News Updates July 29, 2022

1. Bitcoin bull run ‘getting interesting’ as BTC price hits 6-week high

Bitcoin price performance is taking in increasingly higher resistance levels as July gains could top 20%.

Bitcoin (BTC) delivered a swift six-week high into July 29 as the aftermath of the latest macro developments boosted risk assets.

 *Monthly close could seal 20% gains*

Data from Cointelegraph Markets Pro and TradingView captured local highs of $24,445 for BTC/USD on Bitstamp, its best since the week beginning June 13.

After consolidating around $23,000, bulls got a second wind to propel the market higher on the back of the United States Federal Reserve’s latest rake hikes and GDP data confirming that the U.S. was now in a recession.

Risk assets outperformed across the board, with Bitcoin and altcoins joining gold in giving traders and analysts cause for positivity on the outlook.

2. Summer Relief Rally’ Drives Bitcoin to Over 24,300 for First Time in Over 6 Weeks

On Friday (July 29), Bitcoin and Ethereum hit $24,339 and $1,747 respectively as what some call the “summer relief rally” managed to drive the crypto market higher (with the total crypto market cap now back above $1 trillion).

According to data by TradingView, on crypto exchange Bitstamp, at 6:41 a.m. UTC on July 29, the Bitcoin price hit $24,339, which is (so far) today’s intraday high and the first time that the $BTC price has been this high since June 13. Currently (as of 8:10 a.m. UTC on July 29), Bitcoin is trading around $23,831, 4.13% in the past 24-hour period.

As for Ethereum, the $ETH price hit $1,747 at 6:36 a.m. UTC on July 29. Currently (as of 8:12 a.m. UTC on July 29), Etheruem is trading around $1,699, up 5.2% in the past 24-hour period.

3. French Lawmaker Calls for Crypto Committee as Legal Questions Loom

A new Senate grouping is needed to educate lawmakers about the risk of crime using virtual assets, the Centrist Union’s Nathalie Goulet told CoinDesk.

The French Senate should set up a new committee to probe crypto assets, lawmaker Nathalie Goulet told CoinDesk Thursday, citing the risk of opaque markets being linked to crime and financial instability.
Senators don’t have the technological know-how to confront topics like the Markets in Crypto Assets (MiCA) legislation recently agreed upon by the European Union – or on the related topic of how to tax the sector, Goulet said.

“I’m not sure that today there are 10 senators who are capable of understanding” crypto policy issues, said Goulet, who sits on the Centrist Union political grouping, which is the Senate’s third-largest.

 *France's Presidential Candidates Ignore Crypto Issues*

The text of the motion formally requesting a new committee, published Friday, is heavy on the negatives of the technology. The document says blockchain may support crime because it “permits anonymity and favors opaque trading,” and compares the market to the subprime mortgages that caused the 2008 financial crisis.
Goulet’s concerns arise from her own background in countering terrorist financing – a topic on which she recently penned a book – as well as warnings given by European Central Bank President Christine Lagarde

But despite her skepticism, Goulet told CoinDesk that she is keeping an open mind about innovations with which she and many of her colleagues are largely unfamiliar.
“If it presents a risk to the economy, one must say so,” she said. “If it has an added value to the economy, one must say so, too. But in any case, we can’t stay in the dark on a subject like this.

Politicians in France are showing rising interest in the crypto world. The country recently awarded regulatory recognition to Binance as part of the country’s wider strategy to set the country up as a crypto hub.
In June, Pierre Person, at the time a lawmaker in France’s National Assembly, penned a report that called for legal recognition of the decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs) that underpin innovative finance, alongside a ban on mining that uses fossil fuel power.
Setting up the proposed new committee – which would take evidence from the crypto and banking industry at a series of hearings – is not yet a done deal, and in any case wouldn’t happen until recess is over in October.

In the meantime, Goulet said she will try to persuade her colleagues to take an interest, even though they’re currently focused on more pressing issues like rising consumer prices.
Otherwise, she said, “the legislator will have to make decisions on subjects that it hasn’t mastered. It’s not at all reasonable.”