Bitcoin above $30K again as cryptocurrencies seek direction

By Ovunc Kutlu

ANKARA (AA) - The price of Bitcoin climbed above $30,000 on Thursday as cryptocurrencies are seeking direction but have failed to recover from massive losses in the last two weeks.

Bitcoin, the world’s biggest crypto by market cap, was more than $30,000 at 11.15 a.m. EDT, while it was trading around that level at 4 p.m. EDT up 2.5% for the day.

The price of Ethereum, the world’s largest altcoin, was at $1,995 for a daily increase of 1%.

The crypto market lost almost half of its value during the last six weeks as the total value of the crypto market is down to $1.27 trillion on Thursday, from $2.19 trillion April 4.

Most of the losses came during the past two weeks after the US Federal Reserve increased interest rates by 50 basis points May 4 and signaled more hikes are on the way in June and July.

On top of the Fed's monetary tightening, the crypto market is also struggling with inner hurdles, especially with the controversial stable coin UST plummeting since last week.

Initially designed to be pegged one-to-one with the dollar, the price of UST continued to decline and has fallen to $0.08795.

Luna Foundation Guard, the organization behind UST, sold at least $2.1 billion worth of Bitcoin in the past 10 days to support the price of UST, according to figures released Monday.

Many crypto investors partially blame the organization for selling its Bitcoin reserves and causing a decline in its price to bring the value of UST back to $1.

A positive development for the cryptos came with Russia's Industry and Trade Minister Denis Manturov saying Wednesday that his country would legalize cryptocurrencies sooner or later as a means of payment, as Moscow struggles with western sanctions on various sectors, especially banking, industry and energy.