Trading Moment: Market Rebound Driven by Expectations of a US-Iran Ceasefire; BTC and ETH Approaching Resistance Levels of 72,000 and 2,200 respectively.

Daily market data review and trend analysis, produced by PANews.

Macro Market

After the US stock market closed, the US proposed a one-month ceasefire plan with "15 conditions" and planned to deploy 3,000 soldiers from the 82nd Airborne Division to exert pressure. WTI crude oil briefly broke through $93 yesterday, but then plunged more than 6% to below $88 due to expectations of peace talks; Brent crude oil fell more than 6% during the day. Matt Maley of Miller Tabak pointed out that the real key lies in whether the Strait of Hormuz can be reopened to traffic, and verbal promises alone are not enough to stabilize the market.

Global risk assets breathed a sigh of relief after Trump hinted that the US and Iran "may be quite close to reaching a deal." US stock futures rebounded across the board, with S&P 500 futures up 0.7%, Nasdaq 100 futures up 0.8%, and Dow Jones futures up 0.7%. Asian stock markets surged even more, with the Nikkei 225 index jumping over 3% to 53,836.94 points and the South Korean KOSPI index rising over 3% to 5,722.99 points. The A-share market also rebounded after some volatility, with the Shanghai Composite Index rising over 1% to return above 3,900 points, and over 100 stocks hitting their daily limit for the second consecutive day.

The precious metals market saw a sharp V-shaped rebound, with spot gold rebounding 2% after a significant correction, and spot silver surging 3.88%. Meanwhile, stagflation concerns intensified, leading to a sell-off in the US Treasury market. The 5-year yield rose to a nine-month high of 4.10%, while the 2-year and 30-year yields rose by 6 and 2 basis points, respectively.

AI Dynamics

Tech giants underperformed on Tuesday amid macroeconomic pressures and intensified industry competition, with the Big Seven tech stocks collectively underperforming the 493 S&P 500 components, nearly erasing their year-to-date gains. News that Amazon AWS is developing AI tools to automate functions such as sales triggered panic in the software sector, causing the Software ETF (IGV) to plunge 4%, extending its year-to-date decline to 23% and hitting a new low since February.

In terms of individual stocks, Oracle has retreated more than 50% from its September high, Salesforce has plummeted more than 6.5%, ServiceNow has fallen nearly 6%, and Microsoft has dropped nearly 3%. Over the past six weeks, several tech giants, including Google, Meta, and IBM, have seen declines of more than 10%, exacerbating market concerns about the profitability and high valuations of the AI sector.

Bitcoin price

Bitcoin has shown resilience despite the impact of the macro-geopolitical situation, rebounding quickly after a brief dip and currently fluctuating around $71,000. Panic in the options market has eased, with short-to-medium-term implied volatility down more than 5% from its peak. Skew indicators have rebounded across the board, and a large number of put options established during the crisis have been liquidated. This Friday marks the quarterly options settlement, and $75,000 remains a significant resistance level. Regarding fund flows, stablecoin transfers surged to a record high of $440 billion over the weekend, with USDC reaching $368 billion and USDT reaching $72 billion, indicating that investors are inclined to convert to cash as a buffer. Meanwhile, Binance's monthly spot trading volume fell to $52 billion, a new low for the year. Most analysts currently believe that $72,000 to $74,000 is a key resistance zone; if the recent high cannot be recovered, it may fall back below $68,000, or even drop to $42,000.

Bearish view

The core logic of the bears lies in the risk of a technical breakdown and the predatory trading driven by high liquidity. They believe the current rebound is merely a continuation of the downtrend, and macroeconomic pressures could plunge prices into a deeper abyss at any time.

Rekt Capital points out that the 200-week exponential moving average (EMA) at $68,300 is neither a reliable support nor resistance level, and prices may eventually fall into a macro downtrend after hovering around this level.
Killa Analysis suggests that Bitcoin encountered resistance in the 71.4K area. If it fails to recover this previous high, the price is highly likely to fall back below 68K, and Monday's rise was merely a continuation of the previous low.
Crypto Seth believes that if the price reaches 85K, there will be a $10.5 billion short liquidation, and if it falls to 59K, there will be a $5.2 billion long liquidation, indicating extremely high market volatility risk.
Cryptocurrency guru Michael Terpin warns investors that the market has not yet bottomed out, predicting that the price of Bitcoin may fall to $42,000 or even lower, and that the mainstream media's bearish outlook is the best buy signal.

bullish view

The bulls firmly believe that the bottom has been found, and the continued inflow of institutional funds and the geopolitical safe-haven appeal will drive Bitcoin into a new supercycle.

