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- The Cuban authorities have decided that cryptocurrencies are necessary for building socialism and have included them in the program for the country's economic development until 2026. The document is titled "Guiding Principles of the Party's Economic and Socialist Policy." 
The idea of introducing cryptocurrencies into the domestic economy of the country was first voiced in 2019. The authorities announced then that they were going to use the assets for external payments, since operations with the dollar became unavailable for them due to the sanctions imposed by the United States against Cuba. The new set of measures includes support for cryptocurrency initiatives. We are also talking about currency liberalization, which should allow citizens and companies to use any type of assets for settlements.
The Cuban authorities want to build on the experience of Venezuela, which was able to introduce its own cryptocurrency called El Petro and made possible the use of bitcoin and other digital assets. Several national payment platforms have appeared in the country, designed to work with cryptocurrencies.

- Bill Miller, legendary investor and founder of hedge fund Miller Value Partners, said it was no longer possible to ignore bitcoin. According to him, cryptocurrencies are gradually becoming mainstream, which is why they will be fully adopted within a few years. The financier did not rule out that central banks will try to control the situation, but they will still have to give up sooner or later.
“If bitcoin was considered a kind of internal network asset earlier, and the overwhelming majority of citizens were sure that it would soon collapse, everyone is now waiting for a new wave of bullish sentiment to buy as many coins as possible at a bargain price. Investors have everything under control now, because of which exchanges can no longer move the asset to drawdowns or growth so simply,” Miller believes.
The financier recalled that he first invested in BTC in 2014 or 2015 at an average price of $350 per coin. Now such amounts seem so distant past that no investor believes in returning to them.

- Tesla sold part of its bitcoins for $272 million, generating a profit of $101 million from this transaction. This is stated in the report for the first quarter of 2021. According to Elon Musk, the electric car maker sold 10% of its crypto assets solely to test the liquidity of the market.
Recall that the company invested $1.5 billion in BTC just in early February. And according to Tesla's management, the company is satisfied with the liquidity of the market for the first cryptocurrency and will continue to accumulate digital assets, selling part of its electric vehicles for bitcoins.

- The growing interest in cryptocurrencies threatens the South Korean labor market with a shortage of young workers. According to a number of employers, their employees aged between 20 and 30 are distracted by tracking bitcoin price fluctuations or quit their jobs to devote themselves entirely to trading. In this regard, some companies are looking for ways to block access to cryptocurrency exchanges during business hours.
The 20-year-old Chosun interviewee left the credit card company after three years as he earned 3 billion wons ($2.7 million) in cryptocurrency revenues. “I loved the job,” he says, “but I realized that financially it would be wiser to focus on investing, taking into account the income from the time I spend.”

- The creator of the sports media platform Barstool Sports Dave Portnoy announced the investment of a "seven-figure" amount in the first cryptocurrency in August 2020. He did this after he met with the founders of the Gemini exchange, the Winklevoss brothers. Later, the investor sold all his bitcoins at a price of about $11,600. He said that he lost a decent amount on the market drawdown and was disappointed in cryptocurrencies.
And now Dave Portnoy has reacquired digital gold in the amount of... 1 bitcoin. “This is all I could afford at $48,000. 50 thousand, and now I have one bitcoin,” stated the creator of Barstool Sports.

- In 1581, the Russian Tsar Ivan the Terrible killed his son, in anger. And now, 440 years later, one of the residents of Moscow filed a complaint with the police against his son, in anger. He did this after he failed to receive over 100 million rubles (approx. $1.35 million) from the family's cryptocurrency mining farm. The Russian created a mining company in 2017 and appointed his 23-year-old son its CEO, while he continued to periodically invest in the business. In April 2021, the company started having problems and the head of the family fired his son. According to his father's calculations, at least 137 million rubles should have been on the company's account, but he found only 18 million, after which he reported to the police.

- New York-based wine distributor Acker, Merrall & Condit has announced that it has begun accepting digital currencies as payment at its auctions and retail stores. Acker, Merrall & Condit is the world's largest fine wine auction house, founded back in 1820. After the pandemic, the company found itself in the same boat as other retailers as most of its offline stores were closed. 
To offset the impact of COVID-19, the organization has placed a bid on its own online auction. Prices for some of the best wines it has to offer are around $1000 a bottle. And according to the company's management, it is very fortunate that now they can be paid for with such cryptocurrencies as Bitcoin, Ethereum, Bitcoin Cash and Dogecoin.

- One of the JPMorgan top managers, Daniel Pinto, announced back in February 2021 that his bank was ready to launch a service for operations with bitcoin if the bank's clients needed it. And this week, the Coin Desk portal reported that the American giant decided to launch a fund focused on BTC. The journalists found out that the JPMorgan bitcoin fund will be available only to private clients and will start operating this summer.
Note that the head of this investment bank, Jamie Dimon, had previously repeatedly criticized BTC, stating that the cryptocurrency is a common fraudulent scheme. Daimon even threatened his traders with firing if they tried to invest in bitcoin. But as you can see, the position of Dimon and the policy of JPMorgan have changed significantly now.

- Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin donated 100 ETH and 100 MKR totaling over $600,000 to a fund to fight the coronavirus pandemic in India. Following Buterin, the former CTO of the Coinbase crypto exchange Balaji Srinivasan joined the campaign, donating 21.7463 ETH (almost $550,000 at the time of payment).

- The creator of the stock-to-flow model, a popular cryptocurrency analyst aka PlanB, believes that the current decline in bitcoin is quite normal and expected, and only confirms the bullish trend. The analyst stressed that one should not expect constant growth, sometimes pullbacks should also occur: “Nothing grows without pullbacks. Bitcoin has already been growing for 6 months in a row. This is similar to the mid-cycle correction we saw in 2013 and 2017.”
At the same time, the expert noted that he even “calmed down to some extent”: the market was too overheated, and now a small “cooling” phase awaits it. In addition, the rate of the first cryptocurrency turned out to be lower currently than the expectations of the S2F model, which means it may well continue to grow.

- The bitcoin rate will reach $200,000 in 2022. This forecast was recently announced by Dan Morehead, CEO of venture capital firm Pantera Capital. According to the businessman, BTC is doomed to further growth, as more and more investors begin to understand that storing capital in cryptocurrency is much more efficient than in traditional instruments.
The value of BTC adds $200 every time 1 million new users register on its network. If such dynamics persist, the price of cryptocurrency in 2022 will approach or even exceed the $200,000 mark.
According to Dan Morehead, the spread of bitcoin is a result of, among other things, the growth in the number of smartphone users. There are now about 3.5 billion people in the world who own such devices, making bitcoin available anywhere and at any time.


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First, a review of last week’s events:

- EUR/USD. The US economy is showing impressive growth. Europe, on the other hand, is in a widespread lockdown and, apparently, is experiencing a second recession. The share of those who received at least one COVID-19 vaccine in the EU is 25.1%, while in the United States there are 2.5 times more of them, 63.2%. Can the euro grow in such a situation? Only 25% of experts answered positively to this question last week, and they turned out to be right: the pairEUR / USD reached the level of 1.2080 on Tuesday, April 20.
The majority of analysts (50%) believed that the bulls and the bears would be engaged in “tug of war” across the 1.2000 line. And they also turned out to be not far from the truth: the pair fluctuated up/down in the range of 1.1995-1.2080 from Tuesday until the end of the week. Although, of course, the victory remained with the bulls, since the last chord of the trading session sounded near the high of the last seven weeks at 1.2100.
There are two main reasons for these dynamics. The first one is in America, the second one is on the other side of the Atlantic, in Europe.
On the one hand, the yield on long-term US Treasury bonds continues to fall, and along with it the US currency continues to weaken. The dollar index against a basket of six major currencies (DXY) declined to 91.0, down 230 points from this year's high of 93.3. This fuels the risk sentiment of investors and continues to push the major US stock indexes up. This happens even despite the proposal of US President Joe Biden to almost double (from 20% to 39.6%) the capital gains tax for citizens with income of $1 million or more.
On the other hand, the euro was supported by positive forecasts for the rate of vaccination in Europe, in particular the news that Pfizer will increase the supply of vaccines to the EU by 100 million doses. The yield on German bonds is growing, which are beginning to catch up with their competitors from the United States. Stronger than expected statistics on business activity in the Eurozone helped the bulls on EUR/USD as well. Analysts polled by Reuters expected on average the PMI to decline from 53.2 points to 52.8. However, it rose to 53.7 in April;

- GBP/USD. First, a few words about another pair, GBC/USD, which may appear in the foreseeable future. While in some countries, regulators ban cryptocurrencies (for example, in Turkey), in others they are trying to put them at their service. The Bank for International Settlements (BIS) has recently conducted a survey and it has turned out that of 66 central banks, 52 are thinking about their own digital currency. And one of these reflective regulators is the Bank of England, backed by one of the country's largest financial conglomerates, Barclays.
The digital pound has already received a playful name "Britcoin", which makes those who know what "Brit Milah" smile. For those who are not in the know, let us explain: this is a rite of circumcision among religious Jews. However, if Brit Milah is rooted in the deep past, then Britcoin is the digital future of the UK that has broken away from the EU.  
But until the GBC/USD pair has appeared in the list of trading instruments, let us return to its “older sister”, the GBP/USD pair. It went up at the beginning of the week, thanks to the weakening dollar, like EUR/USD. The pair reached a height of 1.4010 on Tuesday, having added 170 points. However, it did not manage to fix above the 1.4000 horizon: the pound lost all its advantage two days later, and the pair dropped to the level of 1.3825. At the very end of the trading week, the pound was helped by strong statistics on business activity in the services sector: the Markit index rose from 56.3 to 60.1 (against the forecast of 59.0) over the month, thanks to which the pair grew slightly and completed the five-day period at 1.3885;

