Mark Yusko, founder and CEO of Morgan Creek Capital Management, told Cointelegraph that the next cryptocurrency bull market will start earlier than most people think. The start of the second quarter is due to more dovish central bank policies and expectations for the Bitcoin halving.

Yusko said that although the Fed is unlikely to cut interest rates soon, the market tends to anticipate the Fed’s decision, which means that even a slowdown or pause in rate hikes will be interpreted as an upcoming turning signal, which will stimulate interest rates, including those of cryptocurrencies. All risk assets in the index triggered positive moves.

U.S. institutions may have been supporting Bitcoin’s rally in January, when the cryptocurrency rose more than 38%. The start of the year tends to be positive for token prices, crypto services provider Matrixport said in a Wednesday research note.

In five of the six years bitcoin has rallied in January, the cryptocurrency ended the year with a positive return. On average, the remainder of the year is up more than 245%, wrote research director Markus Thielen.

The report said Bitcoin had its only down year after a strong January in 2014, when the price had just reached the peak of the bull market. According to Matrixport, the driver of the 2023 bull run could be the expected March 2024 Bitcoin halving cycle, when the number of cryptocurrencies entering the system drops by 50% every 10 minutes.

As a result, the statistical probability that Bitcoin’s price could double between now and the end of the year is high, the report said. This means that bitcoin prices could reach $45,000 by Christmas, the report added.

NFT and gaming company Limit Break, backed by FTX in a funding round last year, shelled out $6.5 million for a 30-second ad that will air during this year’s Super Bowl.

According to reports, this is the first time an NFT developer has bought an ad during the Super Bowl, one of the most watched events on television, attracting an estimated 100 million viewers each year.

Limit Break will use the ad to promote free NFTs related to the web3 gaming ecosystem it has been developing, and the company says that Limit Break’s Super Bowl NFT minting campaign aims to bring new users into its “cryptocurrency community.”

Ray Dalio, founder of Bridgewater Fund, the world’s largest hedge fund company, said in an exclusive interview with CNBC that Bitcoin will not be an effective currency, nor will it be an effective store of wealth, let alone an effective medium of exchange. Crypto markets are too volatile and almost independent of any economic situation.

But for the world we live in, we all know that traditional currencies are in crisis. Additionally, Ray Dalio in this interview brings up an idea he thinks about the viability of cryptocurrencies, namely some kind of inflation-linked coin.

Ray Dalio said that everyone wants to maintain the purchasing power of their assets, if you create a coin that says this is the purchasing power that I know I can deposit and invest my money for a period of time, then I can Trade it anywhere, I think that would be a good coin, similar to an inflation indexed bond.

Andrew Glantz, Xclaim’s chief strategy officer, said three claims transactions have been confirmed following Genesis’ bankruptcy filing, with an average value of more than $1 million, between 25% and 35% of face value.

A $4 million claim was sold to Jefferies Leveraged Credit Products LLC, according to a filing Tuesday.

It is reported that Xclaim is a platform that focuses on providing trading encrypted claims. In previous news, on January 20, Genesis and its lending subsidiary filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy.

According to the data analyzed by The Block, Bitcoin and Ethereum options and futures trading indicators generally rose in January. The open interest of Bitcoin options increased by 116.5%, and the open interest of Ethereum options increased by 71.7%.

Bitcoin options volume rose 107.8% in January to $16 billion. Ethereum options volume rose 54.5 percent to $8.5 billion in January.

In terms of bitcoin and ethereum futures, open interest in bitcoin futures rose 21.3%, while open interest in ethereum futures rose 15.9%.

In terms of futures trading volume, Bitcoin and Ethereum futures trading volume also rose, with Bitcoin futures trading volume increasing by 73% to $656 billion in January.

The NFT project Cool Cats announced on social media the launch of a scoring and reward system called “Cool Score”, which aims to reward loyal and active members of the Cool Cats community. The Cool Score scoring and rewards system adds gamification mechanisms that will control access to future collectible drops, IRL events, VIP benefit opportunities, and other products.

Cool Cats said that the scoring reference criteria include: the duration of holding Cool Cats NFT, whether the cool pet has fully evolved, the types of items hoarded in Cooltopia, community participation, etc. Currently, Cool Cats holders can connect their wallets to the website to access And check your Cool Score score.

According to NFTGo.io data, the current Cool Cats NFT floor price has risen to 2.24 ETH, an increase of 12% in the past 24 hours.

Global financial advisory and asset management firm Devere Group released the results of its cryptocurrency survey on Monday. Devere found that 82 percent of millionaire clients with $1 million to $5 million in investable assets had sought advice on investing in cryptocurrencies.

Without providing further details, the asset manager wrote: “While the market has had a difficult year in 2022, over the past 12 months, eight out of 10 high-net-worth (HNW) individuals have invested in their of financial advisors ask about adding cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin to their investment portfolios.

Data from the blockchain data aggregation platform Dune Analytics shows that the trading volume of the NFT market OpenSea on the Polygon blockchain surpassed that of Ethereum for the second consecutive month. In December, the OpenSea market sold 1.3 million NFTs on the Polygon blockchain, 1 1.5 million NFTs per month. This compares to 0.995 million NFTs and 1.1 million NFTs sold on the Ethereum chain.

In addition, data shows that the TrumpDigital Trading Cards launched by Trump is OpenSea’s NFT project with the highest sales volume on the Polygon blockchain. The project sold 5,517 NFTs in January, for a transaction volume of 1,760 ETH (approximately $9.2 million).

Despite the recent strength in cryptocurrencies, 72% of traders said they have no plans to trade cryptocurrencies or digital assets in 2023, according to a JPMorgan survey. In 2022, only 25% of traders expressed such thoughts.

The survey was conducted in January after a dismal 2022 for cryptocurrencies, with bitcoin plunging nearly 70% last year. Only 8% of traders said they are currently trading cryptocurrencies, and 14% said they planned to do so within five years, the survey showed.

Meanwhile, 6% of respondents said they have no current plans to trade cryptocurrencies, but plan to buy or sell within 12 months. Entering 2023, although Bitcoin has soared by 39%, this does not seem to be able to attract more bets from Wall Street investors, especially considering that the Fed’s interest rate hike process has not yet ended.