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Jordan Belfort has once said: 'I know many Wall Street fraudsters, but in comparison to the crypto market, they are like kids in the kindergarten'. The recent Bitcoin dump provides evidence about how the cryptocurrencies markets are rigged. Let's take a closer look.
December 3rd, 13:00 UTC. After a dead cat bounce, Bitcoin starts falling. It goes from a $57,600 high down to $53,500 (about -$4,000), within 7 hours. Up to that point we have normal trading activity, with volume ranging from 150 to 650 BTC per 5' of trading - with bursts of around 1,500 BTC when round price points are broken.
At 20:10 UTC the first test dump takes place, from $53,500 to $51,700 within 10', with 1,000 BTC for the first 5', and another 2,850 BTC for the second 5' period. Although dumping continued for another 10', with another 3,000 BTC traded in the first 5' period and another 1,500 in the second 5' period, it was evident that the market would react, by taking the price back to more or less where the pumping started. At 20:45 there was even a correction from $52,700 up to $54,000, with trading activity going back to normal. Bitcoin price was still declining but at a more normal pace, returning back to $52,700.
At 4:50 UTC in the morning, everyone in Europe is asleep. In the US, it's almost midnight in the East coast. Thank God, it's Friday! Traders have called it a day. And then, BOOM! Almost 1,900 BTC go to sale in 5 minutes. Then another 4,000 in the next 5 minutes, dragging the prices below the $50,000 mark. Another 3,300 BTC in the next 5 minute period, and another 3,000 BTC in the next. At 5:10 UTC, prices seem to start stabilizing around $49,000-49,500, and volume drops to 1,300 BTC. Lows from 4:50 until 5:20 UTC were down to $47,500, but the market has recovered quite some of its losses.
That's when the second wave started. At 5:20 UTC, another 3,800 BTC went on sale, dragging the price to a fresh low of $46,580. Some of them were forced liquidations, that continued in the next 5 minutes, dragging prices even lower at $42,000, with almost 5,400 BTC going on sale. By 6:00 UTC, the job was done, and Bitcoin was trading at around $47,000-47,750 - that's around $10,000 lower than the previous day.
To get the mass of this volume, while at normal trading hours at that time of day, you see some 1,000-2,000 BTCs traded per hour, on December 4th, between 5:00 and 6:00 UTC in the morning, the volume reached 31,600 BTCs (15-30 times the normal trading activity). Last Saturday morning, between 5:00 and 6:00, the volume was barely 850 BTCs.
A short position opened right after the test dump, at $54,000 for a full Bitcoin, with 10x leverage (actual value at $5,400), would have earned by 6:00 UTC some $7,000 or 130% within just a few hours. To get the mass of such a return, if you bought BTC at $47,000 you will get 130% return, when BTC hits $108,100 - and that's not going to happen within the next few hours, days, weeks, or even months.
Those who own the game, own your money! Wake up!