- USD/JPY. Recall that we talked in the previous review about the fact that one of the reasons for the fall in the yield of 10-year US Treasury bonds, and with it the strengthening of the yen against the dollar, may be the return of Japanese buyers to the market. They were actively getting rid of American bonds at the end of the financial year, but they began to replenish their investment portfolios with them now.
The majority of analysts (70%) voted seven days ago for the fact that the growth of the Japanese currency and the decline of the USD/JPY pair will continue, and this forecast turned out to be absolutely correct. The level 107.50 was indicated as a support, which became the local bottom of the week. This was followed by a correction and a finish at 107.85; 

- cryptocurrencies. While the task of the bulls on Friday, April 16 was to prevent the BTC/USD pair from falling below $60,000, they are struggling seven days later to gain a foothold in the $50,000 area. After the explosive growth to $64,800, which took place on the eve of the American exchange Coinbase' IPO, we are witnessing an equally rapid collapse now. The price of bitcoin was falling to the level of $47,545 on Friday April 23, showing a 26.6% drop.
It is difficult to single out any one reason for what happened. Prominent analyst Willy Woo said the drawdown was triggered by massive power outages in Xinjiang province, one of the largest regions in China where bitcoin mining is concentrated. According to the BTC Cambridge Energy Consumption Index, Xinjiang accounts for about 25% of the coin's total hashrate. Due to the fact that most of the miners were temporarily out of order, the hash rate of the asset began to decline, and the average transaction fee on the bitcoin network exceeded $50, which has not been the case since 2017.
According to Woo, bitcoin should have returned to growth after the electricity supply situation stabilized. Electricity returned to Xinjiang, but bitcoin continued its decline.
We have repeatedly written that the crypto market is heavily influenced by regulatory risks. And in this case, it is possible that panic has been fueled by the rumors that an investigation may begin in the United States regarding a number of financial institutions on suspicion of money laundering using cryptocurrencies. Additional pressure on the market was made by two news stories. The first is the news that the US Congress has approved the creation of a SEC and CFTC working group to develop cryptocurrency regulation. The second is the plans of US President Joe Biden to raise taxes on capital gains, which could limit investment in digital assets.
The total cryptocurrency market capitalization decreased by 17% over the week, from $2.2 trillion to $1.825 trillion. Meanwhile, bitcoin continues to lose ground. If its share in the total capitalization on January 2 was 72.65%, then it is only 50.70% on April 23. This suggests that investors are looking for more profitable assets for their investments among altcoins, of which there are currently more than 8,000. Just look at the Ethereum quotes. Despite the April 18 crash, this leading altcoin managed to renew its all-time high last week, reaching $2,635. Of course, a wave of sales did not pass it, but the fall in the price of ETH over the week was only about 11%. As for the participation of Ethereum in the total capitalization of the crypto market, its share has grown from 10.79% to 14.49% since the year started.
Summing up the past week, we note that the bitcoin price dropped below the 50-day average, which is quite an alarming factor and may provoke further sales. The BTC dominance index, as already mentioned, is also going down. However, it is still far from the lows of early 2018, when it fell to 32%. Another index, Crypto Fear & Greed Index, dropped from 78 to 55 points during the week and approached the neutral zone.


As for the forecast for the coming week, summarizing the views of a number of experts, as well as forecasts made on the basis of a variety of methods of technical and graphical analysis, we can say the following:

- EUR/USD. As expected, the European Central Bank
maintained an ultra-soft policy and did not make any adjustments at its meeting on April 22. And its head Christine Lagarde made every effort to limit further growth of the euro. Investors should have concluded from her speech that the ECB will begin to roll back fiscal stimulus (QE) later than the US Federal Reserve, since the EU economy lags behind the American one. (According to JPMorgan forecasts, the GDP of the Eurozone, after a 1% decline in the first quarter of 2021, is expected to grow by 6% in the second quarter. In the US, the same figures are +5% and +10%). 
The ECB is not interested in a strong euro, as it interferes with European exports, and considers the current EUR/USD quotes to be quite high. However, Ms. Lagarde was unable to reverse the pair's downward trend. Moreover, it is very likely that the US Federal Reserve Head Jerome Powell will say the same thing at its upcoming meeting on Wednesday, April 28 as she did: that, although the pace of the US economic recovery is impressive, this is absolutely not enough to start discussing curtailment of fiscal stimulus programs.
The next meeting of the ECB will be held on June 10, and a lot can happen during this time. The euro will be pushed upwards by the increasing rate of vaccination and the economic recovery of the EU. And the bears are unlikely to be able to turn the pair south until the yield on US Treasuries starts to rise again.
Goldman Sachs analysts believe that the four largest countries in the Eurozone will vaccinate 37% of their population by the end of May, and this figure will already be 54% by the end of June. As a result, the bank raised its forecast for EUR/USD from $1.2100 by the end of the year to $1.2500.
The latest Bloomberg consensus estimate, on the contrary, decreased. If the figure called in January was 1.2500, now it is 1.2200. Although this value suggests further strengthening of the euro.
The main event of the coming week will be the meeting of the Open Market Committee of the US Federal Reserve System and the commentary of its management on the future monetary policy. Jerome Powell, as already mentioned, is likely to adhere to a rhetoric similar to Christine Lagarde, which may put another pressure on the yield of American bonds and the USD rate.
Growth of the euro in the coming week is expected by 60% of experts, supported by graphical analysis, 100% of trend indicators and 85% of oscillators onH4 and D1. The remaining 15% of the oscillators give signals that the pair is overbought. Resistance levels are 1.2125, 1.2185, the target is the February 25 high at 1.2245.
It should be noted that when switching to the forecast for May, the picture changes sharply, and here it is already 70% of experts, supported by graphical analysis on D1, who expect the EUR/USD pair to fall below the 1.2000 horizon. Supports are located at 1.1940, 1.1865 and 1.1800 levels. The target of the bears is the low of the end of March around 1.1700.
As for the events of the coming week, apart from the Fed meeting, one should pay attention to the statistics on consumer markets: the USA - on Monday April 26, Germany - on Thursday April 29 and the Eurozone¬ - Friday April 30. In addition, GDP indicators for the first quarter will become known: the USA - April 29, as well as Germany and the Eurozone - April 30;

- GBP/USD. A number of experts believe that successful vaccination of the population will help warm up the UK economy. Quarantine restrictions have been severely relaxed in recent weeks, pubs and restaurants have opened. Macro statistics are encouraging. However, Brexit-related concerns, massive trade deficits and UK budget deficits continue to weigh on the pound. But the dollar is also under pressure. Perhaps that is why the forecast for the GBP/USD pair looks rather contradictory: 45% of experts vote for its movement to the north, 35% to the south and the remaining 20% to the east. The technical analysis readings on H4 look contradictory as well.
On D1, thanks to the uptrend that began 13 months ago, most of the oscillators (65%) and trend indicators (85%) look up. Graphical analysis also indicates that the pair will try again to storm the 1.40000 high, but after that it will go down to the support in the 1.3670-1.3700 zone. The nearest resistance level is 1.3920, the nearest support is 1.3800;

- USD/JPY. The key indicator for this pair was and is the yield on US government bonds. If it continues to decline next week, then the pair USD/JPY will go further down. The nearest support is in the 106.80-107.10 zone, the next one is located near the 200-day moving average of 105.80.
The experts' opinion coincides completely with what was expressed a week earlier. 70% of them believe that the pair will continue to fall. The remaining 30% expect the pair to rebound upward (resistance levels 108.35 and 109.00). There is complete discord among the oscillators on H4, on D1 - 75% are colored red, and 25% give signals that the pair is oversold. Graphical analysis on both time frames shows that at first the pair can rise to the resistance of 108.35, and only then, having bounced off this level, it will sharply go down;

- cryptocurrencies. According to a number of experts, the drop in the share of bitcoin in the total capitalization of the crypto market is a very alarming factor for investors. Recall that the dominance index of the leading cryptocurrency was 85% at the beginning of 2017, and it decreased to 45% before the collapse. Now this figure is just over 50%. Pessimists argue that the rise in BTC/USD quotes before the listing of Coinbase on the NASDAQ exchange was the last stage of the bullish rally, and we need to prepare for a new "crypto winter" now, which could stretch for several years. This is confirmed by the massive liquidation of BTC futures.
However, as is usually the case, in addition to pessimists, there are also optimists. For example, analysts at Santiment believe that bitcoin's trend remains bullish. They have reached this conclusion having analyzed the frequency of tweets with the phrase "buy the dip" and "bought the dip". With the bitcoin price dipping below $51,000, the number of low buy posts hit a weekly record of 2,108 tweets. This allowed Santiment analysts to conclude that this correction is nothing more than a "bump in the road."
However, two thousand Twitter users are unlikely to seriously affect the market. Much more important is the mood of institutional investors who are not crypto enthusiasts at all. And there is a high probability that they will not be active until there is clarity on the attitude of the leading regulators to the sector. Those of the "whales" who purchased the cryptocurrency in the fall of 2020 may well start fixing profits at the current level: the price around $45,000-50,000 is more than acceptable for them. But new large purchases look quite risky.


