The United States equities markets have started the week on a weak note as investors remain unconvinced that the Federal Reserve will pull back its aggressive monetary policy. The Nasdaq Composite index fell to its lowest level since September 2020. All eyes will be fixated on the U.S. Consumer Price Index data for September to be released on Oct. 13 as that could influence the Fed’s decision on the size of the rate hike in the next meeting in November. Depending on how the market perceives the reading, legacy markets and the cryptocurrency markets may witness a pick up in …

Decentralized Ethereum (ETH) scaling platform Polygon (MATIC) announced the launch of Polygon zkEVM Public Testnet, an “Ethereum-equivalent” ecosystem with cross-compatibility to existing smart contracts, developer tools, and wallets built on Ethereum and Polygon PoS. zero-knowledge Ethereum Virtual Machine (zkEVM) is a layer 2 construction on top of Ethereum that aims improve scalability through mass transfer processing rolled into a single transaction. The testnet launched under Polygon’s zero-knowledge R&D team as a full-featured, open-source implementation of zkEVM. Decentralized finance (Defi) protocols Aave and Uniswap, along with Web3 social platform Lens and gaming studio Midnight Society, will be among the first projects …

The United States nonfarm payrolls increased by 263,000 in September, marginally below the Dow Jones estimate of 275,000, but the unemployment rate dropped to 3.5% compared to the forecast of 3.7%. Some analysts believe the report shows that the jobs market remains strong in spite of the Federal Reserve’s efforts to slow down the economy and that could encourage the Fed to go ahead with another aggressive rate hike in its next meeting in November. This led to a sharp fall in the U.S. equities markets on Oct. 7. Although Bitcoin (BTC) has traded in close correlation with the U.S. …

Decentralized Ethereum scaling platform, Polygon, has announced a partnership with the Ocean Conservation Exploration and Education Foundation (OCEEF) to promote ocean literacy through new creative, entertaining, and engaging ways to give people exposure to deep underwater missions. A new wave in ocean conservation @oceef_, a world class ocean conservation NGO, is working with #Polygon towards a next-gen ocean conservation initiative. The aim is to offer interactive experiences via a governance platform where participants can assist in key decisions. pic.twitter.com/N40r3iu54f — Polygon - MATIC (@0xPolygon) October 6, 2022 Polygon shared that the aim of this collaboration is to offer interactive experiences …

The company behind the Spartan Race has released a nonfungible token (NFT) collection which will immortalize the names of the initial holders in stone, with plans to build a 35 foot (10.5 meter) statue in Ancient Sparta encircled with 15,000 name-engraved stones. Spartan founder and CEO Joe De Sena plans to bury his ashes under his stone at the site dubbed the “Spartan 300 Memorial” which will pay homage to the ancient Battle of Thermopylae in which 300 Spartans were killed. Of the 15,000 NFTs, 300 will be “Super Rare” with holders of that NFT type given the option of …

The S&P 500 fell for six days in a row and made a new year-to-date low on Sept. 27, but Bitcoin (BTC) maintained its outperformance and stayed well above its June low. This could be a positive sign because several times, markets that show strength on the way down are the ones that outperform in the event of a recovery. The United States equities markets rebounded sharply on Sept. 28 after the Bank of England announced a bond-buying program and the U.S. Treasury yields pulled back from multi-year highs. As this occurred, strong buying in Bitcoin took place, but BTC …

Crypto and stock trading platform Robinhood announced the launch of Robinhood Wallet, a self-custody, Web3 wallet, with Polygon (MATIC) as its first supported blockchain. Robinhood launched the beta version of its Web3 wallet on iOS and is being made available to the first 10,000 users that joined the waitlist on May 2022. Hosted first over the Polygon blockchain, Robinhood Wallet allows users to trade and swap cryptocurrencies with no network fees. Sharing his thoughts on the crypto wallet’s launch, Johann Kerbrat, CTO of Robinhood Crypto - Robinhood’s crypto trading platform said: “Like we did with the stock market, Robinhood Wallet …

The United Kingdom is in focus following the British pound’s fall to a new all-time low against the United States dollar. The sell-off was triggered by the aggressive tax cuts announced by Prime Minister Liz Truss’s government. The 10-year gilt yields have soared by 131 basis points in September, on track for its biggest monthly increase since 1957, according to Reuters. The currency crisis and the soaring U.S dollar index (DXY) may not be good news for U.S. equities and the cryptocurrency markets. A ray of hope for Bitcoin (BTC) investors is that the pace of decline has slowed down …

The Federal Reserve hiked rates by 75 basis points on Sept. 21 and Fed chair Jerome Powell projected another 125 basis points increase before the end of the year. If that happens, it will take the benchmark rate to 4.4% by the end of the year, which is sharply higher than the June estimates of 3.8%. The Fed also intimated that it only expects rate cuts to be considered in 2024. The expectation of higher rates pushed the 2-year Treasury to 4.1%, its highest level since 2007. This could attract several investors who are looking for safety in this uncertain …

The United States equities markets and the crypto markets are likely to remain volatile in the near term because traders remain nervous about the size of the next Federal Reserve rate hike on Sept. 20 and Sept. 21. While the majority favors a 75 basis point rate hike, according to the CME FedWatch Tool, some analysts expect the Fed to hike rates by 100 basis points, the first such instance since the early 1980s. Many expect Bitcoin (BTC) to continue its slide and drop below the June low in the future. Although anything is possible in the markets, many times, …

The United States equities markets and the cryptocurrency markets had been rising leading up to the Sept. 13 release of the August consumer price index data, but the rally fell apart once the data showed inflation rising, rather than falling. The negative data dashed any hope of a Federal Reserve pivot in the near term and it triggered a sharp decline in risky assets. The market capitalization of U.S. stocks plunged by about $1.6 trillion on Sept. 13 and the market cap of the cryptocurrency markets slipped below $1 trillion. Statistician and independent market analyst Willy Woo, believes that Bitcoin …

After trading near the $20,000 level for several days, Bitcoin (BTC) turned down sharply and dropped below $19,000 on Sept. 6. The fall was not limited to the cryptocurrency markets as the United States equities markets also closed lower on Sept. 6. Risky assets have been facing selling pressure in the past few days as investors are worried that the Federal Reserve could continue with its aggressive tightening policy. The CME FedWatch Tool shows that the probability for a 75 basis point rate hike in the September meeting has risen to 80% from 69% a week back. This extended the …