Several tokens held by Sam Bankman-Fried’s embattled trading business Alameda Research were sold late on Wednesday for millions of dollars, as the firm’s founders face criminal charges related to the collapse of Alameda and FTX, the crypto exchange Bankman-Fried ran.
On-chain data cited by crypto research firm Arkham Intelligence suggested $1.7 million worth of tokens from Alameda-linked wallets was sold in the open market over a span of several hours on Wednesday.
That sparked concerns on Crypto Twitter that the sales would trigger a steep fall in the prices of those tokens.
On-chain data showed Ethereum-based tokens such as USD coin (USDC), dai (DAI), curve (CRV), ether (ETH), convex (CVX) and others were consolidated from several wallets to just two wallets and later sold for tether (USDT) stablecoin.
The value of the transactions ranged from a fraction of an ether to over 15 ether, the on-chain data shows.
Token Roundup
Solana (SOL): Solana continued its steep drop as the price of the cryptocurrency lost another 13% on Thursday. SOL was recently trading at $8.40.
Bitcoin (BTC): Thelargest cryptocurrency by market value broke a two-day losing streak on Thursday and was recently trading at around $16,600, up 0.3% over the past 24 hours. Equities markets ended the day higher as traders prepared for the year end. The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite gained 2.6%, while the S&P 500 and Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) closed up 1.7% and about1%, respectively.
Ether (ETH): The second-largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization followed BTC’s steps and had recently gained about 0.5% to trade just below $1,200.
Market Analysis: Cryptos vs. Equities in 2022
Although the world’s largest cryptocurrency by market value, bitcoin (BTC), saw a roughly 64% decline in value year-to-date, CoinDesk research shows that bitcoin and ether returns in 2022 per unit of risk were about the same as equities and significantly better than bonds.
Bitcoin and ether appeared to be affected by the same forces that made stock investing a challenge over the past year, including high inflation and the looming threat of recession. According to CoinDesk data, stocks were nearly twice as risky in 2022 as 2021.
Deteriorating liquidity appears to be one of the largest factors in what has caused this.
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