Bitcoin Today: Tether could be a problem

2 Jul 2018

Price
Like was expected, closure of the June Futures brought movement to the market and pulled the price above the Bearish Trend Line, which was a strong resistance to the price recently. BTCUSD reached 6300.0 level, which was crucial for breaking the downward pattern, but did not go upper and has been trading in an indecisive pattern slightly above it during the weekend. To confirm the further development of the upward movement, we will need to see more volumes above the 6300, which will prove that traders are ready to buy on this price; next resistance on the way up will be 6500 – 6650 zone. Negative scenario is a further movement in the narrow lateral pattern, which will demonstrate low demand on current price and eventually bring BTC down again; 6000.0 level will play a supportive role I such scenario.

Today forecast
Trading in the 6300.0 – 6500.0 zone.

Latest news

• Red Flag Waved in Tether’s Relationship with Kraken Exchange
  Bloomberg recently suggested tether trading red flags. Enlisting former Fed regulator Mark Williams and NYU’s Rosa Abrantes-Metz, Mr. Leising and his collaborators examined USDT activity on Kraken, finding “oddly specific order sizes—many going out to five decimal points, with some repeating frequently.” Trading bots, if that is what this is, are rather par for the course these days, and hardly controversial. It’s USDT’s lack of responsiveness that has this group searching for explanation. Bitcoin core (BTC), again assuming tether inflation as the cause, jerks and pulls seemingly according to tether dumps, which most would term “normal.” Tether lingers, unresponsive.
  The theory goes that with increased demand, an asset’s price should correspondingly increase. One trade, of 75 tether, for example, managed to move the price three naughts and a one after a decimal point, basically nothing. And USDT price should’ve gone up at various other stages, along with pumping the gas with still more tether to bring it to settle. That didn’t happen either. Again, what should be a natural search for equalization through supply is instead, seemingly, being controlled by bots.
  Some immediately believe this to be textbook manipulation, but more substantive information is needed before making such an accusation. Still, researchers maintain these kinds of irregularities “would be akin to defying gravity.” The manipulation question first came from a renowned poker player, Andrew Rennhack. He scrubbed data from Kraken and published his musings. He was one of the first to openly suggest something was amiss.
  Later, researchers noticed those oddly specific numbers, such as the 13,076.389 tether, lead them to “suspect that such numbers could be signals to cheaters’ automated trading programs. One possible explanation: The software would look for orders with a unique size, and trade against that.” Taking both sides of a coin gives off the impression of a kind of momentum, and government regulators have seen fit to make doing so illegal. No evidence that Kraken itself is involved in any manipulation has emerged. Kraken CEO Jesse Powell responded, “Nothing looks out of place to us in our publicly available data feed. We have not verified the legitimacy of the data set [researchers] asked us to review.”
  
  
• Philippines’ Economic Zone Creating Crypto Regulations, Licensing 25 Exchanges
  The authority of the Filipino government-owned economic zone is drafting regulations for cryptocurrencies and planning to limit the number of licenses it issues to 25. Other rules include the requirement for each crypto exchange to invest at least US$1 million within 2 years. The authority has reportedly received about 60 applications from crypto companies so far.
  “There are many operating scammers who set up an exchange with very little capital and they are victimizing investors…We do not want the Philippines to be a haven for scammers even if these scams are happening abroad. That’s why thro