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First, a review of last week’s events:

- EUR/USD. The past week was marked by two important economic events: impressively strong macro-statistics from the USA and a collapse in the yield of 10-year US government bonds.
According to the data published on Thursday April 15, US retail sales jumped by +9.8% in March (against the forecast +5.9% and a fall of -2.7% in February), which is the best indicator for the last 10 months. What is happening on the labor market also shows an active recovery of the country's economy. Thus, the number of initial applications for unemployment benefits fell from 769 thousand to 576 thousand. And this is not just better than the predicted 700 thousand, this is the lowest level since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic. Industrial production grew by 2.7%.
All these figures clearly indicate the rapid growth of US GDP in the first quarter of 2021. and allow us to speak with confidence about its continuation in the coming months.  Against this background, the collapse in the yield of American Treasuries, the strongest since the beginning of last November, looks surprising. If at the end of March, the yield on 10-year bonds reached a local multi-month maximum of 1.775%, now it has fallen to 1.583%.
Along with bonds, the dollar is weakening. The USD DXY index is trading in the 91.5 zone on Friday, April 16, which is 180 points below this year's high of 93.3. As a result, as predicted by most experts (65%), the EUR/USD pair continued its growth last week, coming close to the important support/resistance level of 1.2000 and ending the five-day period at 1.1980.    
This situation suggests that strong economic statistics from the United States can no longer provide serious support to the US currency. And the latter is now more correlated with the yield on Treasury bonds. Apparently, the rate of vaccination against coronavirus has already been taken into account in the USD quotes. And new fiscal stimulus programs and endless printing of new money by the Federal Reserve started working against the dollar. Its weakening has already gone beyond the usual correction, heating up the risk sentiments of investors: in addition to the euro, the currencies of commodity and developing countries are also growing, and the S&P500 index renews its all-time high for the 22nd time this year;

- GBP/USD. The weakening dollar supported the British currency, the fall of the GBP/USD pair stopped, and it even managed to climb 120 points. Thus, its movement over the past four weeks can be defined as lateralin channel 1.3670-1.3920. As for the last chord, the pair placed it in the central zone of this channel, ending the trading session at 1.3840;

- USD/JPY. It was said above about a sharp drop in the yield on 10-year US Treasury bonds. Experts call the coverage of short positions by hedge funds, as well as the return of Japanese buyers to the market, among the possible reasons for this collapse. They were actively getting rid of American bonds at the end of the financial year, but they began to replenish their investment portfolios with them now. This led to an increase in demand for the yen, which, thanks to the negative interest rate, they use to finance such operations.
One of the scenarios pronounced a week ago suggested that the weakening of the dollar and the strengthening of the yen would push the pair USD/JPY towards the support of 108.40. This is exactly what happened: starting from the level of 109.65, the pair dropped to the horizon 108.60 by Thursday, April 15, followed by a small rebound and a finish at 108.80;     

- cryptocurrencies. What has been so much anticipated over the past eight weeks has come true: Bitcoin has finally broken through the $60,000 horizon and is now trying to gain a foothold above this important psychological level. The new historical high was the height of $64,800, which the BTC/USD pair reached on Wednesday April 14. However, a correction followed, and the bulls were struggling to prevent the main cryptocurrency from falling below $60,000 for the whole of Friday, April 16.
According to the Forbes rating, thanks to the growth of bitcoin, its creator under the pseudonym Satoshi Nakamoto got into the top 20 richest people in the world. According to various estimates, he owns between 750k and 1.1 million BTC coins, and his fortune has exceeded $60 billion now.
But if Nakamoto became the owner of countless crypto-treasures a long time ago, then the current large investors are only at the beginning of their journey. According to the analytical service Santiment, the so-called "whales" continue to accumulate bitcoins. Analysts found that they have accumulated up to 2.2% of the total cryptocurrency market supply so far, reaching an 11-month high. A similar situation was observed at the beginning of May last year. As the Santiment report says, we are talking about investors controlling 100,000 or more BTC. 
Along with the "whales", for the first time since December 2020, miners have also started to accumulate savings, which creates a shortage of supply and contributes to an increase in the price of the main digital asset.
Miners receive income in cryptocurrency, but they pay fiat to service and equipment providers, so they are forced to sell part of the mined coins. The volumes of such sales depend on current market conditions and expectations of the bitcoin price. Starting from March 31, miners started accumulating BTC reserves again. Whereas for four months before that, they reduced their positions, converting bitcoins to fiat. The largest volumes of cryptocurrency, from 17,000 to 24,000 BTC per day, were sold by them in January 2021.
“Miners have switched to accumulating digital assets, because they have enough cash reserves to support their activities, which they raised during the rise of bitcoin from $20,000 to $40,000. Or, most of them are holding coins in anticipation of further appreciation,” Flex Young, CEO of Hong Kong-based Babel Finance, told CoinDesk. The number of bitcoins in miners' wallets has increased to 1.806 million BTC over the past two weeks.
The growth of the BTC/USD pair is facilitated by a weak dollar and a decrease in the yield of long-term US government bonds as well. This increases the attractiveness of cryptocurrency as a hedge against inflation.
The total crypto market capitalization on April 10 finally crossed the $ 2.0 trillion bar, and never fell below it. At the time of this writing, on April 16, it is at $ 2.2 trillion.
At the same time, the share of bitcoin in the total crypto market capitalization continues to decline continuously: if it was 72.65% on January 2, then it was only 52.10% on April 16. As already mentioned, this is most likely due to the fact that speculators are switching to other, more profitable, assets.
As for the Crypto Fear & Greed Index, it rose from 70 to 78 points in a week. Both values are in the overbought zone, but they are still far from critical, and therefore cannot become a serious obstacle to the growth of the BTC/USD pair.


As for the forecast for the coming week, summarizing the views of a number of experts, as well as forecasts made on the basis of a variety of methods of technical and graphical analysis, we can say the following:

- EUR/USD. As mentioned in the first part of the review, trillions of dollars of economic support programs not only increase the US national debt, but also begin to put serious pressure on the American currency. Low, close to zero interest rates do not help it either. But at the same time, the head of the FRS says that although the pace of the US economic recovery is impressive, it is not enough to even begin to discuss the curtailment of fiscal stimulus programs. According to Jerome Powell, this requires several more months of such positive results. The economy must “make even more significant progress” towards target levels of employment and inflation.
Of course, such statements are not good for the dollar and contribute to the growth of risk sentiment. But as for the other side of the Atlantic Ocean, there are more and more vigorous statements of EU officials about the imminent termination of lockdowns and the unprecedented growth of the Eurozone economy. According to the consensus forecast of Bloomberg experts, the ECB will slow down the emergency asset purchase (QE) program by July, and at the end of this year will announce its termination in March 2022.
All of the above could lead to the EUR/USD breakout of the 1.2000 resistance and its rise to the January highs in the 1.2300 area. Resistances on this path will be the levels 1.2125 and 1.2185.
However, at the moment such a bullish forecast is supported by only 25% of experts. True, graphical analysis, 100% of trend indicators on H4 and 90% on D1 are on their side. The picture is slightly different among oscillators. Only 65% of oscillators on both time frames are colored green, while the rest are already giving signals that the pair is overbought.
The majority of analysts (50%) have now taken a neutral position, believing that the bulls and the bears will be engaged in “tug-of-war” across the 1.2000 line in the near future. But the victory will still be with the dollar in the future. And, when moving from weekly to monthly forecast, the number of supporters of bears increases from 25% to 70%. In their opinion, the EUR / USD pair will test the support in the 1.1700 zone once again and, if successful, will drop another 100 points lower.
As for the events of the coming week, we should pay attention to Thursday April 22. The next ECB meeting will be held on that day. Any special changes in its monetary policy are not likely to be foreseen. However, the press conference of the management of the European Central Bank is of interest, during which investors can receive positive signals about the intentions of this regulator. If the business activity indicators in Germany and the Eurozone, which will be released the next day, April 23, also turn out to be encouraging, this could support the euro; 

- GBP/USD. Problems after the UK's exit from the EU, an impressive trade deficit and the country's budget deficit continue to put pressure on the pound. And even the dollar, which weakened against other currencies, let the GBP/USD pair get just a sideways trend, but never return to sustainable growth.
The British currency may regain its attractiveness, especially if large capital that left it due to Brexit begins to return to the country. The pound is also supported by the successes of vaccination against COVID-19. Therefore, some analysts believe that the long-term uptrend, which began on March 20, 2020, is too early to be buried, and the pair has a chance to continue its movement to the north. 30% of experts vote for the bullish forecast at the moment. However, when switching to forecasting by the end of spring, their number doubles: up to 60%. The nearest resistance levels are 1.3920 and 1.4000.
In the meantime, the overwhelming majority of analysts, supported by graphical analysis on D1, first expect the pair to drop to the lower border of the 1.3670-1.3920 trading channel, and in case of its breakdown, the pair will move to the 1.3600 zone.
Among the events of the coming week that can influence the formation of local trends, we can note the release of statistics on the UK labor market on Tuesday April 20, data on the consumer market on Wednesday April 21, and business activity in the Markit service sector.¬ on Friday April 23. Noteworthy is the speech of the head of the Bank of England Andrew Bailey on April 21 as well;

- USD/JPY. The pair starts the next week within the zone 108.60-109.25. Recall that this is the very narrow trading range from which it could not get out for three whole weeks in March. And it is quite possible that now it will become a serious obstacle on the path of the yen to further strengthening. Graphical analysis completely agrees with this version. According to its forecast on the H4 and D1 timeframes, before continuing to move south, the USD/JPY pair will be squeezed within these limits for several days.
And 70% of analysts are sure that the pair will continue to decline. Support levels are 108.35, 107.50 and 106.00; The remaining 30% expect the pair to bounce up. Resistances are at 109.25 and 110.00, the goal is to overcome the March 31 high of 110.95 and take the height of 111.00;

