Bitcoin paints Nasdaq green as NCI index marks 38% gain in January

Bitcoin’s bullish surge in January has helped the Nasdaq Crypto Index to register its third-highest monthly gain, with a 38% surge. The cryptocurrency market started the year on a bullish note, defying major bearish market outlooks. Bitcoin (BTC) and a number of altcoins touched new multi-month highs as inflation cooled off. 

NCI recorded its third-biggest monthly gain since its inception in February 2021. The crypto asset index was launched by Brazilian asset manager Hashdex in partnership with the United States stock exchange. The index consists of eight cryptocurrencies: Bitcoin, Ether (ETH), Bitcoin Cash (BCH), Litecoin (LTC), Chainlink's LINK, and Stellar's Lumen (XLM), among a few others.

BTC has the highest weightage in the index, with 69.8%, followed by ETH (27.08%). The rest of the other altcoins have a weightage of less than 1%.  Thus, the subsequent rise of BTC and ETH, which have surged over 35% in the past month, reflected on the index as well. The index weightage refers to the share of stocks invested in a particular digital asset.

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With a prolonged crypto winter throughout 2022, Bitcoin ended the last year at around $16,500 and the majority of the altcoins also tested their yearly lows towards the end of the last year. Many market pundits had warned that the bearish sentiment might continue into the new year owing to the FTX saga folding out on a daily basis. However, the crypto market showed resilience and started the year on a bullish note and registering a market-wide double-digit gain for the past month.

Federal Open Market Committee press briefing announced an interest rate hike of 25 basis points. The U.S. Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell suggested that inflation had begun to cool off in the world’s largest economy. The Fed raise worked wonders for the crypto market, BTC price touched $24,000 briefly and the crypto market cap rose by 4%.