Global crypto market cap hit $2.82T on Sept. 3, a 7-month high, with Zcash up 16.5%, Cardano up 13%, and BTC trading above $81K as the Fed rate decision nears.
Zcash (ZEC) gained 16.5% on Sept. 3, making it the top performer among the top 50 cryptocurrencies by market cap. Cardano (ADA) rose 13%, while Dogecoin (DOGE) and XRP each climbed roughly 10%. Bitcoin (BTC) traded near $81,460, up 5.4% on the day.
Those moves pushed the global crypto market capitalization to $2.82 trillion, the highest level in more than seven months. The reading marks a recovery from the sell-off that began in mid-January, when the total market cap fell from around $3.4 trillion to roughly $2.3 trillion in the first week of February.
ETF Inflows and OTC Activity Cleared the $80,000 Level
Paul Howard, senior director at Wincent, said BTC’s break above $80,000 was driven by a combination of ETF inflows and over-the-counter activity. "Bitcoin breaking the $80K wall, fueled by $100 million of ETF inflows and OTC activity, was enough to banish the bears ahead of US economic data," he said. Howard added that a revival in meme coin trading had helped build momentum, and said he expects a gradual climb toward $100,000 by year-end.
Crypto-related equities moved alongside digital assets. Circle rose 16.46%, Strategy gained 15%, and Coinbase added roughly 10%. Strategy's STRC preferred shares climbed back near their $100 par value after falling as low as $69 five weeks earlier.
Richard Green, head of institutional at RootstockLabs, said BTC's parallel gains with gold reflect what he described as a "debasement trade," driven by concern over government debt and the prospect of looser monetary policy. "The closer those conditions get to crisis levels, the more investors allocate capital towards assets, particularly hard assets," he said, while noting that further drawdowns remain possible.
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Traders Are Evenly Split on the September Rate Decision
Markets showed little consensus heading into the Federal Reserve's Sept. 16 Federal Open Market Committee meeting. Traders priced a 50.4% chance of a 25-basis-point rate hike and a 49.6% probability of rates holding steady.
Adam Haeems, head of asset management at Tesseract Group, pointed to roughly $1.4 billion in September BTC put options positioned between $68,000 and $75,000. He noted that overall put open interest is about half that of call open interest, with heavy call positioning between $82,000 and $100,000. Haeems described the setup as a "hedged long," with investors maintaining exposure while protecting against a possible pullback.
Green echoed the cautious tone, saying that while conditions are supportive of hard assets, the market has not ruled out further downside. The split among Fed watchers means the direction of the next major move will likely depend on how policymakers respond to incoming inflation and employment data in the days ahead.
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