First Mover Americas: Bitcoin at $100K Sounds Nice, but Expect Pullback

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Bitcoin topped $98,000 heading into the U.S. morning, extending its breakout from an eight-month consolidation since crypto-friendly Donald Trump won the U.S. presidency. The largest crypto has advanced 4.5% over the past 24 hours, leaving the broad-market CoinDesk 20 Index behind. Some altcoins are quickly catching up to BTC's gain, with ether (ETH), Chainlink (LINK) and Uniswap (UNI) surging 5% in the past hour. The $100,000-per-BTC mark is just a stone's throw away and BTC futures on Deribit maturing next year are already trading above the threshold. Still, the round-number level might pose a barrier at least in the short term as investors take some profits after a 40% rally in only two weeks. "If BTC breaks through $100K, there is a high probability of a pullback," Gracy Chen, CEO at crypto exchange Bitget, said in a note. It's a "psychological barrier where investors might reassess their positions, leading to a natural sell-off point, as seen in other asset classes when significant round numbers are breached."

Crypto-focused U.S. equities also rallied pre-market open. MicroStrategy (MSTR), owner of the largest corporate bitcoin treasury, rose 11% to $520 before the open of U.S. trading. Public companies following MicroStrategy's approach of buying BTC for its treasury also gained. MARA Holdings (MARA) added 10% and Semler Scientific (SMLR) 24% before the opening bell. Options trading on Defiance's 2X long MicroStrategy ETF, which is a leveraged bet on MSTR share prices, took off yesterday and showed extreme bullish positioning with risk-on sentiment at record levels.

The creator of the Chillguy meme threatened legal action for profit-related assets or applications using his character as a spoof token went viral on social media. The Solana-based meme token CHILLGUY, inspired by Phillip Banks' copyrighted character, skyrocketed in price this week nearing $500 million market value fueled by its viral spread on TikTok. Banks’ legal threats tanked the token's price from Wednesday's peak, as holders likely took profits.

Chart of the Day

• Google Trends, a widely used tool to gauge interest in trending topics, is returning a value of 100 for the worldwide search query "memecoins" over the past five years.
• A score of 100 represents peak popularity — the maximum number of searches for the query during a given time frame — and points to an impending retail investor frenzy.
• Source: Google Trends

- Omkar Godbole

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