The continuous price fluctuations in the crypto market considerably impact the Circle’s stablecoin, USD Coin (USDC). The recent performance of its whales’ addresses is making a more southern move. USD Coin has seen its primary wallet addresses drop by almost two years.
Data from GlassnodeUSD Coin metrics by, a crypto analytics firm, have been getting less and less impressive. Recent sell-offs of stablecoins have led to a reduction in its market value.
A report on the second-largest stablecoin by market cap revealed that the US Treasury Department’s sanction on Tornado Cash is a contributory factor against USDC’s performance. This sanction not only created an opening for USDC’s capital drop, but also had an impact on Tether, the top competitor.
Circle, the parent developer of USD Coin, was authorized to freeze 75,000 USDC tokens following the approval of Tornado cash. Some addresses were connected to Tornado Cash held the coins.
This action brought a reduction in USDC’s market cap. Tether, however, saw a complete opposite result. The USDT market saw a $2 million increase in USDT just a few days following the US Treasury sanction.
A lot of industry commentators are trying to compare the rise and fall in USDT market caps and USDC. Many believe investors made the switch from USDC towards USDT. Data from the on-chain analytics provider indicated that there was a significant sell-off in the last two weeks.
Also, Glassnode data confirmed that the USDC’s seven-day moving average of exchange deposits reached a 17-month low of 138250. This compares to a comparable value of 138.810 in March 2021.
📉 $USDCThe number of exchange deposits (7d MA), has fallen to a low of 138.250 in 17 months.
On 23 March 2021, a 17-month previous low of 138.810 had been observed
View metric:https://t.co/yhG6sKrvi6 pic.twitter.com/tB9ZoQVs7j
— glassnode alerts (@glassnodealerts) August 22, 2022
Also, there’s an indication that the holding of the top 1% addresses for USDC hit 87.667%. This represents a 22 month low in stablecoin.
USDC is not without its problems
USDC witnessed an increase in performance despite the fact that it has a smaller market cap. As it reached its three-year peak, the weekly mean transaction volume increased. This value reached 228,721.050 USDC tokens. This growth surpasses that recorded in June, which was 226,056.588 USC.
📈 $USDCThe mean transaction volume (7d MA), just hit a three-year record of 228,721.050 USDC
On 19 June 2022, the previous 3-year record of 226,056.588 USDC had been reached
View metric:https://t.co/VUwnIn7YLP pic.twitter.com/FDrgkDUIuZ
— glassnode alerts (@glassnodealerts) August 22, 2022
USDC has received a lot attention for its potential to compete with USDT as the top stablecoin in terms of market capital in July 2022. USDC moved within $11 billion of Tether’s market cap. However, it lost all of its gains after the Tornado Cash events.
Tether has yet to make a statement on the position of Tether on whether or not to freeze USDT tokens that are connected to Tornado Cash. Firms that allow assets to be linked to sanctioned crypto-mixer platforms could face negative legal consequences.
Featured image taken from Pixabay. Charts taken from TradingView.com