PDAXScope: Bitcoin's ATH aftermath

(March 15) Check out other fresh news in the crypto world in today’s issue of the PDAXScope. 📰

Crypto News:

Bitcoin drops to $60K as crypto bulls see $650M in liquidations

Crypto market capitalization dropped 7%, its sharpest fall this year, as Bitcoin (BTC) plunged 8% in the past 24 hours to wipe weekly gains and kickstart a marketwide decline. Bitcoin slumped from Thursday’s high of $73,000 to as low as $65,800 early Friday before slightly recovering. Ether (ETH), Cardano’s ADA, BNB Chain’s BNB and XRP showed similar losses, while volatile meme coins dogecoin (DOGE) and shiba inu (SHIB) fell 13%. Solana’s SOL tokens were the only major token in green, up 1% since Thursday. Data shows that crypto-tracked futures suffered over $800 million losses, the second-largest figure this year. Longs, or bets on higher prices, suffered $660 million in liquidations, likely contributing to the sharp downturn.

Cosmos-based Canto Blockchain reverses course on Polygon Layer-2 plans, unveils new roadmap

Cosmos-based Layer-1 blockchain Canto unveiled its "Cyclone Stack," aimed at scaling and improving performance. It is also reversing course on its previously announced plan to shift to an Ethereum Layer-2 network. Canto, a blockchain designed for decentralized finance (DeFi) applications, announced in September that it would become an Ethereum Layer-2 network using Polygon’s Chain Development Kit. The team clarified on Friday, however, that it will continue to function as a Cosmos-based layer-1 network. It will run Polygon's type-1 prover, plugging into their aggregation layer designed to unify blockchain liquidity.

Global News:

A year on from Credit Suisse's rescue, banks remain vulnerable

A year after the banking crisis that felled Credit Suisse, authorities are still considering how to fix lenders' vulnerabilities - including in Switzerland, where the bank's takeover by rival UBS created a behemoth. A top global financial watchdog recently warned Switzerland must strengthen its banking controls, highlighting the risk that a failure of UBS - now one of the world's biggest banks - would pose to the financial system. One of the key weaknesses that emerged last year was that banks’ liquidity requirements proved insufficient. Credit Suisse saw billions of deposits exiting in a matter of days, burning through what had appeared to be comfortable buffers of cash.

Peak rates boost U.S. demand for riskier form of corporate debt

The U.S. market for one of the riskiest types of corporate debt is resurging this year, as companies cater to investor demand for assets that can lock in high yields for several years ahead of an expected decline in interest rates. Holders of these bonds, called junior subordinated debt, are among the last to be paid in case of a default and companies can defer interest payments. The reward for such high risk is yields that exceed those of senior bonds, for maturities of up to 40 years, though issuers typically call, or redeem, the bonds in five or 10 years. Like stocks, these hybrid bonds rank low in a company's capital structure, but they resemble bonds with interest payments. With the Federal Reserve widely expected to start cutting rates later this year, investors are scrambling to get their hands on securities that will pay the current levels of high interest for years to come.

Local News:

Remittances up by 2.7% in January

Cash remittances from overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) rose by 2.7% year on year in January, the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) said. Data from the BSP showed cash remittances coursed through banks increased by 2.7% to $2.836 billion in January from $2.762 billion in the same month last year. Land-based workers sent home $2.253 billion in January, up by 3.1% from $2.186 billion in the same month last year. Remittances from sea-based OFWs grew by 1.1% to $582 million in January from $575.7 million a year earlier. The BSP said that inflows from the United States, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), and Singapore mainly contributed to the growth in remittances during the month.

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