PiCK

Dollar strength weighs on crypto… risk-off sentiment spreads as Iran conflict escalates

Source

Minseung Kang

Summary

It said that heightened military tensions surrounding Iran pushed up the U.S. dollar index (DXY), putting broad risk assets, including cryptocurrencies, under downward pressure.
It noted that bitcoin (BTC) slipped from $70,000 to around $66,500, continuing to fluctuate around the midpoint of its range, while Cardano (ADA), Zcash (ZEC) and Dash (DASH) fell more than 4% in a day.
It added that after the liquidation of excessive leverage, bitcoin futures open interest stabilized at around $15.3 billion, while meme-coin and DeFi indexes as well as NEAR, Jupiter (JUP) and Morpho (MORPHO) showed relative strength.

Forecast Trend Report by Period

As military tensions surrounding Iran flare up again, the dollar is strengthening and risk assets broadly—led by cryptocurrencies—are coming under downward pressure.

According to CoinDesk, a crypto-focused media outlet, as of 20:49 on the 3rd the U.S. dollar index (DXY) was up 0.5%, marking its highest level since Jan. 19. The move comes as Israel carried out additional strikes on Tehran and Beirut, and after the U.S. embassy in Riyadh was hit by an Iranian drone attack, reinforcing demand for safe-haven assets.

Gold climbed to $5,410 per ounce the previous day, but later retraced to around $5,260. Some analysts say the market is opting for the dollar rather than gold as the preferred haven.

Bitcoin (BTC) followed a similar path to gold this week. It rebounded to $70,000 the previous day but later slid to around $66,500, continuing to trade around the middle of the range it has been stuck in since last month. Altcoins fell more sharply than bitcoin. Cardano (ADA), Zcash (ZEC) and Dash (DASH) each dropped more than 4% over the day.

In derivatives markets, conditions appear to be stabilizing after the clearing out of excessive leverage. Bitcoin futures open interest has steadied at around $15.3 billion, while liquidations over the past 24 hours totaled about $392 million. The long-short split was broadly balanced.

Meanwhile, some themes showed relative strength. Meme-coin and DeFi-related indexes edged higher. NEAR rebounded more than 13% from oversold territory, while DeFi tokens Jupiter (JUP) and Morpho (MORPHO) also posted double-digit gains over the past week.