- cryptocurrencies. The most optimistic forecast for the bitcoin price was given by the authors of the cult animated series The Simpsons. A running line with quotes of financial assets appears on the TV screen in the new 18th episode of season 32. The bitcoin exchange rate is marked with a green sign of infinity.
Of course, such dynamics would greatly delight investors. However, the forecasts of specialists still look much more modest. Although they also strive upward. So, according to the latest report of the Kraken exchange, its analysts, relying on historical data, admitted the growth of bitcoin by 50% in April. Taking into account that the month began at $59,000, the target of the movement could be the $90,000 mark. However, before the rally resumes, the first cryptocurrency can expect a correction of at least $10,000.
As for the second major cryptocurrency, Ethereum, Kraken predicts it could rise to $15,000. Exchange analysts noted the important, in their opinion, support and resistance levels for this altcoin: $1,462 and $2,695. Plotting historical patterns of ETH price movement on logarithmic curves, they concluded that the peak of the bullish cycle is still far away. The experts are confident that the price of Ethereum could rise by 700% from the levels of the end of March and reach a high at $15,238.
A slightly more modest forecast for the price of this altcoin was given by the famous crypto trader and host of the podcast The Wolf Of All Streets Scott Melker. According to him, Ethereum may surpass bitcoin in terms of profitability in 2021, and the price of the coin may rise to $10,000.
He revealed In an interview with Cointelegraph that he has largely switched his strategy from the first cryptocurrency to ETH in recent months. “I don’t understand why this is crazy. In fact, this is just an increase of less than five times the current price. Bitcoin almost tripled last year,” Melker told reporters. “It reminds me of investing in the Internet in the early 1990s.”
Maciej Vitkoviak looked even deeper into the history, revealing to the world a crypto-life hack of almost 40 years ago - an emulator of a vintage computer Commodore-64 from 1982, adapted for mining bitcoins. This developer has created the C64 Bitcoin Miner software specifically for this PC. He demonstrated a hashrate of 0.2 H/s on the VICE emulator, which will allow him to get a block of BTC “in just” ... 337 years and 10 months ?.

NordFX Analytical Group


Notice: These materials should not be deemed a recommendation for investment or guidance for working on financial markets: they are for informative purposes only. Trading on financial markets is risky and can lead to a loss of money deposited.

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The specialists of the NordFX brokerage company have developed a new convenient mobile app that allows you to conduct full-fledged trading in the financial markets without having to switch to other platforms.

The app supports 12 languages and contains all the functionality traders need, which they can use in just a few clicks. The trading platform integrates indicators and other tools for advanced technical analysis. In addition, the application includes an economic calendar, as well as options for opening and verifying an account, depositing and withdrawing funds.

The line of trading instruments includes 33 Forex currency pairs, gold, silver, Crude and Brent oil, as well as the main cryptocurrency pairs: Bitcoin (BTC/USD), Ethereum (ETH/USD), Ripple (XRP/USD) and Litecoin (LTC/USD).

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You can download the NordFX mobile app from Google Play

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First, a review of last week’s events:

- EUR/USD. The U.S. economy continues to recover vigorously. The S&P500 index renews another high, the value of American Treasuries is growing and, accordingly, their yield is falling. And the dollar is falling along with it.
However, the market, for the most part, is reacting not to real numbers for the last week and a half, but to forecasts and promises. As already mentioned, the US economy is growing. But the head of the US Federal Reserve said that although the March statistics on the labor market is impressive, it is not enough to even start discussions on the curtailment of fiscal stimulus programs. According to Jerome Powell, this requires several more months of such positive results.
His colleagues agree with him. So, the head of the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco Mary Daly noted that the US economy is still very far from the recovery, and the Fed will wait until this happens. And the head of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, James Bullard, said that one should not even think about changes in the US monetary policy until the end of the COVID-19 pandemic.
But as for the other side of the Atlantic Ocean, there are more and more vigorous statements of EU officials about the imminent termination of lockdowns and the unprecedented growth of the Eurozone economy. And in spite of the calls of German Chancellor Angela Merkel for tighter isolation, optimistic data on industrial production in this country are cited.
As a result of all these verbal battles, the scales tipped to the side of the euro. As predicted by most experts, the EUR/USD pair went up, rising to the height of 1.1930 on Thursday, April 08. This was followed by a correction and a finish at 1.1900;

- GBP/USD. Problems after the UK's exit from the EU, an impressive trade deficit and the country's budget deficit continue to put pressure on the pound. And even the dollar, which has weakened against other currencies, does not allow the GBP/USD pair to return to growth. We see how the British currency, step by step, is losing ground starting from February 24. Last week the pair was able to grow only to 1.3920. This was followed by a reversal and, as predicted by graphical analysis, it dropped to the level of 1.3670. As for the final chord, it sounded at the height of 1.3710;

- USD/JPY. It has been repeatedly written that the rate of this pair is greatly influenced by the yield of US Treasuries. Fluctuations in the yield of these securities allowed the yen to straighten its shoulders a little and win back 165 points from the dollar in the first four days of the week, dropping to 109.00. However, then the strength of the bears dried up, and the pair ended the five-day period at the level of 109.65;

- cryptocurrencies. The overwhelming majority of analysts (70%) gave a negative forecast for the BTC/USD pair last week, expecting it to move towards $50,000. This is exactly what happened, and the fall of bitcoin on Wednesday to $55,540 made many talk about the beginning of new "crypto freezes". Fortunately for investors, the panic was premature and the pair returned to the $58,000 zone on Friday. However, the question of why the main cryptocurrency failed to gain a foothold above $60,000 remains open.
One of the versions is a drop in demand from large institutional investors. But, as is clear from the statistics of crypto exchanges, "whales" continue to withdraw cryptocurrency to cold wallets. And therefore, they expect its growth to continue.
The miners' actions are also indicative of their bullish sentiment. They switched to hoarding coins in April, creating a shortage in the market. The movement of cryptocurrency from miners to crypto exchanges has decreased by almost 40%: from 450 bitcoins per day in March to 275 in the first decade of April. Naturally, such a shortage of supply should push the price up. Suffice it to recall that the BTC/USD pair rose from $19,000 to $30,000 in a similar situation the previous time.
In the meantime, just as bitcoin cannot take the $60,000 height by storm, the total market capitalization cannot step over the $2.0 trillion bar either, once approaching it, once moving away. At the time of writing this review, on Friday April 09, it has once again come close to this important psychological level, reaching a volume of $1.990 billion. As for the Crypto Fear & Greed Index, it has changed only by 4 points during the week, having fallen from 74 to 70.
It should be noted that the share of bitcoin in the total crypto market capitalization is continuously decreasing: if it was 62% on March 14, then it was only 55% on April 09. This is undoubtedly due to the lack of positive price dynamics for BTC/USD. Speculators are switching to other instruments, which allow making serious profits at the moment. And here the ripple should be noted.
When the ripple fell to $0.170 at the very end of December 2020 due to the claims of the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), many gave up on it. However, on April 7, at the high, the price of this altcoin reached $1.108, showing a 550% gain since the the year started. Its capitalization also grew during this time, rising from 1.40% to 2.42%. The reason for this rally, especially in the last week, was the news that ripple's lawyers have gained access to the SEC documents and are making serious progress in litigation with this powerful regulator.


As for the forecast for the coming week, summarizing the views of a number of experts, as well as forecasts made on the basis of a variety of methods of technical and graphical analysis, we can say the following:

- EUR/USD. As is said in the first part of the review, the statements of the US Federal Reserve leaders, the growth of the stock market and the fall in the yield of US Treasury bonds are important factors. But they are limited in time. So is the falling dollar. And at some point, everything can turn 180 degrees. The higher the US stock indices soar - Nasdaq, Dow Jones, S&P500, the more frequent talk about “soap bubbles” that are about to burst. Investors borrowed a record $814 billion secured by their own portfolios by the end of February 2021. And this is 49% more than a year ago. A similar situation resulted in the collapse of the stock market and in the economic crisis in 2008.
But until this happens, the attractiveness of the dollar continues to decline, which plays into the hands of low-income currencies and, first of all, the euro. The dollar is not facilitated by the confrontation between Democrats and Republicans in the US Senate over the scale of further fiscal stimulus either.
Of course, a way out of this political stalemate will be found, and there will be more clarity about the results of vaccinations and the speed of recovery of the US and Eurozone economies. But according to forecasts of 65% of experts, the EUR/USD pair will continue its growth in the coming week. This scenario is supported by 75% of oscillators and 85% of trend indicators on H4. The advantage of the “greens” is much weaker on D1, here it is only 65% of technical indicators that point to the growth of the pair. At the same time, 15% of oscillators are painted neutral gray, and 20% already give signals about the pair being overbought.
As for the graphical analysis, it shows movement in the 1.1835-1.1950 trading range on H4, the range is, of course, wider on D1: first, the pair goes down to the lower border in the 1.1700 zone, and then rises to the 1.2000 height. It should be noted that in the transition from weekly to monthly forecast, 55% of analysts vote for the decline of the pair to the horizon of 1.1700.
As for the events of the coming week, we should pay attention to inflation indicators and data on the US consumer market (due out on April 13, 15 and 16), Eurozone (April 12) and Germany (April 15) . Also of interest is the speech of the head of the US Federal Reserve Jerome Powell on Wednesday April 14;

