By Samuel Indyk & David Pichodo
Investing.com – The price of Bitcoin was around $46,000 on Monday morning as the world’s largest cryptocurrency struggled for upside momentum amid a broad risk-off tone. Stock markets in Europe and US stock futures were trading lower as the spread of the Omicron variant threatens the recovery with some European countries announcing new lockdown measures and further restrictions set to continue.
Most of the other major cryptocurrencies were also trading lower with Decentralised Finance (DeFi) coins such as Ethereum, Cardano, and Solana down between 3.5% and 7.0% in the last 24 hours.
Only two of the top 10 cryptocurrencies by market cap were trading higher, XRP and Terra.
Terra is now the ninth-largest cryptocurrency after a 30% surge in the latest week.
Bitcoin technical analysis
Bitcoin dropped below its 200-day moving average around $47,100 towards the end of last week.
On the daily chart, the 50-day moving average ($56,200) is now approaching the 100-day moving average ($54,500). When a shorter term moving average drops below a longer term moving average it is known as a ‘death cross’ and technical analysts often use this as a bearish signal.
On the downside, the 4th December low near $42,000 and the psychological $40,000 level could be the next support levels to watch out for.
On the upside, a return above the 200-day moving average would be seen as a positive signal but only return above $50,000 would significantly improve Bitcoin’s chart profile on a daily basis.