Investing.com-- Bitcoin’s price rose slightly on Tuesday ahead of the upcoming Federal Reserve meeting where the central bank is widely expected to cut interest rates.
Crypto prices were little enthused by the release of more details on an upcoming project by Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump, which appears to be a banking or exchange platform.
Bitcoin climbed 1.4% to $59,399.0 by 08:44 ET (12:44 GMT). The token remained squarely within a $50,000 to $60,000 trading range seen through most of the year.
Trump unveils more details on crypto project
The team behind World Liberty Financial- an upcoming crypto project backed by the Trump family- unveiled some key details on the project during a launch event on X on Monday evening.
The project appears to be a crypto banking and exchange platform, and will have its own native token- WLFI- which will be distributed among the founding team and released for sale to the general public. About 20% of the tokens will be reserved for the founders, 17% will be reserved for rewards, and 63% of the float will be released to the public.
Trump spoke briefly during the event, which was hosted on X. He reiterated plans to make America the “crypto capital” of the world, but gave scant details on said plans.
Trump has campaigned on a largely pro-crypto stance for the 2024 presidential election race. But he was seen lagging Democratic candidate Kamala Harris after a fiery debate last week.
Harris has so far given few details on her plans for crypto, but is expected to continue the Biden administration’s crackdown against the sector.
Crypto price today: Altcoins muted with Fed in focus
Broader cryptocurrency prices also moved in a tight range, with focus turning squarely to a Fed meeting this week.
World no.2 crypto Ether rose 0.5% to $2,314.69, while XRP added 2%. ADA and SOL traded flat, while MATIC added 1.9%
Among meme tokens, DOGE fell 0.5%.
The Fed is widely expected to cut interest rates and signal an easing cycle when it concludes a two-day meeting on Wednesday. Traders were seen pricing in a greater chance that the Fed will cut rates by 50 basis points, up from prior expectations for a 25 bps cut.
Lower rates bode well for crypto, given that they free up liquidity that can be deployed into speculative assets. But the sector saw little price action in anticipation of Wednesday’s decision.
Bitcoin mining profitability drops to 50% below pre-halving levels
Hashprice, a measure of a Bitcoin miner’s daily profitability, has dropped 2% this month and remains more than 50% below pre-halving levels, JPMorgan revealed in a recent report. The bank warned that this decline, "coupled with seasonal curtailment, could slow near-term hashrate growth."
"U.S.-listed miners' share of the network hashrate increased for the fifth consecutive month to 26.7%, the highest level on record," JPMorgan analysts also highlighted.
Bitcoin mining stocks declined in the first half of September as Bitcoin's price stayed below $60,000, while the network’s hashrate climbed, according to a report from JPMorgan on Monday. The hashrate has risen 4% month-to-date and has now returned to pre-halving levels. The hashrate is a measure of the total computational power used in mining and processing transactions on proof-of-work blockchains and serves as an indicator of competition in the mining industry.
JPMorgan tracks the market cap of 14 U.S.-listed bitcoin miners, which collectively fell 3% since the end of August to just under $20 billion. Among these miners, Hut 8 Corp (TSX:HUT) outperformed with an 11% gain, while CleanSpark Inc (NASDAQ:CLSK) lagged behind, declining 12%.
Ambar Warrick contributed to this report.