Bitcoin Surges Past $89K as Crypto Market Rebounds

Bitcoin (BTC) approached $89,000 in Asian morning hours on Wednesday, following a 24-hour low of $86,200. This slight improvement in market sentiment was reflected in major tokens, which showed signs of recovery. XRP and BNB Chain's BNB led the gradual rebound, as traders continued to grapple with Tuesday's market carnage, which saw overall capitalization drop by as much as 10% and at least $1.2 billion in losses on bullish bets.

XRP rose by 3%, while BNB and Solana's SOL added 5%. Dogecoin (DOGE) and Cardano's ADA showed a slight 1.2% gain, while Tron's TRX was down 5% in the past 24 hours. The broad-based CoinDesk 20 (CD20) was down 2%. This move higher was in line with a CoinDesk analysis on Tuesday, which indicated that assets were likely oversold and could see relief in the short term, given a five-month low in a sentiment index and a large-scale liquidation event.

Gold fell 1.3% on Tuesday after a profit-taking bout following a record rally where it touched a new high Monday, but rose higher in Asian morning hours Wednesday. Reasons for Tuesday's panic ranged from money flowing out of bitcoin ETFs, with over $1 billion pulled out in the last two weeks, to a stronger yen, a perceived safe-haven currency whose growth tends to pull down riskier bets.

Expectations for easier U.S. Federal Monetary policy have surged, with prediction markets putting chances of a May rate cut to 30% over the past week, and the chances of two rate cuts by June have more than tripled to 15%. These hopes come after a gauge of U.S. consumer confidence marked its deepest fall since August 2021, decreasing 7 points in February to 98.3 in its third straight decline. U.S economic data and policies tend to impact prices of risk assets such as bitcoin, as crypto traders bet on expectations of retail participation as idle cash frees up.

Hopes of an altcoin rally remain muted among traders, with fresh dollar inflows expected to flow exclusively to BTC. BTC finally broke out of its range, dipping below