Bitcoin Halving Impact Fades as Demand Takes Center Stage
According to reports, the Open Interest in Bitcoin is now 30 times higher than it was 11 days before the 2020 Bitcoin halving.
With news of the ongoing FTX saga, Bitcoin price has seen increasing volatility, shedding over 20% in less than a week. Bitcoin isn’t the only cryptocurrency in the market to be taking a toll, however. Exchanges, institutional firms, and hard wallets have all suffered under the strain of uncertainty in the industry.
Grayscale Bitcoin Trust Fund faces 40% discount
Earlier in the week, Grayscale Bitcoin Trust (GBTC) – the world’s leading institutional Bitcoin funds – saw a record discount of over 40%, with shares just below $8.80. While GBTC has been experiencing a slow decline over the past year with the sustained bear market slowing down adoption, the current price is a massive slash from the record high it held a year ago in November 2021, when it was sitting at $51.47 per share. Part of this rests in the structural problems that GBTC suffers. This is because it’s an investment fund linked to an asset but there are price discrepancies that exist. As a result, it has been reported that Grayscale is trying to convert the fund to an exchange-traded fund (ETF) that will stabilise the premium or discount of the price.
Ledger’s challenges related to scalability
Amidst the FTX uncertainty, Ledger has suffered issues with users unable to withdraw from their hard wallets. According to Ledger CTO Charles Guillemet, this is a result of “massive usage” on their platforms which has caused “few scalability challenges”.
After the FTX earthquake, there’s a massive outflow from exchanges to @ledger security and self sovereignty solutions ✊
We see a massive usage of our platforms and had a few scalability challenges this night. It should be resolved now. https://t.co/a1Le91tNZF— Charles Guillemet (@P3b7_) November 10, 2022
According to Guillemet and the official Ledger Support, the outages should be resolved at this point.