- GBP/USD. At the moment, the absolute advantage for this pair is on the side of the bears. 85% of oscillators and 100% trend indicators on H4 are painted red. On D1 it is 85% and 80%, respectively. 65% of analysts also vote for the further fall of the pair. The nearest support is 1.3670, the target is a transition to the zone 1.3575-1.3610. Graphical analysis on D1 also draws the continuation of the downward trend. However, according to its forecast, the pair may rise to the resistance level of 1.3900 before heading south.
Even though the sell-off of the pound continues, many analysts note that the long-term uptrend, which began on March 20, 2020, has not been affected. And the fall of the last 6 weeks can be considered as a correction, after which the British currency may continue its growth. The pound will regain its attractiveness, especially if large capital that left it due to Brexit begins to return to the country. The pound is also supported by the successes of the early stages of vaccination against COVID-19. In this case, according to 70% of experts, the GBP/USD pair has many chances to regain its lost positions and return first to the 1.4000 zone, and then retest the February 24 high at 1.4240 before the end of spring;

- USD/JPY. Back in early March, the volumes of purchases of futures contracts for the yen exceeded sales. But the fast pace of the US economic recovery has changed everything. According to the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), the number of short contracts on Japanese currency began to grow since mid-March, reaching record values since January 2019.  
At the moment, despite the confusion in the indicators' readings, the majority of experts (65%), supported by graphical analysis on H4, expect further weakening of the yen and the return of the USD/JPY pair, first to the level of 111.00, and then its rise another 100 points higher, to the level of 112.00.
The remaining 35% of analysts are looking south, expecting to see how the pair will test 108.40 support. Moreover, when moving to the monthly forecast, the number of bear supporters increases to 60%, and the target shifts to the zone 105.00-106.20.
As for the events of the coming week, one can note the speech of the head of the Bank of Japan Haruhiko Kuroda on Wednesday April 14, from which the market will wait for signals regarding the monetary policy of the regulator for the near future.  Recall that the Bank of Japan has not been able to decide how to respond to rising yields on US securities and what to do with its own. If the yield on 10-year US bonds and commodity prices continue to rise, and the regulator does not respond to this, it could hit the yen even harder. And it has already suffered quite tangible losses, having lost more about 700 points to the dollar over the past three months.

- cryptocurrencies. The news background of the past week was quite versatile. Thus, the investment bank Morgan Stanley has filed an application with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), according to which 12 funds of the bank will be able to invest in BTC. Each of the funds indicated in the application will be able to place up to 25% of the capital in the first cryptocurrency. And that's good for investors.
On the other hand, the billionaire and founder of PayPal, Peter Thiel, declared out of the sudden that bitcoin has become an instrument of China's policy and is increasingly hitting the dollar. That is why, according to Peter Thiel, the US government should attend to the regulation of this benchmark cryptocurrency. It should be noted that this businessman previously supported bitcoin, and now one needs to understand who or what made him change his mind. And if the wind blows from the White House, this is a very negative signal for the cryptocurrency market.
As for the forecasts, experts of another large world bank, JPMorgan, called the long-term target for the bitcoin rate of $130,000, having lowered the bar from $146,000 due to the fall in gold quotes. Analysts made such a forecast based on the calculation of the theoretical capitalization of the first cryptocurrency in case of an influx of funds from the market of precious metals.
In general, the topic of comparing bitcoin with gold, for which cryptocurrency is becoming a digital alternative, sounds more and more often. Many bitcoin bulls in the expert environment say that BTC will be able to bypass gold in terms of capitalization in the future. In this case, the value of all bitcoins should grow 10 times and exceed the $11 trillion mark. And according to analysts at Ark Invest, that could happen within the next few years. "We believe that bitcoin is better than gold and it's safe to say that it will capture a gold market share or even more."
Billionaire and founder of the crypto bank Galaxy Digital Mike Novogratz agrees with the forecast of Ark Invest. He stated In a comment for CNBC that he was shocked by the pace of digital asset adoption. The investor also admitted his previous forecast of the price of the first cryptocurrency of $60,000 too conservative. “Bitcoin is on the inevitable path to reaching and exceeding the capitalization of gold,” said Novogratz.
Quite an astronomical forecast was given by the author of the book “Rich Dad, Poor Dad”, investor and entrepreneur Robert Kiyosaki. He suggested in a recent interview that the first cryptocurrency could reach a value of $1.2 million in the next five years. Kiyosaki first bought bitcoin last year after the pandemic effectively shackled the global economy. It was then trading at $9,000. “I wish I could buy it for 10 cents, like many people did, but I still look like a genius because today it costs about $55,000. I think that in another five years it will grow to $1.2 million,” the entrepreneur announced.
At the same time, even though Kiyosaki, opposite to Peter Thiel, has turned into a defender of bitcoin, he still prefers gold and silver for main investments, explaining this by the fact that the cryptocurrency is outside the regulatory field.
And finally, at the end of the review, another crypto life hack. This time, it's about how to make money without "mining", without buying or selling cryptocurrency. After all, it turns out that it is enough just to look into the future and register a promising Internet address in time in order to become a millionaire. So, domain name registrar GoDaddy put up Roger Ver's Bitcoin.com domain for sale for $100 million earlier last week. However, this time the deal fell through: upon discovering the ad, the owner declared that it was “100% fake" and demanded to remove the domain from sale. But this does not mean that you will not be able to earn a tidy sum at other addresses. After all, there are still so many promising cryptocurrencies in the world besides bitcoin.


NordFX Analytical Group


Notice: These materials should not be deemed a recommendation for investment or guidance for working on financial markets: they are for informative purposes only. Trading on financial markets is risky and can lead to a loss of money deposited.

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The $100,000 Super Lottery was launched by the brokerage company NordFX among its clients on April 1. The name speaks for itself: 100 cash prizes of $500, $1,000, $2,500 and a super prize of $ 20,000 will be drawn by the year end.

It is quite easy to take part in the lottery and get a chance to win one or even several of these prizes. It is enough to have a Pro account in NordFX (and for those who do not have it - register and open a new one), top it up with $200 and... just trade.

Having made a trading turnover of only 2 lots in Forex currency pairs or gold (or 4 lots in silver), the trader will automatically receive a virtual lottery ticket. The number of lottery tickets for one participant is not limited. The more deposits and the greater the turnover, the more lottery tickets the participant will have, and the greater their chances of becoming a winner of the prize money.

Unlike trader contests, there is no need for a lottery participant to show exceptional trading results. In this case, both experienced professionals and beginners have equal chances of winning. And they can either use the received prize money in further trading, or take it out without any restrictions.

70 prizes of $500 each, 20 prizes of $1,000 each, 10 prizes of $2,500 and 1 super prize of $20,000 will be drawn. The draws will be held on July 1, October 1, 2021 and January 3, 2022. For more details, visit the NordFX website.

Notice: These materials are not investment recommendations or guidelines for working in financial markets and are intended for informational purposes only. Trading in financial markets is risky and can result in a complete loss of deposited funds.


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NordFX Brokerage company has summed up the performance of its clients' trade transactions in March. If earlier traders from China, India, Sri Lanka and Vietnam waged an active struggle for leadership, all three steps of the podium were occupied by representatives of China last month.

The highest monthly profit, $66.377, was received by a client, account No. 1179XXX, mainly on transactions with gold (XAU/USD) and bitcoin (BTC/USD).

The second place in the rating of the most successful traders was taken by the owner of account No.1545XXX, who earned $26,142 on transactions with the main cryptocurrency.

And, finally, in third place is a trader, account No.1530XXX, with a profit of $16.977, among whose main trading instruments are the pairs XAU/USD and GBP/USD.

The passive investment services:
- in CopyTrading, the largest increase of 507% in March was shown by the VN.NO1 signal, however, its maximum drawdown was quite impressive, 63.65%. In the “middle” category, we can note the RED DOG signal: a profit of 34.86% with a drawdown of 23.25%. And, finally, among the most non-aggressive signals, Follow Trend attracts attention, it showed quite a good growth of 15.25% in March with a drawdown of only 4.18%.
- in the PAMM service, one should note the manager under the nickname GoodCandles5000: the growth for the month on his account was 26.77%, the maximum drawdown was 9.88%.

Among the IB partners, NordFX TOP-3 is as follows:
- the largest commission, $12,878, was accrued to a partner from Sri Lanka, account No.1483xxx;
- next is a partner from India, account No.1527xxx, who received $6,593;
- and, finally, a partner from India, account No.1491xxx, who received $4,855 as a reward, closes the top three.


Notice: These materials are not investment recommendations or guidelines for working in financial markets and are intended for informational purposes only. Trading in financial markets is risky and can result in a complete loss of deposited funds.


