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Crypto Markets Analysis: Prices Trade Quietly Despite Surrounding Noise
Price action for bitcoin and ether is relatively flat as markets become quieter near year end.
Updated Dec 23, 2022, 7:50 p.m. Published Dec 23, 2022, 7:38 p.m.
Crypto price movement was relatively mild this week.
Despite the soap opera surrounding Sam Bankman-Fried’s arrest, extradition and incredible shrinking $250 million bond, crypto assets appear to be ignoring the noise and trading on the basis of fundamentals, sentiment and basic supply and demand.
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This is welcome news for markets in that focus can now shift to factors that are more connected to valuations. One factor that stands out is the decline in trading volume, understandable given the time of year. Crypto traders can be forgiven for a break after an exhausting and painful year.
The weekly chart for bitcoin shows an approximate 50% decline in trading volume on Binance, along with a 17% decline in trading volume for ether.
Bitcoin’s seven-day performance versus the U.S. dollar was middle of the pack (ninth) this week relative to the top 20 cryptocurrencies by market capitalization.
By contrast, BTC finished third in the prior week. Its absolute performance was stronger, however, gaining 1.4% versus a 0.9% decline last week.
Ether’s 4.7% increase was a mirror opposite of last week’s 4.6% decline. ETH landed third on the performance list. BNB led the way with a 6.4% gain.
There was a much narrower dispersion of performance this week, with winners and losers ranging from 6.4% to -3.1%, compared to 30.6% to -15.4% the week prior.
Bitcoin and ether remain range-bound
Our thoughts on bitcoin’s chart are relatively unchanged from our thoughts a week ago.
Momentum is fairly stagnant, with BTC's Relative Strength Index (RSI) reading remaining in fairly neutral territory.
Past trading activity shows significant price agreement between $16,500 and $17,000. When agreement exists to this extent, prices can remain at that level for an extended period of time. This is compounded by the decline in volume that is emblematic of year end trading.
Bitcoin is currently trading fairly tightly to its 20-day moving average, and appears poised to remain there for the time being.
Ether’s chart implies an almost identical situation, which is unsurprising given its persistently tight correlation with bitcoin.
Coindesk Market Index sector performance
CDI Select sector performance shows the Currency (CCYS) and Smart Contract Platform (SCPX) sectors leading the way on both a weekly and monthly basis.
With BTC and ETH composing 62% and 58% of the CoinDesk Currency sector and Smart Contract Platform sector, respectively, the outperformance is strongly tied to the performance of the individual assets. Other notable assets within the CCYS and SCPX include:
CCYS:
SCPX:
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What to know:
- As of October 2025, GoPlus has generated $4.7M in total revenue across its product lines. The GoPlus App is the primary revenue driver, contributing $2.5M (approx. 53%), followed by the SafeToken Protocol at $1.7M.
- GoPlus Intelligence's Token Security API averaged 717 million monthly calls year-to-date in 2025 , with a peak of nearly 1 billion calls in February 2025. Total blockchain-level requests, including transaction simulations, averaged an additional 350 million per month.
- Since its January 2025 launch , the $GPS token has registered over $5B in total spot volume and $10B in derivatives volume in 2025. Monthly spot volume peaked in March 2025 at over $1.1B , while derivatives volume peaked the same month at over $4B.
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Asian equities opened the week slightly higher ahead of a heavy run of central bank decisions, including a Federal Reserve meeting where markets have largely priced in a 25-basis-point rate cut.
What to know:
- Bitcoin traded above $91,300 as Asian equities opened higher, with markets anticipating a Federal Reserve rate cut.
- Bitcoin rose 2% in 24 hours, facing resistance near $94,000, while Ether gained 3% to $3,135.
- Despite crypto market gains, sentiment remains cautious, with potential for a deeper slowdown without new liquidity.
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