (AVAX) Plummeted by 32%
Avalanche has tagged itself as one of the best verifiable platforms for institutions, enterprises, and governments. Avalanche plays an integral role in decentralized finance and it’s one of the biggest NFT blockchains by all-time sales volume. AVAX, a native asset of Avalanche fell victim to the bearish trends of the market during the second week of November. AVAX opened on Sunday, 6th November at $19.60, and this rose to $19.70 the same day. AVAX tested a weekly low of $12.97 on Saturday, 12th November, and was exchanging hands for $13.38 in the afternoon hours of the day. Trading activities on AVAX led to an increment in volume from $236 million to $878 million.