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First, a review of last week’s events:

- EUR/USD. The U.S. economy continues to recover vigorously. This is evidenced by the impressive data from the labor market. Thus, the number of new jobs created outside the agricultural sector (NFP) has almost doubled compared to the previous period (growth from 468K to 916K) and, moreover, has exceeded the forecast (647K) by almost a third. The ISM Manufacturing PMI has risen from 60.8 to 64.7. Also, according to the ADP report, the employment rate in the private sector has increased from 176K to 517K. All this suggests that fiscal stimulation of the economy and the injection of money into it is working. But is it good for the dollar?
Of course, this scheme also includes yields on long-term US government bonds, as well as the prospects for monetary policy for the next few years. Investors are sensitive to statements by Fed Chairman Jerome Powell on the possibility of curtailing the quantitative easing (QE) program and raising the interest rate.
On the one hand, according to the statements of the management, the Federal Reserve System does not intend to raise interest rates until at least 2023. The Fed is not going to change other parameters of the quantitative easing (QE) program either, believing that injecting $1.9 trillion into the economy will be quite enough. But on the other hand, US President Joe Biden presented a massive $2.25 trillion infrastructure spending plan on Wednesday March 31, along with a financing scheme through tax increases. If, indeed, these funds arise not at the expense of the printing press, but at the expense of an increase in the tax load, this will mean the curtailment of QE, and will entail the flow of capital from the stock market to the government bond market.
But while this is all just planning, the market has frozen in anticipation, and the EUR/USD pair has moved into a sideways trend. As predicted by the majority of experts (70%), the dollar continued to strengthen at the beginning of last week, and the pair came close to 1.1700. But then, largely thanks to Biden's new plan, it turned around and went up. However, this rebound can hardly be called a trend change. The pair just returned to where it had been on March 25-30. It completed the trading week in the same zone, at the level of 1.1760;

- GBP/USD. In general, the chart of this pair was similar to the chart of EUR/USD, with only one fundamental difference. If the euro continues to retreat against the dollar, the British pound, albeit with difficulty, is trying to hold the defense. This time, the UK GDP growth for the fourth quarter of 2020 to 1.3%, as well as the revised upward index of business activity came to help it.
Let us remind that, when making a forecast for the previous week, 40% of experts voted for the strengthening of the dollar, 10% for the strengthening of the pound and 50% for the sideways trend. And in general, everyone was right. The pair both fell to 1.3705, and grew to 1.3850, and eventually finished only 40 points above the start. Having started the five-day week at 1.3790, it completed it at 1.3830;

- USD/JPY. Most analysts (60%) had expected this pair to consolidate above the 110.00 horizon. 100% of trend indicators and 75% of oscillators had agreed with this scenario. And it turned out to be absolutely true. The pair has been relentlessly moving north since January 6 and it renewed this year's high on Wednesday March 31, reaching 110.95.  The long-awaited correction to the south did not happen again, and the pair ended the trading session at 110.65;

- cryptocurrencies. Bitcoin is storming the $60,000 threshold again. At the time of writing, the maximum it has reached so far is $60,170. However, as soon as the benchmark cryptocurrency approaches this milestone, another wave of sales follows, causing a pullback. However, these ebbs are not large enough. And this suggests that there are fewer and fewer people willing to part with bitcoin at this level. Investors are waiting for a leap up. And these small corrections just give them the opportunity to replenish their stock of tokens on the pullback.
A huge number of bitcoins are flowing into cold wallets, which indicates that the "whales" institutions are set for the further growth of BTC and see it as an asset for long-term investments. The news background also contributes to this. “We see Square, Tesla, MicroStrategy and others buying bitcoin,” says ARK Invest CEO Catherine Wood. - Now cryptocurrencies determine part of the business of these companies. And the announcement of the sale of Tesla for BTC will allow you to do business in any region without wasting time and money on exchanging fiat currencies." The major payment system, PayPal, has also joined the crypto race. it intends to provide its customers with the opportunity to pay in bitcoins in all stores that are partners of the company, and there are approximately 29 million of them around the world. According to Reuters, in addition to the main cryptocurrency, PayPal also plans to introduce support for payments in Bitcoin Cash, Ethereum and Litecoin.
We can talk about the gradual adoption of cryptocurrencies in various sectors of the economy at the moment. However, large investors are still very worried about the attitude of regulators to this type of assets. And, first and foremost, the US authorities. According to a number of analysts, while bitcoin and the main altcoins act as a store of value and speculation, the American regulator turns a blind eye to it. But as soon as bitcoin begins to compete with the dollar as a means of payment and international payments even a little, the attitude of the authorities can change dramatically. And it is not at all excluded that the initiatives of PayPal and other payment systems will cause a negative reaction from them. An example of this is Facebook's Libra, which was strangled in the bud.
In the meantime, as mentioned, the main cryptocurrency is trying to gain a foothold above $60,000, and the total market capitalization is trying to exceed the most important psychological level of $2.0 trillion. It reached a volume of $1.993 billion on the first day of April, but it rolled back to the level of $1.936 billion on Friday. It is noteworthy that the dominance of bitcoin in the market has slightly decreased over the past 7 days: from 59.56% to 57.88%. Moreover, its share in the crypto market literally fell to 55.50% on April 1. The reason for this is the closure of long positions when the BTC/USD pair reached the horizon of $60,000.
The Crypto Fear & Greed Index has started to rise again. It rose by 20 points over the week, from 54 to 74, and came close to the strongly overbought zone.


As for the forecast for the coming week, summarizing the views of a number of experts, as well as forecasts made on the basis of a variety of methods of technical and graphical analysis, we can say the following:

- EUR/USD. Europe is preparing for a new wave of coronavirus. The rate of vaccination, although growing, is slow. Only 16.5% of the EU population has received at least one injection so far, compared to 45.6% in the USA. The situation could be aggravated by another month of lockdowns. Coupled with the absence in the EU of a plan to stimulate an economy similar to the American one, it could provide additional support to the dollar and put pressure on the euro.
Analysts from Japanese bank Daiwa Securities note that dollars are now being bought not only by speculators but also by asset managers. And in their opinion, the USD DXY index will go up while the American economy improves and Treasury yields rise. This scenario is also supported by experts from Nordea Markets, according to whom the EUR/USD pair is expected to decline to the level of 1.1500.
On the other hand, excessive US stimulus measures could overheat the US economy. In addition, according to the WTO estimates, the surplus of dollars in the country will lead to an increase in demand for imports by 11.4%. Most of this demand will be met by exports from Asia and Europe. And if the countries of the Eurozone radically accelerate the rate of vaccination, then the preponderance will be on the side of the European currency.
It is clear that graphical analysis, 75% of oscillators and 95% of trend indicators on D1 are still colored red at the moment. However, the remaining 25% of the oscillators are already signaling that the pair is oversold. The picture is completely different On H4: about half of the indicators have switched to green.
As for the opinion of experts, the pair is expected to grow next week by 55% of them, however, when switching to the monthly forecast, their number grows to 65%. The bears' goals are 1.1700 and the low of November 2020 at 1.1600. The goals of the bulls are 1.1885 and 1.2000.
As for the events of the coming week, we can mention the publication of the ISM index of business activity in the services sector on Monday 05 April, the publication of the minutes of the US Fed's FOMS meeting on Wednesday 07 April and a speech of the head of the organization, Jerome Powell, on Thursday 08 April;

- GBP/USD. The British currency may continue to grow, as it did in the first two months of 2021. Especially so if there is a return to the country of major capital that fled from it due to Brexit. The pound is also supported by the successes of the early stages of vaccination against COVID-19. However, this may not be enough due to the problems after the UK exit from the EU, the impressive trade deficit and the country's budget deficit.
However, the majority of experts (65%) are quite optimistic about the future of the British currency at the moment. 15% predict its weakening, and the remaining 20% insist on a sideways trend.
The 1.3850 level can be designated as the support/resistance zone of the last eight weeks. It is the lateral movement along it that graphical analysis draws. On H4, the borders of the trading range look like 1.3755-1.3850. On D1, they are naturally much wider, 1.3670–1.4000.
85% of oscillators and 70% of trend indicators on D1 look north. Also, the green has an advantage among trend indicators on H4: those are 75%. But as for the oscillators, here 60% are painted in neutral gray, and 20% - in red and green;

- USD/JPY. It has been repeatedly written that the rate of this pair is greatly influenced by the yield of US Treasuries. However, the Bank of Japan has not been able to decide how to respond to rising yields on US securities and what to do with its own. If the yield on 10-year US bonds and commodity prices continue to rise, and the Japanese regulator does not respond to this, it could hit the yen hard. And it has already suffered quite tangible losses, having lost more than 800 points to the dollar over the past three months. 
Currently 85% of the trend indicators on H4 and 100% on D1 are facing north. 60% of the oscillators on H4 and 65% on D1 are looking in the same direction, the rest signal that the pair is overbought.
And a very interesting and unexpected picture emerged during a survey of analysts. Giving a weekly forecast, 70% of them were in favor of a correction to the south and 30% - for a sideways trend. The number of votes cast for the growth of the pair is 0. Moreover, when switching to a monthly forecast, the number of bears' supporters grows to 90%. The graphical forecast on both timeframes also supports the bearish scenario. Support levels are 110.35, 109.85, 109.00 and 108.50. The nearest resistance level is 111.00, the targets of the bulls are 111.70 and 112.20;

- cryptocurrencies. As has been noted many times, the "whales" store large stocks of bitcoins in cold wallets. According to Glassnode, not only the volume of frozen crypto assets is growing, but also the number of such long-term investors. For example, the Norwegian billionaire Oystein Stray Spetalen changed his attitude towards bitcoin in just one day! Back on March 18, he actively demanded that the EU authorities ban the cryptocurrency. And a day later ... he became an investor in the Norwegian crypto-exchange Miraiex, stating that "when the facts change, I also change." Another Norwegian billionaire, Kjell Inge Rokke, who opened a special company to invest in bitcoin, may have caused this turnaround. "I can’t let him make money, but me not," Spetalen said.
So, will there be an opportunity to make money on bitcoin anytime soon? During the current cycle, the price of the cryptocurrency has risen by almost 500% since October 2020 and has updated highs above $60,000. Bitcoin rallied during the first two months of 2021 but ran into a hurdle in March. However, according to a number of experts, historical data indicate that after the March rollback bitcoin's growth may continue in April. “The season may be the determining factor. - Danny Scott, head of CoinCorner exchange, said in a conversation with Forbes. - April always stands out because it marks the end of the UK and US tax period. If we start from historical information, April may well end with an upswing."
So, the data shows that bitcoin has risen by an average of 51% in April over the past 10 years. If this scenario is repeated, its price may be around of $80,000 by the end of the month. There were only two negative months of April: in 2014 (minus 6%) and in 2015 (minus 4%). But both of these times happened on bearish cycles, and therefore it is worth taking into account the "current sentiment in the industry." “Now we are, by and large, experiencing a bullish period, and momentum is consistently forming every week,” said Scott. If we apply Fibonacci levels to the charts of the BTC/USD pair, then the next targets for it may be the levels of $73,000 and $92,000.
It is appropriate to quote here the opinion of the popular cryptocurrency analyst Willy Woo, who said that we will see the final stage of the explosive growth of the first cryptocurrency rate this year. But it will also be the last one for a three-year bull cycle. Now the bitcoin rate is at a local bottom and there is no point in selling your BTC reserves, Woo thinks. “You have to be crazy to sell right now. At the bottom, bitcoin is now being bought up in huge volumes,” the analyst noted, citing the statistics of the Coinbase cryptocurrency exchange as an example. It is surprising that with such optimism of individual crypto enthusiasts, 70% of analysts expect not growth, but, on the contrary, a fall in the BTC/USD pair to the $50,000 mark during April.
And in conclusion of the review, we present you the next "miracle device" in our traditional micro-heading "Crypto Life Hacks". A group of enthusiasts adapted the Game Boy portable game console for cryptocurrency mining. A video about this was released on a YouTube channel. Only its 4 MHz Sharp processor was used directly for mining. However, this invention is unlikely to make the craftsmen millionaires: tests have shown that with a bitcoin rate of about $55,000, they will need 50 thousand years to mine $1.


