Crypto Markets Today: Binance.US to Buy Voyager Digital's Assets; Bitcoin Slides Into the Red

Voyager Digital, the bankrupt crypto lender, said Monday Binance.US has agreed to buy its assets for $1.022 billion.

This article originally appeared in Crypto Markets Today, CoinDesk’s daily newsletter diving into what happened in today's crypto markets. Subscribe to get it in your inbox every day.

• The bid represents the fair market value of Voyager's cryptocurrency portfolio, which has a current market value of around $1.002 billion, and an additional consideration of $20 million in incremental value.
• Voyager said in the statement, "The Binance.US bid aims to return crypto to customers in kind, in accordance with court-approved disbursements and platform capabilities."
• Binance CEO Changpeng "CZ" Zhao had said last month that his exchange's U.S. wing would be making a fresh bid for Voyager Digital. CoinDesk had earlier reported that Binance was preparing a bid for the bankrupt crypto lender's assets.
• Binance.US will make a good faith deposit of $10 million and will reimburse Voyager for certain expenses up to $15 million. Voyager will also seek the approval of the bankruptcy court at a hearing on Jan. 5, 2023.
• Voyager, which went into bankruptcy earlier this year, had agreed to sell its assets to the now-defunct crypto exchange FTX, with FTX beating out rivals Wave Financial and Binance for the assets.

Token Roundup

Bitcoin (BTC): The largest cryptocurrency by market value slid 0.8% over the past 24 hours, trading around $16,610. Equity markets also kicked off the new week with losses as traders felt the continuing nervousness over the Federal Reserve’s hawkish message last week on tighter monetary policy until it is "sufficiently restrictive" to bring inflation down. The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite closed down 1.49%. The S&P 500 slid 0.90% and the Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 0.49%.

Ether (ETH): The second-largest cryptocurrency followed BTC’s trajectory, also dropping around 0.5% to $1,170.

Filecoin (FIL) and Storj (STORJ): FIL is down 28% over the past five days, with STORJ down 20%. Data from Coinglass points to record liquidations on long positions for storage protocols' tokens: Nearly $5.7 million long FIL positions were liquidated on Dec. 16, according to Coinglass, while $365,000 in STORJ long positions were also liquidated.

Crypto Market Analysis: Bitcoin Correlations Show Dollar Still Rules (In the Inverse)

By Glenn Williams Jr.

Bitcoin’s correlation with copper has been interesting to track, rising as high as 0.9 a week ago. Its decline to 0.41 since then raises questions of reliability.

Outside of a “black swan” event specific to a centralized crypto entity, BTC’s price remains largely tethered to the Federal Reserve’s monetary policy decisions. Now that the Sam Bankman-Fried news is beginning to subside, Fed Chair Jerome Powell is reemerging as crypto’s primary antagonist, even if unintentionally so.

The takeaway is that crypto assets prices will largely be driven by inflation figures, the size of the Federal Reserve’s balance sheet and market interpretations of Fed officials’ statements. For a newer asset class with the ability to function outside of traditional finance, old-school markets and economics continue to impact its progression.

Read the full technical take here.

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