Decentral Block Post

Bitcoin (BTC) has been trending up since mid-July, although the current ascending channel formation holds $21,100 support. This pattern has been holding for 45 days and could potentially drive BTC towards $26,000 by late August.

According to Bitcoin derivatives data, investors are pricing higher odds of a downturn, but recent improvements in global economic perspective might take the bears by surprise.

The correlation to traditional assets is the main source of investors' distrust, especially when pricing in recession risks and tensions between the United States and China ahead of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's visit to Taiwan. According to CNBC, Chinese officials threatened to take action if Pelosi moved forward.

The U.S. Federal Reserve's recent interest rate hikes to curb inflation brought further uncertainty for risk assets, limiting crypto price recovery. Investors are betting on a "soft landing," meaning the central bank will be able to gradually revoke its stimulus activities without causing significant unemployment or recession.

The correlation metric ranges from a negative 1, meaning select markets move in opposite directions, to a positive 1, which reflects a perfect and symmetrical movement. A disparity or a lack of relationship between the two assets would be represented by 0.

Polkadot (DOT) looks ready to extend its ongoing price recovery due to a classic bullish pattern forming on its daily chart.

DOT paints "cup and handle" pattern

Notably, DOT has been forming a "cup and handle" pattern since mid-June, confirmed by its price crashing and recovering in a rounding, U-shaped trajectory (cup), followed by the development of a trading range on the right-hand side (handle).

Cup and handle patterns are typically bullish continuation setups that form during an uptrend. But in rare cases, they appear at the end of a downtrend, leading to a bullish price reversal. As a result, DOT's possibility of continuing its price recovery seems high.

Thus, from the technical perspective, DOT initially eyes a breakout above its cup and handle's resistance line near $8.50.

A decisive close above the resistance line, i.e., a breakout move accompanied by a rise in volume, could have DOT eye approximately $12 as its upside target by September, up more than 50% from today's price.

Polkadot (DOT) looks ready to extend its ongoing price recovery due to a classic bullish pattern forming on its daily chart.

DOT paints "cup and handle" pattern

Notably, DOT has been forming a "cup and handle" pattern since mid-June, confirmed by its price crashing and recovering in a rounding, U-shaped trajectory (cup), followed by the development of a trading range on the right-hand side (handle).

Cup and handle patterns are typically bullish continuation setups that form during an uptrend. But in rare cases, they appear at the end of a downtrend, leading to a bullish price reversal. As a result, the possibility of DOT continuing its price recovery seems high.

Thus, from the technical perspective, DOT initially eyes a breakout above its cup and handle's resistance line near $8.50.

A decisive close above the resistance line, i.e., a breakout move accompanied by a rise in volume, could have DOT eye approximately $12 as its upside target by September, up more than 50% from Aug. 's price.

Crypto exchange Zipmex, which operates in Thailand, Indonesia, Singapore and Australia, released a statement this week denying reports that it has filed for bankruptcy and announcing its progress in resuming withdrawals from its Z Wallets. 

Zipmex customers can withdraw Solana (SOL) from their wallets Tuesday and will be able to withdraw XRP on Thursday and Cardano (ADA) on August 9, the company said.

Zipmex provides its customers with two wallets: Z Wallet, used for Zipmex services and receipt of earnings and bonuses, and Trade Wallet, where fiat currency and funds for trading are held. Zipmex paused all withdrawals from its platform on July 20 but resumed withdrawals from Trade Wallets two days later. The company cited its exposure to Babel Finance and Celsius defaults as necessitating the wallet freeze. Babel Finance owed Zipmex $48 million and Celsius owed it $5 million.

Now altcoins in Z Wallets will be transferred to Trade Wallets, leaving only Bitcoin (BTC), Ether (ETH) and stablecoins frozen in Z Wallets. Zipmex promised customers that it would “start to release some of these tokens [BTC, ETH and stablecoins] into your Trade Wallet starting in the middle of August.”

Related: Thai SEC launches digital hotline for Zipmex users

Bitcoin (BTC) saw volatility after the Aug. 2 Wall Street open amid ongoing market reactions to tensions between the United States and China.

BTC price U-turns as Pelosi lands in Taipei

Data from Cointelegraph Markets Pro and TradingView showed BTC/USD spiking above $23,000 on the day as news came in that Nancy Pelosi, speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, had landed in Taipei, Taiwan after warnings of retaliation from Beijing.

The visit, which had raised concerns of a major incident occurring, appeared to go without a hitch — something an analyst at major banking giant JPMorgan had previously said would spark a market rally.

Both the S&P 500 and Nasdaq Composite Index were slightly higher at the time of writing, reversing initial losses. Previously, Asian markets had fared worse on the uncertainty, with both the Shanghai Composite Index and Hong Kong's Hang Seng losing around 2.3% on the day.

As traders eyed an end to the recent few days' calm on BTC, it remained to be seen whether important trendlines nearby would continue to hold after seeing retests overnight.

The Waves (WAVES) community has supported a governance proposal to revive the decentralized finance (DeFi) lending protocol Vires.Finance after its liquidity crisis. The vote aims to stabilize the project and compensate the users who were affected. 

In April, Neutrino (USDN), a stablecoin running on the Waves platform, depegged from the dollar. This led to a series of user withdrawals within the platform, eventually ending in a liquidity shortage where users became unable to withdraw their funds from the platform. During the event, Waves founder Sasha Ivanov stepped in, accumulating $500 million in debt into his wallet with the intent to gradually pay it out.

To fix the situation, the Vires team submitted a proposal that gives two options to users with a balance of above $250,000 on the platform. The first option is to exchange their positions for USDN, with a 1 year vesting period and a 5% liquidation bonus. The second option is to remain in USD Coin (USDC) and Tether (USDT) with 0% APY, which will be repaid by Ivanov, without any guarantees on the time frame for the payments.

With the proposal in effect, the Vires team expects to have better liquidity, allowing users to withdraw their funds from the platform. In the announcement sent to Cointelegraph, Ivanov thanked the Waves community for supporting the proposal, highlighting that the community always has the last word on their platform.

Related: These are the least 'stable' stablecoins not named TerraUSD