NordFX Analytical Group


Notice: These materials should not be deemed a recommendation for investment or guidance for working on financial markets: they are for informative purposes only. Trading on financial markets is risky and can lead to a loss of money deposited.

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First, a review of last week’s events:

- EUR/USD. The dollar has periodically changed its status since the COVID-19 pandemic started, becoming either a safe haven currency or a risky asset for investors. For example, the US currency declined amid rising stock markets in November-December 2020. And since January, the dollar began to rise along with the S&P500. Now this index is in the area of its all-time high¬: 3.795. The DXY dollar index is also quoted in the area of annual highs: 92.72.   
The main reason for this volatility in the USD is the coronavirus situation and the US government's response to it. And the Fed threw in yet another riddle last week. Recall that it has become clear following the meeting of the Open Market Committee (FOMC) that the US Federal Reserve does not intend to raise interest rates until at least 2023. The Fed is not going to change other parameters of the quantitative easing (QE) program either. The bill signed by US President Joe Biden on a new $1.9 trillion package, according to the Fed, is quite a sufficient measure to stimulate the economy.
Just a few days later, Fed Chairman Jerome Powell announced that the regulator would gradually phase out $120 billion in monthly asset purchases from the moment the US economy almost fully recovers. And this, according to forecasts of the Fed itself could happen this summer.   
So, it turns out that the Government and the Senate may start a debate on winding down QE in the near future. But what about the information that the Biden Administration is now discussing another new package of fiscal stimulus for another $3.0 trillion?
The market "sided" with Jerome Powell this time, and the dollar continued to strengthen its positions. As predicted by the main forecast, which was voted for by the majority of analysts (65%), the EUR/USD pair went down, broke through the support at the 200-day SMA at 1.1825, and dropped to the 1.1760 horizon. This was followed by a slight rebound and a finish at 1.1790;
   
- GBP/USD. After a two-week stay in the sideways channel 1.3775-1.4000, the widespread strengthening dollar pulled the pair down. 55% of the experts were on the side of the bears, and they were right. The GBP/USD pair reached the local bottom at 1.3670 on Thursday, March 25, after which it returned to the lower border of the side channel, which turned from support to resistance. The last chord of the week sounded near it, at the level of 1.3790;   

- USD/JPY. The large-scale correction of the pair to the south never happened. Just 50 points were enough for the pair: having dropped to the level of 108.40, it turned around and went north again, following the strengthening dollar. The nearest target of the bulls was designated the height of 110.00, and the pair almost reached it: the week's high was fixed at 109.85. After that, it declined slightly and completed the working five days at 109.67; 

- cryptocurrencies. The forecast for the past week, which was supported by the majority of experts, was not most optimistic for the bulls. It assumed the cessation of growth, the breakdown of bitcoin's lower boundary of the upward channel and its lateral movement in the range of $50,000-60,000. Unfortunately for investors, this is exactly what happened. The BTC/USD pair was at a height of $60,000 on March 20, but it found a local bottom at around $50,290 on Thursday March 25. And if the fall in bitcoin was 16%, then some of the top altcoins lost about 25% in price.
One of the few that won was ripple. Starting at $0.4652 seven days before, it peaked at $0.5955 on March 22, and was trading at $0.5450 by the evening of Friday March 26.
In general, as we predicted, the crypto market turned out to be overheated. Elon Musk's statement that bitcoins accepted as payment for Tesla cars would no longer be converted into dollars did not help it either. such information could have pushed the market high up not so long ago, but now it has given only a small short-term impulse.
According to Skybridge Capital CEO and former White House communications director Anthony Scaramucci, Tesla has about $1.5 billion in BTC at the moment. In total, Elon Musk owns little more than $5 billion in bitcoins through Tesla, SpaceX and personally. Perhaps this is no longer enough, and bitcoin needs more powerful locomotives than Tesla or MicroStrategy to move the market up.
But just a few words from regulators such as the US Fed are enough to push it down. The head of the US Federal Reserve System Jerome Powell questioned the qualities of the first cryptocurrency as a tool for savings and payments. During his speech at the virtual summit of the Bank for International Settlements, he noted the high volatility of digital assets, because of which, in his opinion, they are useless as a means of accumulation. “They are not backed by anything and are used more for speculation, so they are not particularly popular as a means of payment. Crypto assets are more likely to replace gold rather than the dollar,” Powell said.
The fall of BTC/USD was evidently affected by the fall of the S&P500, with which such a risk asset as “digital gold” correlates more and more. Traders have closed about 240,000 positions over the past few days, and the total capitalization of the crypto market has decreased from $1805 billion to $1,680 billion. The Crypto Fear & Greed Index moved from 71 to the central zone during the week and is at 54, which is flat. However, it is possible that this is only a lull before the storm.


As for the forecast for the coming week, summarizing the views of a number of experts, as well as forecasts made on the basis of a variety of methods of technical and graphical analysis, we can say the following:

- EUR/USD. There are three main factors on the side of the American currency. The first is the successful vaccination of the population, including not only the results already achieved, but also the promise of President Biden to vaccinate 200 million US residents in the first 100 days of his stay in the White House. The second factor is the growing attractiveness of government bonds for foreign investors. And the third factor is the strength of the US economy, which is capable of lifting the economies of many other countries along with itself.
Europe has none of these factors. ECB Vice President Luis de Guindos did say that if vaccination in the Eurozone increases sharply by the summer, then Europe will face a sharp economic rise in Q3 and Q4. But these are just words.
At the moment, 70% of experts expect the dollar to continue strengthening and the EUR/USD pair to decline to the 1.1640-1.1700 zone. The ultimate target is the lows of September-November 2020 around 1.1600. This forecast is supported by 85% of trend indicators on H4 and 100% on D1, as well as 75% of oscillators on D1. The remaining 25% give signals that the pair is oversold.
Note that graphical analysis indicates that the euro may strengthen to 1.1880 in the coming days on both time frames, and the pair will go south only after that.
It should also be noted that when switching from a weekly to a monthly forecast, it is already 60% of analysts who vote for the growth of the EUR/USD pair. The targets are 1.2000 and 1.2200.
As for the events of the coming week, the release of data on the consumer markets in Germany on March 30 and the Eurozone on March 31 should be considered, as well as data on the US labor market on Wednesday March 31 (ADP report) and Friday April 02 (NFP). The speech of U.S. President Joe Biden on March 31 is also of interest. Markets will wait for signals from him regarding the steps that his administration will take to speed up the recovery of the country's economy;

- GBP/USD. We will receive UK GDP data for Q4 2020 on Wednesday, the last day of March. According to forecasts, the indicator will remain at the previous level of 1%. This is unlikely to add optimism to investors, but it will not upset them either. Therefore, 50% of them vote for the sideways trend, 40% for the strengthening of the dollar and only 10% for the strengthening of the British pound.
The technical analysis readings are as follows. On H4: 50% of the oscillators point to the north, 50% to the south. The trend indicators have a similar pattern. D1 is dominated by red. 65% of oscillators and 70% of trend indicators are colored red. 
The nearest support levels are 1.3760, 1.3700, 1.3670, resistance levels are 1.3820, 1.3900, 1.3960. The targets are 1.4000 and 1.3600, respectively;

- USD/JPY. The pair reached a nine-month high at 109.85 last week, showing an impressive increase of almost 730 points over the past three months. This suggests that such traditional safe havens, which is the yen, are now of little interest to investors.
It is unlikely that the Tankan index will greatly affect the market sentiment. Published by the Bank of Japan, this index reflects general business conditions for large manufacturing companies. Tankan is an economic indicator of Japan, which is heavily dependent on export-oriented industry. The index value above 0 is positive for the yen, the value below 0, respectively, is a negative factor. However, according to forecasts, the value of the index, which will be published on Thursday April 01, will not be higher or lower, but equal to 0. This is a neutral value. Although, it is possible that it will support the Japanese currency somewhat, since Tankan was at minus 10 a quarter earlier. But it is likely to be only a small correction of the USD/JPY pair to the south.
Overall, most analysts (60%) remain bullish, expecting it to consolidate above the 110.00 horizon. The targets are 111.70 and 112.20. 100% of trend indicators and 75% of oscillators agree with this scenario. The remaining 25% give signals that the pair is overbought.   
The remaining 40% of experts, supported by graphic analysis, still hope for a long-awaited correction to the south. At the same time, when moving to monthly and quarterly forecasts, their number increases to 75%. Support levels in case the pair falls are 109.00, 108.60, 108.40, 106.65. The target is zone 106.00;

