Bitcoin, Ether, others steady amid Russia-Ukraine crises

KATHMANDU: Crypto prices have shown some resistance despite the Russian-Ukraine war crisis and the US and EU nations trying hard to stop Russian President Vladimir Putin, by imposing harsh sanctions.

The world’s largest cryptocurrency Bitcoin was down just 0.63 per cent at $39,006.61, the latest data by the crypto exchange CoinDesk showed. This is the same level where it started the weekend. For once on Saturday, Bitcoin had touched the $40,000 mark.

The m-cap of Bitcoin stood at $746.40 billion, while the 24-hour trading volume was $600.87 million. The Bitcoin hash rate, however, seems to have been hit due to the Russia-Ukraine war. Bitcoin recorded 173.8 million terahashes per second on Saturday, a significant decline from 248.1 million terahashes on Feb. 12.

The m-cap of Bitcoin stood at $746.40 billion, while the 24-hour trading volume was $600.87 million. The Bitcoin hash rate, however, seems to have been hit due to the Russia-Ukraine war. Bitcoin recorded 173.8 million terahashes per second on Saturday, a significant decline from 248.1 million terahashes on Feb. 12.

The hash rate shows computer power used to mine and process transactions on the network.

The second biggest and blockchain-based software platform Ethereum was also down just 0.35 per cent at $2,777.77. The 24-hour high for Ethereum stands at $2,855.22, while it went down to $2,681.79 in the past 24 hours.

Top gainers and losers:

The top three most traded cryptos on CoinDesk were XRP (down 1.76 per cent) , Terra (up 1.95 per cent), and Solana (down 0.94 per cent). Top gainers as per the latest data were Keep Network (up 10.71 per cent at $0.711273), Uniswap (up 8.68 per cent at $10.01), and Filecoin (up 7.09 per cent at $20.73).

Top three loser cryptos included Aragon (down 6.18 per cent), Skale ($0.120666), and loTex ($0.075076).

Crypto donations to Ukraine:

Interestingly, Ukrainian officials are directly soliciting crypto donations, adding to crowdfunding efforts that have raised more than $5 million in Bitcoin, Ether and other tokens since Friday. Ukraine’s official Twitter handle, as well an account belonging to the country’s Vice Prime Minister Mykhailo Fedorov, shared details of the crypto wallets on Saturday. Victor Zhora, one of Ukraine’s top cyber defence officials, confirmed to Bloomberg that the tweets and the wallet addresses were accurate.

The addresses posted by these accounts have received hundreds of donations worth more than $3 million in less than 24 hours, according to transaction information available for the wallets and data from blockchain analytics firm Elliptic. The median donation was worth around $95, Elliptic co-founder Tom Robinson previously told Bloomberg News. Livement