Global economic tensions prevented Bitcoin from reclaiming the $85K support, pushing the bellwether cryptocurrency to a multi-month low this week.
Over the past seven days, around $1 trillion in liquidity exited the market, with the total crypto market cap dropping from $3.04 trillion to $2.04 trillion.
Market sentiment has been steadily declining since US President Donald Trump sparked concerns of a global trade war by announcing new tariffs last month.
As of Friday, the Crypto Fear and Greed Index stood at 27, down seven points from the previous week.
Altcoin markets took the biggest hit, erasing nearly all gains from the post-election rally. Leading projects, especially meme coins, were down double-digits.
Why Bitcoin price is not going up?
After listing the $90k support level at the start of the week, Bitcoin remained confined within a narrow trading range under the $85,000 mark.
A number of bearish forces were at play that influenced the market direction.
First, Trump’s trade war tensions intensified, with the former president admitting, “There could be a little disruption,” as a side effect of his economic policies, including tariffs on China, Canada, and Mexico.
The trade standoff with China escalated further as Beijing retaliated with tariffs on US agricultural goods, which took effect on Monday.
This heightened fears of a prolonged trade conflict, triggering massive capital flight from risk assets like Bitcoin to more stable options such as gold.
Trump’s remarks amplified concerns about a prolonged trade war with China and led to massive capital flgiht from risk assets such as Bitcoin and most cryptocurrencies in general.
On top of this, on Friday, he threatened a 200% tariff on European wine, cognac, and other alcohol imports.
Second, the crypto market reacted negatively to Trump’s Bitcoin strategic reserve, which fell short of expectations after direct purchases were excluded from the initiative.
Third, recent comments from the Federal Reserve added to the uncertainty.
While inflation data showed signs of cooling, the Fed remained cautious, warning that tariffs and strong consumer spending could keep inflation elevated.
With the current macroeconomic headwinds, short-term Bitcoin holders have been aggressively selling, locking in losses as panic spreads.
CryptoQuant data shows that entities holding BTC for one to three months have offloaded over $100 million in the past six weeks.
On top of that, outflows from spot Bitcoin ETFs have added to the selling pressure
In line with this, some estimates across social media platform X suggested that BTC could dive lower over the short term before recovering.
Will Bitcoin price go up?
Some market developments could support a Bitcoin recovery.
China is reportedly considering expanding its economic stimulus measures, a move that has historically boosted risk assets like Bitcoin.
Meanwhile, a recent report citing Bo Hines, executive director of the Presidential Working Group on Digital Assets, revealed that during a closed-door roundtable hosted by the Bitcoin Policy Institute, he stated that the White House plans to accumulate as much Bitcoin as possible.
Any related developments on these fronts could act as a bullish catalyst for Bitcoin.
From a technical perspective, well-known analyst Rekt Capital noted in a March 14 X post that Bitcoin is showing “early-stage signs of a Bullish Divergence”—a potential indicator of a rebound.
Reclaiming the $84K level could further build on this bullish setup, the analyst added.
When writing, Bitcoin was trading a little over that mark at $84,412 but was down 6.8% over the past week.
Meanwhile, fellow analyst Ali pointed out that Bitcoin is consolidating within an ascending triangle—an upside break from which is often the precursor to a potential breakout.
If BTC successfully breaks above the resistance, Ali suggests this could trigger a 9% price move, setting up the next leg higher.
Despite the current uncertainty, long-term projections for Bitcoin have remained strong.
The most recent prediction came from billionaire venture capitalist Trim Draper.
In a recent podcast appearance, he said his end-of-year price target or BTC was $250,000 as the dollar continues to weaken.
Altcoin market recedes
The total altcoin market dropped 7.63% to over $1.09 trillion during the late Asian trading hours on Friday.
The altcoin season index stayed consistent with last week, at 16.
The top performers for this week all posted modest gains:
Story
Story (IP) rose 20.7% over the last 7 days, hitting a weekly high of $6.53 on March 12 before settling at $5.87 as of press time.
Its market cap stood at $1.46 billion, while its daily trading volume was hovering at $106.9 million.
Source: CoinMarketCap
Most of these gains came from the hype surrounding the listing of IP on the crypto exchange Kraken.
The altcoin also gained traction after launching the IP Portal, which is now open for public preview and enables users to easily register and browse IP across apps on Story.
Additionally, Story Protocol has integrated with the decentralized exchange Orderly to improve liquidity for tokenized intellectual property, making it easier for developers to trade and monetize assets like AI training data, patents, brands, and digital content in decentralized apps.
Celestia
Over the past week, Celestia (TIA) jumped 12.2%, trading at $3.61, with a market cap crossing $2 billion.
Its daily trading volume hit $92.52 million, and the circulating supply reached 1.1 billion TIA tokens.
Source: CoinMarketCap
This week’s gains seem to be mostly driven by the Celestia and Citrea partnership, which makes it easier to deploy Bitcoin appchains with scalable, low-cost data availability while tapping into Bitcoin’s liquidity and security.
It allows developers to build more efficient and affordable applications on Bitcoin, sparking excitement among investors.
As a result, TIA holders are expecting increased adoption and utility within the Bitcoin ecosystem, reflected in its surge this week.
Kava
Kava (KAVA) managed to hold 9.25% gains over the past week, exchanging hands at $0.477, while its market cap stood at nearly $517 million.
Notably, the price rally came along with a jump in daily trading volume from $10 million to over $42 million as of press time, a sign of increased interest from its investors.
Source: CoinMarketCap
The altcoin’s rally took off after the community proposed an upgrade to Kava Lend that would add AI-powered chat features through OROS, Kava AI’s agent, to make it easier for users to check balances, trade, and manage loans.
Running on Kava’s blockchain, the upgrade strengthens community involvement and adds more utility to the HARD ecosystem.
HARD holders will have a say in fees and rewards, keeping things community-driven.
Through the proposal, the project aims to make Kava Lend more user-friendly, boost activity, and expand across chains in the future.
The post Bitcoin’s comeback? Two major catalysts fuel optimism as Story Protocol rallies 20% appeared first on Invezz