Bernstein analyst Gautam Chhugani explicitly stated that "the bottom has been reached and the market is moving upwards," pointing out that net outflows from ETFs have reversed (spot ETF holdings have reached 6.1% of total supply, and micro-strategy holdings have reached 3.6%), and maintaining a target price of $150,000 by the end of 2026.
Michaël van de Poppe emphasized that since the crash in February, Bitcoin has been hitting new lows, and as long as key support holds, it could reach 77K to 80K.
LP points out that the low-leverage liquidation clusters in the 72K to 73K region are acting as a "magnet," with prices typically sweeping up this liquidity before any significant expansion.
Astronomer says the market is rising as planned, the internal correction is largely over, and the next target is the 71.9K to 72K area.
Castillo Trading still expects to see Bitcoin challenge $74,000.
sykodelic has decisively gone long at $69,900, believing that the price is continuing to make higher highs and lower lows, the OBV indicator remains strong, and the target is 72K to 74K.

Ethereum Dynamics

Ethereum stalled at the $2,200 resistance level. In the options market, ETH's short-to-medium-term implied volatility (IV) has dropped more than 8% from its peak and more than 5% from two days ago, indicating some easing of panic. The distribution of tokens shows a strong resistance level of 7.5 million ETH in the $2,750-$2,850 range, while there is dense support of 1.3 million ETH around $1,850.

Analyst Ted Pillows warned that $2,000 is currently the only key support level; a break below this level would accelerate the plunge, potentially sending the price straight to a new low of $1,400. Ali Charts noted that the SuperTrend indicator on Ethereum's daily chart has turned green for the first time since May of last year, indicating a shift in momentum towards the bulls. He believes the long period of sideways consolidation is ending, and as long as the $1,800 support holds, a new upward trend is about to begin, with a target of $3,080 after a break above $2,200.

Market Dynamics

Yesterday, a new draft of the US Clarity Act proposed a comprehensive ban on business models and interest-like structures that passively hold stablecoins to generate returns. This ban directly and severely impacted USDC's growth trajectory. Circle's stock price plummeted by approximately 25% in a single day, marking its largest drop in history, and dragged down Coinbase's stock price by over 8%.

Currently, there is a growing number of domestic and international KOLs discussing $TAO on social media. The token surged nearly 90% in March, reaching a high of over $344, its highest level since December of last year. Analyst Michaël van de Poppe stated that TAO's breakout clearly heralds the arrival of the era of "AI combined with cryptocurrency." He believes that TAO's next strong resistance level will be in the $450 to $500 range.

Key data (as of 13:00 HKT on March 25)

(Data source: CoinAnk, Upbit, SoSoValue, CryptoBubbles)

Bitcoin ETF: +$167 million, first net inflow after 3 days of net outflows.
Ethereum ETF: -$16.1842 million, marking the fourth consecutive day of net outflows.
XRP ETF: +$1,399,900
Fear of Greed Index: 14 (Extreme Fear)
Upbit 24-hour trading volume rankings: XRP, BTC, ONT, ETH, SUN
Sector Performance: The crypto market generally rose, with the AI sector surging over 10%, while only the RWA sector saw a slight decline.

24-hour liquidation data: A total of 65,308 people worldwide were liquidated, with a total liquidation amount of $2.189 billion, including $69.95 million in BTC liquidations, $34.46 million in ETH liquidations, and $5.16 million in SOL liquidations.

Today's Outlook

Coinbase will launch the Impossible Cloud Network spot trading pair ICNT-USD.
Coinbase adds Checkmate (CHECK) and Sign (SIGN) to its listing roadmap
Binance will delist APTUSD and OPUSD-margined perpetual contracts on March 25th.
Metaplanet will hold its shareholders' meeting on March 25.
Binance Futures will launch perpetual contracts for Meta, NVIDIA, and Alphabet stocks at the U-basis.
SOON: The soonBase L3 network will be shut down on March 26 to redirect resources to AI capital market development.
Humanity (H) will unlock approximately 105 million tokens, worth approximately $10.2 million, on March 25.

The top 100 cryptocurrencies by market capitalization with the largest gains today are: Siren up 97.5%, Bittensor up 11.6%, Stellar up 8%, ASI Alliance up 7.5%, and Quant up 7.4%.