coindesk.com
The "Bart Simpson" price pattern, resembling the cartoon character's hairstyle, made a comeback to the bitcoin market early Wednesday as the cryptocurrency saw a quick rise and fall in a thinly traded market.
Bitcoin jumped from $39,120 to $41,700 in 30 minutes to 02:15 UTC only to fall back to $39,000 by 03:30 UTC, CoinDesk data shows. The sudden rise perhaps stemmed from stop orders on short trades and ran into stronger selling pressure.
"There was a sharp jump in the rate from $39,200 to $41,700, followed by an almost equally rapid pullback to the area below $39,000. Stop orders were triggered in the morning low-liquid market, but it is clear that the selling pressure remains huge," Alex Kuptsikevich, senior market analyst at FXPro, said in an email.
"In fact, since Feb. 10, the rises in the bitcoin rate have become less and less long and end at ever lower levels," Kuptsikevich added.
"Recently, there has been a lack of dynamism in both the spot and derivatives markets. Yesterday's BTC spot trading volume was slightly over $7b, while the perpetual contract trading volume was only around $40b," Griffin Ardern, a volatility trader from crypto-asset management company Blofin said in a Telegram chat. " Since derivatives rely on index prices, it is not difficult to "spot blast" against the BTC index prices in several smaller exchanges in this case."
Looking ahead, the liquidity could remain thin at least until the Fed rate decision, scheduled at 19:00 UTC. The U.S. central bank is expected to hike interest rates by 25 basis points, kicking off the tightening cycle that is expected to take rates to highs of 2.5% from the current 0.25%.
Bitcoin was trading near $40,300 at press time, representing a 2% gain on the day.