Nervousness spreads across all risky assets as US regional banks add to already significant losses.
Bitcoin BTC €26,219 it fell below $29,000 around the Wall Street open on May 4, as the US stock market showed jitters over a resurgence of the banking crisis.
“Too many things at once” for US banks
Data from Cointelegraph Markets Pro and TradingView showed that the BTC/USD pair lost ground while the S&P 500 lost 0.7%.
The fall in risky assets was accompanied by more chaos in shares of US regional banks, with PacWest Bancorp once again leading the way, down more than 50% on the day.
At the time of writing, the bank had already posted significant losses and had fallen 86.5% so far this year. Nonetheless, in a statement , the bank called its position “solid.”
As Cointelegraph reported , reassuring words from US officials about the stability of the banking system appeared to contradict reality to many commentators, and confusion only increased as the crisis dragged on.
Within the last 24 hours:
1. PacWest Bank, $PACW , explores potential sale
2. Western Alliance Bank, $WAL , explores potential sale
3. First Horizon Bank, $FHN , cancels merger with TD Bank due to “regulatory concerns”
4 Fed says “banking system is sound”
5. No comment from…
— The Kobeissi Letter (@KobeissiLetter) May 4, 2023
“For the first time in weeks, equity markets are responding to the banking crisis,” financial opinion resource The Kobeissi Letter wrote in part of the Twitter coverage.
Kobeissi argued that the latest Fed rate hike, confirmed at 0.25% on May 3, had added fuel to the fire.
“Perhaps it is that the equity market worries that the crisis is not isolated,” he continued.
“The Fed’s rate hike is only making things worse.”
In addition to PacWest, First Horizon and Western Alliance were two other big losers of the day, with drops of 53% and 38%, respectively.
“Trust in a financial institution is built over decades and destroyed in days,” Bill Ackman, CEO of hedge fund manager Pershing Square, continued in his own response.
“As each domino falls, the next weakest bank begins to falter. Until investors are rewarded for betting on a weak bank, there will be no bid, and the best sale will be last price. We’re running out No time to fix this problem.”
For his part , Marty Bent, founder of the cryptocurrency company TFTC, described the crisis as a point of no return.
“Any way you look at it, things look absolutely dire for the US financial system. This looks like the end of the game,” he warned on May 3.
“I find it hard to believe that anything can be done to restore confidence in the system. No amount of backing, money printing, buybacks, consolidation, or world wars will be able to put this genie back in the bottle. The Fed and Treasury will try to By all means make the public believe otherwise, but this is just too many things at once.”
The weekly chart underscores the importance of $28,800 for the BTC price
As for Bitcoin, the BTC/USD pair was in a low liquidity zone at press time, with some high-volume traders staying on the sidelines.
Binance order book data uploaded to Twitter by monitoring resource Material Indicators showed bid liquidity slowly rising above $28,000.
As several popular traders called for a return to higher levels to have a chance at the $30,000 resistance, longer-term time frames remained bullish.
Popular trader and analyst, Rekt Capital, highlighted current spot price levels as the site of a major rally.
“Last week, BTC closed its weekly candle above ~$28,800. And this week, BTC has done quite well to hold that level as support, largely due to aggressive buying over the past few days,” he explained about weekly frames.
“The recovery of the $28,800 level is technically in the works.”
