Ether Sees Record Outflows in Last Week of June Due to Negative Crypto Sentiment, CoinShares Data Shows

Ether investment products and funds posted record outflows in the last week of June, bearing the brunt of negative sentiment on cryptocurrencies, according to data on Monday from digital asset manager CoinShares.

Institutional investors took out $50 million (roughly Rs. 370 crores) from investment products and funds on Ether, the token used for the Ethereum blockchain. Ether suffered outflows for a fourth consecutive week, data showed. Ether price in India stood at Rs. 1.57 lakhs as of 10am IST on June 29.

For the month of June, Ether has lost roughly 22 percent of its value against the dollar. On Monday, however, Ether was up 5.4 percent at $2,091.96 (roughly Rs. 1.55 lakhs).

Bitcoin products and funds, meanwhile, suffered a seventh straight week of outflows, totaling $1.3 million (roughly Rs. 9.6 lakhs). For the year, Bitcoin outflows hit about $490 million (roughly Rs. 3,640 crores). Bitcoin price in India stood at Rs. 25.89 lakhs as of 10:30am IST on June 29.

The world's largest cryptocurrency was down 8.4 percent against the dollar so far in June. Since an all-time high of just under $65,000 (roughly Rs. 48.2 lakhs) hit in mid-April, Bitcoin has plunged nearly 46 percent.

"We expect Bitcoin consolidation to continue for the next few weeks until a decisive move takes place," said Pankaj Balani, chief executive officer at crypto derivatives exchange Delta Exchange.

"If the global macro environment deteriorates on account of the decreasing pace of global liquidity, it's expected that Bitcoin may break the crucial level of $30,000 (roughly Rs. 22.2 lakhs) and challenge the highs of the previous cycle at $20,000 (roughly Rs. 14.8 lakhs). Until then, Bitcoin is likely to be in this range and can set up a classic bull trap above $42,000 (roughly Rs. 31 lakhs)."

Overall, crypto investment products saw a fourth consecutive week of outflows, totaling $44 million (roughly Rs. 325 crores). Since mid-May, as negative sentiment spread, net weekly outflows have hit $313 million (roughly Rs. 2,320 crores), or 0.8 percent of total assets under management.

Sentiment on cryptocurrencies has been crushed amid a crackdown on the sector by China, which banned Bitcoin mining activities.

In addition, British and Japanese regulators have independently issued warnings against Binance, one of the world's largest cryptocurrency exchanges. Britain's financial regulator over the weekend said Binance cannot conduct any regulated activity and issued a warning to consumers about the platform.

Japan also issued a similar warning to Binance stating that it has been providing crypto exchange services to Japanese customers without registration.

Crypto assets under management also declined in the latest week to about $38 billion (roughly Rs. 2,82,120 crores). At the end of April, that AUM was at $65 billion (roughly Rs. 4,82,620 crores).

© Thomson Reuters 2021