Bitcoin and crypto course August

Bitcoin wobbles at 29,000 US dollars, while XRP leads the losses among altcoins; SHIB and Helium post gains.

Cryptocurrency markets experienced selling pressure on Friday afternoon as equity markets gave up their early gains and closed the day in the red. Bitcoin (BTC) fell to USD 28,900 on Friday afternoon before recovering slightly above the USD 29,000 mark. The cryptocurrency markets recorded losses and continued their downward trend throughout the day.

Ripple's XRP led the decline in large-cap digital assets, losing nearly 24 % of its value in the last five hours. The fifth-largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization was trading at 64 cents, its lowest price since its partial court victory against the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) on July 13. ADA, SOL and MATIC, the tokens of smart contracts platforms Cardano, Solana and Polygon, also gave back their early gains. LTC, the native token of the Litecoin network, continued its losing streak typical of the quadrennial halving event, losing another 4.5 %.

Some smaller cryptocurrencies are defying the otherwise red day on the crypto markets. The popular dog token SHIB saw an increase of 4 % after developers unveiled plans to link all ecosystem applications to a blockchain-based digital identity. Helium's HNT saw an increase of almost 19 % throughout the day, continuing its momentum since the token's halving day on August 1.

The CoinDesk Market Index, a comprehensive measure of crypto market performance, recently fell 1.5 %. In an email to CoinDesk, Brent Xu, CEO and co-founder of Web3 bond market platform Umee, wrote that crypto prices are unlikely to rise for an extended period of time "until the macroeconomic environment weakens further." This includes a continuation of the policy of interest rate hikes by central banks, which has been ongoing for more than 16 months.