Decentralized exchanges have indelibly changed the way that cryptocurrencies are traded. But in the grand scheme of things, the technology that’s driving these platforms is relatively young… meaning it’s inevitable that teething problems have emerged. Some of the heavy hitters that dominate the market at present are known as non-orderbook markets. While it’s tantalizing and somewhat romantic that these platforms are controlled purely by supply and demand, it often results in some unexpected downsides. There’s one glaring disadvantage that we don’t need to mention too extensively — high swap fees. We currently live in a world where it can cost …

In a market once dominated by a handful of BTC vehicles, there are now a growing number of products offering investors access to gains from popular altcoins like Polkadot. Yesterday, Osprey Funds announced the launch of the Osprey Polkadot Trust. The fund, which will be available to accredited investors with a $25,000 minimum, is set to be listed on the OTCQX market “as soon as possible,” per a press release from the company. Coinbase will serve as the fund's custodian. The fund will give investors access to one of the largest layer one smart contract chains via familiar rails, and …

Bitcoin (BTC) has slowed down after its sharp relief rally over the past 48 hours, but Ether (ETH) is in no mood to rest as it continues to chase new all-time highs. The biggest altcoin by market capitalization seems to have received a boost from the news of the launch of a 100-million-euro ($120.8 million) digital bond sale on its network by the European Investment Bank. Meanwhile, Bitcoin’s institutional adoption has continued to expand. Japanese game developer Nexon disclosed the purchase of 1,717 Bitcoin at an average price of $58,226, for a total consideration of about $100 million. Nexon president …

Bitcoin price started the week off with a strong move that propelled the price above $50,000 and at the time of writing, bulls are in pursuit of the $55,000 level. On April 21, JPMorgan analysts wrote that the liquidity in the cryptocurrency markets is likely to recover sharply after the recent sell-off in Bitcoin (BTC). According to the analysts, “the worst of the liquidations” could be over “suggesting little overhang to work through.” Another bullish sign was shown by the Crypto Fear and Greed Index, which quickly dipped from greed in the last week to fear on April 25, indicating …

As Bitcoin price crashed below $50,000, mainstream media highlighted that the selling across the market could have been triggered by reports that the Biden administration proposed increasing the capital gains tax to 39.6% from the current 20% for people earning more than $1 million a year. In other news, there was an apparent exit scam carried out by Thodex exchange owner Faruk Fatih Özer, which has affected about 391,000 users of the Turkish crypto exchange. Rumors are afloat that the owner may have fled the country with nearly $2 billion worth of crypto assets. U.S. equity markets also sold off …

JPMorgan strategist Nikolaos Panigirtzoglou believes that if Bitcoin (BTC) does not break above $60,000 within the next few days, the momentum signals could weaken “for several months, given their still-elevated level.” Another bearish voice was that of Guggenheim chief investment officer Scott Minerd who said in an interview with CNBC on April 20 that Bitcoin looked frothy and was at risk of a correction to $20,000 to $30,000. Minerd said that such a massive fall will be part of a normal market cycle and that will not alter his long-term target of $400,000 for Bitcoin. However, several analysts, including statistician …

A smart contract platform aimed at the decentralized finance market seeks to make it easy to transfer decentralized applications from clogged, expensive Ethereum to Polkadot. The open-source project’s goal is to create easy-to-use blockchain infrastructure that will improve the interoperability of cross-chain assets, attracting developers of DeFi projects. Clover Finance wants to build a one-stop infrastructure platform that will make it simpler and less expensive for developers of DeFi projects to migrate their DApps onto Polkadot, a potential Ethereum killer that achieves scalability by running many blockchains in parallel, each with its own design and each serving a specific purpose …

The stakes have been upped for Cardano and Polkadot, with the two networks continuing to dominate the staked capitalization rankings. According to data from StakingRewards, Cardano is currently the top blockchain in terms of staked value, with roughly $26.4 billion worth of Cardano (ADA) allocated to securing the network. With Cardano’s entire capitalization tagging $36.6 billion, 73% of circulating ADA are being staked. StakingRewards estimates Cardano stakers are earning an annual reward of 7.22%. The second-largest crypto asset by staked value is Polkadot with $22.7 billion worth of DOT locked — representing 64% of its circulating supply. Average annual staking …

Few traders would argue against the fact that Bitcoin (BTC) is in a bull market, but there is less consensus on whether the market is in the midst of an "altcoin season." A quick view of Crypto Twitter shows the schism between traders who are certain we are halfway through alt season and those who believe it has yet to begin. Typically, traders rely on a wide swath of indicators and metrics, like Bitcoin’s total market capitalization versus the total altcoin market cap, Bitcoin’s dominance rate, and whether low-cap altcoins have rallied by a certain percentage. As is the nature …

During strong uptrends, the best practice is to buy on significant dips as profits are produced when the price quickly rebounds from oversold conditions. This appears to be what happened on April 18 as traders jumped at the opportunity to buy Bitcoin and altcoins at lower levels. However, no market can keep going up in a straight line and periodic corrections and phases of consolidation are needed as they drive away the speculators who only jump in and use high leverage when they sense an opportunity to get rich quickly. The sharp rise in Dogecoin’s (DOGE) price and the huge …

Dogecoin’s (DOGE) massive rally to $0.45 propelled it to a market capitalization of over $54 billion to make it the fifth most valuable cryptocurrency by market cap. This lofty market cap comes as a surprise to many since the project has no active developers and is only a meme coin, thus the current rally brings back memories of the excesses seen during the ICO boom in 2017. Rallies like the one seen in Dogecoin indicate that several traders have entered the fray and are looking to get rich overnight. The only positive sign is that the mania has not spread …

The source code for the upcoming Polkadot Index Network Token, or PINT, has been made public, with half a dozen projects putting their hand up to be included in the index. The project has outlined a four-phase roadmap that it expects to culminate in mainnet launch within three months. According to an announcement on Wednesday, six of Polkadot’s leading projects have already given “soft commitments” for inclusion in the index, including Acala Network, Equilibrium, HydraDX, Litentry, Moonbeam and Plasm. The PINT token seeks to offer investors balanced exposure to the emerging Polkadot ecosystem, hedging the volatility of individual projects against …