October's hot issue is whether or not “Spot Bitcoin ETF” will be approved.

Nice to meet you all.

My name is Masamichi Matsushima a.k.a. “Marin” and I am a crypto asset analyst at Monex, Inc.

I have decided to write a series of articles on the Bitcoin market and my outlook for the future as part of a series of articles in Iolite magazine. I will also introduce individual stocks that I am currently paying attention to under the title of “Marin's Noteworthy Issues".

I will do my best to provide as much useful information as possible to our readers!

August Bitcoin Market Review

In August, Bitcoin was soft amid rising U.S. interest rates. Robust economic indicators and persistent inflation in the U.S. increased concerns about additional interest rate hikes before the end of the year. The BTC dropped sharply to the 3.7 million yen level when the last FOMC meeting summary revealed divergent opinions among participants and increased uncertainty about the interest rate outlook.

Also, reports that aerospace company SpaceX had sold some of its bitcoins led to speculative selling due to the company's association with Elon Musk, who is the CEO of SpaceX. The market then turned its attention to Fed Chairman Jerome Powell's speech at the Jackson Hole meeting, which was in line with market expectations and led to a buying back of bitcoin.

Meanwhile, it was reported that Grayscale, an asset management company, won a lawsuit against the SEC in the U.S., and the price recovered to the 4 million yen per BTC level due to expectations for a physical bitcoin ETF. However, on August 31, the SEC announced that it would delay its decision on the applications filed by several companies, including BlackRock, until October, and disappointing sell-offs pushed the price down again to the 3.7 million yen per BTC level.

In addition, a series of other concerns in August, such as the downgrading of U.S. banks and the real estate bubble in China, spread a risk-off mood throughout the financial markets. Hacking incidents at major DeFi projects such as Curve Finance and uncertainty over crypto asset regulations in the U.S. also weighed on the market, and the bitcoin price fell about 9% from the previous month.

While this is a larger decline than equities in a single month, it is still the largest since the beginning of the year with a performance of over 70%.

October Bitcoin Market Outlook

In October, we expect bitcoin to continue to be influenced by developments surrounding U.S. monetary policy. The FOMC meeting scheduled for the end of October will be a time to assess economic indicators and statements by officials, and depending on the content of these, if the prospect of a halt to interest rate hikes strengthens, risk-on buying may intensify.

Most investors expect one more rate hike this year, and even if the possibility of an additional rate hike emerges, the market's downward movement will be limited. As mentioned above, the U.S. SEC's review of bitcoin physical ETFs is also a factor to watch.

If the SEC postpones its decision again, the market will react negatively. On the other hand, if any of the applications, led by Grayscale and Blackrock, are approved, bitcoin buying will rapidly strengthen.

While there are still concerns about some bad news related to the lawsuit between the SEC and Binance, we expect the uncertainty of crypto asset regulation to gradually fade as the U.S. judiciary continues to rule positively on crypto assets. When these factors combine as favorable factors, there is a possibility that BTC will soar to the 5 million yen level.

Marin's Hot Stocks: Shibainu Coin

In “Marin's Hot Stocks,” we will introduce altcoins that have recently received major news or updates, focusing on the 30 stocks that are the subject of MCB Crypto Ratings provided by Monex Cryptobank.

Since this is the first installment, let's briefly discuss the MCB Crypto Ratings. This rating model evaluates 30 crypto assets relative to each other based on seven criteria, including liquidity, regulatory risk, concentration risk, and hacking risk. By selecting the key factors that investors should check when considering investing in crypto assets and assigning a score to each of them, we provide a clear indication of where each issue stands.

In this article, we will introduce one of the evaluated assets, Shibainu Coin (SHIB).

As the name suggests, Shibainu Coin is a crypto asset with the motif of a Shiba Inu (bush dog). Like Dogecoin (DOGE), which also has a dog motif, SHIB is now known as one of the most popular meme coins, having attracted a great deal of attention after being endorsed by Eron Musk.

As of the end of August 2023, its market capitalization is approximately 700 billion yen, and it is ranked 16th in CoinMarketCap's ranking.

Such Shibayagi coins have been the talk of the town since the release of the Ethereum-compatible Layer 2 network, Shibayagi. Meme coins are generally those without special utility, but the management plans to break away from that status with the development of Shibarium and develop Shibalium Coin into a full-fledged crypto asset project.

SHIB will be used as a fee for Shibarium, and it is expected that various decentralized applications will be created on Shibarium in the future, similar to Ethereum.

Cibarium got off to an uneasy start with a temporary outage in the network soon after its release to the public. However, it is possible that the SHIB ecosystem will expand in the future with the creation of numerous apps and tokens, maintaining its popularity as a meme coin, and that this will cause the price of SHIB to soar.

Profile

Masamichi Matsushima

Crypto Asset Analyst, Monex University, Monex, Inc.

Masamichi Matsushima graduated from Osaka University with a degree in Economics. After retiring from a city bank, he worked as a member of the research firm Baroque Street, where he was involved in industry research and market analysis of the crypto asset and blockchain industry. At Monex Cryptobank, he authored the industry research reports “Blockchain Trends in China (2020),” “Blockchain Application Cases and Issues in the Supply Chain Domain at Home and Abroad,” “Blockchain Data Book 2020,” and others. He has been a contributor to domestic media since March 2021.

Monex Cryptobank, Inc.

Monex Cryptobank, Inc. was established in December 2017 to provide research, study, planning, development, and consulting services related to crypto assets and blockchain services. It is a wholly owned subsidiary of Monex Group, Inc. listed on the First Section of the Tokyo Stock Exchange, and distributes newsletters, research and market outlook on crypto assets, Web 3.0 and blockchain, and operates services such as “Cheeese”, a two-currency app where you can earn bitcoins. [HP] https://cryptobk.jp/



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