Binance’s PoR Audit Results Are In. What’s the Verdict?
Bitcoin Price Manages to Stay Above Support. Are the Bitcoin Bulls Waking Up?
The downtrend is still in place, make no mistake about it, but the bears may soon enter their caves to hibernate for the winter. After all, they’ve had a long run… Looking at the chart, it’s obvious who’s in control from a long-term perspective but the good news for the bulls is that Bitcoin’s price is still trading above $17,000 support.
Price action is mostly going sideways, with small bursts of upside movement but at least it’s not going down. Indeed, there’s not a lot of bullish pressure or momentum but something worth noting is happening around $18,000:
Back in June 2022, BTC dropped to $18K, a price that was last touched in 2020. Since then, Bitcoin climbed a little, went back to $18K, and moved mostly sideways, establishing this level as long-term support.
In early November, when the FTX exchange crashed, this key support was broken. The “normal” behavior, after the break of an important level and after a period of sideways movement, is a strong move in the direction of the break. This time, the support was broken but the price stopped, which is a rather strong indication that the bears are running out of steam.
The bulls are not strong but neither are the bears. The candles are small, sideways, and with just brief moments (daily candles) of upside movement. The fact that the pair is not going lower, shows that the bears are weak as well. What’s next? Maybe Crypto Spring… time will tell.
And speaking of Crypto Spring, it looks like it’s coming early for Binance. The South African branch of international audit firm Mazars just completed the first Proof of Reserves audit on Binance’s funds. The audit revealed that Binance has enough funds to honor customer withdrawals.
Moreover, the audit firm provided a way for Binance customers to enter the Merkle Root Hash on Mazars’ website to verify that their assets actually exist on Binance. According to Investopedia “A Merkle root is the hash of all the hashes of all the transactions that are part of a block in a blockchain network.”
Technical Outlook – BTC/USD
Bitcoin is currently changing hands at $17,220 and has been trading sideways for more than a week. This type of price action usually means that anything can happen in the short term. In the longer term, things are looking up for risk assets and this includes cryptocurrencies.
The last closed daily candle is bullish and looks pretty strong (long body, small wicks), which suggests that the pair is likely headed toward the 50-day Moving Average and the resistance at $18,000 – $18,250.
A break above $18,250 would open the door for an extended climb but a move below the current level ($17,000) would invalidate such a scenario and would make $15,600 the next target.