 - cryptocurrencies. It was noticed that not only plants start growing in the spring, but also bitcoin quotes. So, the BTC/USD pair rose in April by an average of 40% for the past three years. That is, this time it should be somewhere in the area of $70,000-75,000 by the end of April. Call options with expiration on April 30 show similar expectations. Those are now open at a price of $80,000 on derivative exchanges for a total of $240,000,000. Its active withdrawal to cold wallets continues in anticipation of a new growth cycle for the main cryptocurrency.
We have already talked more than once about the support package for the US economy in the amount of $1.9 trillion, of which, according to a study by Mizuho Securities, US citizens can spend $20-25 billion on the purchase of cryptocurrency. Following this anti-Covid package, another one is possible, in the amount of $3.0 trillion. And if adopted, it would also benefit the crypto market.
But all this is in the future. In the meantime, 60% of analysts believe that the BTC/USD pair will move along the Pivot Point of $50,000 for the next one or two weeks, fluctuating in the $46,500-56,000 range.
If we talk about a long-term forecast, according to the co-founder and former CEO of the BTCC cryptocurrency exchange Bobby Lee, the price of bitcoin can rise to $300,000, after which the growth will be replaced by a long-term decline. “Bitcoin bull market cycles occur every four years, and the current one is a big cycle. I think that bitcoin may rise to $100,000 this summer,” he said. However, after reaching an all-time high of $300,000, even a small price decrease will cause the bubble to collapse. Lee suggested that the new crypto winter will last between two and three years, and "investors should be prepared for the fact that the value of bitcoin could fall 80-90% from the historical peak."
And in conclusion of the review, we present you the next "miracle device" in our micro-heading "Crypto Life Hacks". WiseMining has recently introduced the Sato ASIC miner boiler that allows you to heat water by mining bitcoin. The intermediate coolant of the boiler is a special dielectric coolant. The liquid boils and evaporates in the ASIC cooling unit, the vapor rises into the tank coil and condenses, giving off heat to the water. Condensation flows back into the cooling unit of the miner. The developers provided the possibility of connecting this water heater to the main heating system of the room. Sato sales will begin as early as this April.
And one more "life hack", from the criminal world. According to a new study by analytical company Elliptic, the largest darknet market, Hydra, has a new way of exchanging cryptocurrency for fiat money. The vacuum-packed treasure with money is buried "5-20 cm underground", and the exact GPS coordinates are communicated to the buyer. This same method has long been used to sell illegal substances such as drugs. However, it is quite risky, as bandits sometimes track down customers and take away "the parcels". The consequences in this case are unpredictable.


NordFX Analytical Group


Notice: These materials should not be deemed a recommendation for investment or guidance for working on financial markets: they are for informative purposes only. Trading on financial markets is risky and can lead to a loss of money deposited.

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It is possible to make money on currency fluctuations not only by trading. Forex PAMM services allow even those who have no previous trading experience to profit from changes in prices of foreign currency assets. On the other hand, for a professional trader, the Forex PAMM service is an opportunity to increase the size of their trading capital.

What is a PAMM account

PAMM account (from English PAMM - Percent Allocation Management Module) is a special investment account connected to the account of the managing trader. The essence of its work is simple. The trader makes an offer (offer of cooperation with clearly defined conditions), and investors contribute their funds to such an account. As a result of the trading conducted by the managing trader, the profits obtained are distributed among these parties in the proportion specified in the offer.

Key participants in PAMM services

There are three main parties involved in investing in PAMM services:
1. Managing trader. This is a broker's client who has a certain trading experience, confirmed by statistics.
2. Investor. A person who invests their funds into the account of a managing trader. Profits from the results of managing trader's work.
3. PAMM service. This is a broker, for example, NordFX, where trading and financial settlements between the manager and the investor are carried out.

It should be noted that one investor can simultaneously distribute their funds among several managers, forming an optimal investment portfolio, and one manager can accept funds from several investors at the same time.

PAMM services from a manager's point of view

Any trader can become a manager. To do this, you need to register with a broker, for example, NordFX, open a PAMM account, create an offer that will reflect the trader's commission, top up the account and start trading.

By and large, the activities of a manager are not much different from standard trading, but there is one exception. All trader's results will be recorded and displayed for all to see in the form of detailed statistics. It is necessary so that investors can assess the potential of the manager and decide how well the manager's trading strategies are suitable for the investment.

In the NordFX brokerage company, investors can evaluate a manager's trading by almost 50 different parameters that allow them to predict not only potential profit, but also possible risks.  

The managing trader will receive their share of the profit based on the results of their work. The rest will be distributed among all investors in the proportion specified in the offer. Moreover, all this is closely watched by the broker who provided the platform for the PAMM service, so that the trader does not have to calculate anything manually. There are no risks of conflict between the manager and investors due to miscalculations either.

What is the main advantage of a PAMM account from the manager's point of view? First of all, this is an opportunity to significantly increase your income from trading on the international Forex market. In addition to their own funds, the manager will work with investors' money and receive a percentage of the profit for this. The better the trading results, the higher the profit, the more investors will invest their funds in this manager.

As for the flaws, there are none. The manager conducts their usual trading, risks their own funds as usual  and does not bear any additional responsibility to investors for the results of trading. If successful, the number of investors who want to join the trader will grow. However, if the manager is trading at a loss, there will be no people willing to join their account.

PAMM accounts from an investor's point of view

Not only those who trade on their own, but also those who, for some reason, cannot engage in trading, can make money on the international Forex market. For example, you can't make money, you don't have talent, you don't want to study, you don't have time, and so on. But even in these cases, not all is lost.

The fact is that Forex offers almost limitless opportunities for earning money. It is one of the most liquid markets, with a daily turnover of trillions of US dollars, and many traders are keen to work in it. There is no supply of real assets here, and a trader can conclude a sell transaction with numerous financial instruments, even without possessing them.

For an investor, the Forex market is an opportunity to generate passive income by investing their funds in successful managers. Although this type of work cannot be called completely passive. The fact is that the investor will have to perform a certain amount of analytical work. But it will be connected not with how to predict market fluctuations in currencies, but with how to correctly choose a trader who will be entrusted with managing investor's funds.

What are the main advantages of investing in PAMM?

There are several of them:
1. Investing in Forex through PAMM is very convenient. You, as an investor, only need to choose a suitable manager and connect to their account.
2. Full automation. You don't have to deal with any calculations and settlements. The whole process is fully automated on the broker platform.
3. Control by the broker. The risks of cheating on the part of the trader are excluded. Everything is controlled by the service that provides PAMM investment services. For example, the manager does not have access to the funds that are on the investment accounts connected to him. He or she does not have the slightest opportunity to steal investors' funds and disappear with them in an unknown direction. 
4. Investors are offered a convenient investment format. The trading history and comprehensive multifactorial statistics for all managing traders are available, which allows you to evaluate their trading strategies and make competent and weighted decisions.
5. Investing in Forex using PAMM is possible without knowledge of this market. As a depositor, you do not need to dive into the intricacies of trading. All this knowledge is necessary only for the manager.
6. Possibility to create your own investment portfolio. Forex PAMM accounts make it possible for you to diversify your investments by choosing several traders with different trading styles and ratios of profit and risk.

Choosing a manager or how to create your portfolio

Investing through PAMM can be quite profitable. However, there are moments that require effort from those who are going to engage in such activities. The fact is that Forex PAMM accounts, including those at the NordF X broker, are a variety of managers. And the choice is not only about finding the most acceptable conditions in terms of the offer. As mentioned above, investing in the Forex market requires a thorough analysis of the trader’s statistics.

There are three main types of trading strategies that managers use: aggressive, balanced, conservative.

Aggressive managers usually perform well in terms of profit, which can reach hundreds or thousands of percent. But, accordingly, they have quite high risks and large drawdowns. Such accounts are more likely than others to suffer serious losses and can even lead to a complete loss of capital.

Balanced managers show average income. But the risks are also relatively low. Such PAMM Forex accounts suffer losses much less often than aggressive ones.

Finally, conservative accounts show low income. At the same time, investments in Forex with such managers pose the lowest risks. Such traders usually conduct their trading activities the longest, which is reflected in their history on the “showcase” of the PAMM service.

Which option should one choose?

This is where we come to the need to create an investment portfolio. If you plan to invest using PAMM technologies, investments are not much different from buying stocks or other instruments. Classic portfolios usually include different asset categories, both low and high-risk.

When working with PAMM brokers, such as NordFX, your task is to assemble approximately the same portfolio where risks and potential returns are balanced. That is, you can invest in all the categories of managers described above, from aggressive to conservative. As a result, you will be able to get a fairly high profit with limited risks.

In terms of percentage, there are many guidelines. Some experts believe that it would be ideal to allocate only 20% of the total account to aggressive accounts, and divide the rest between balanced and conservative. However, this ratio is not a must. You can determine how aggressive your portfolio will be and make calculations based on it.

Some recommendations for choosing PAMM accounts

And now back to the question of how to choose the most suitable Forex PAMM account. There are several important criteria to pay attention to:
1. Age of the PAMM account. This indicator is particularly important for those investors who plan to invest in aggressive strategies. The longer such managers show positive results, the more reliable they are.
2. Average monthly expected return. This indicator is made up of average monthly profits for previous periods. This way you can see how effective the trader's strategy is and what style of trading they use.
3. Maximum drawdown. This is an equally important indicator that reflects the investor's risks. The higher the maximum drawdown, the more aggressive the trader's style is, and the higher the probability of losing your funds.

Important criteria for evaluation are:
1. The used leverage. Naturally, the higher it is, the greater the load on the deposit, the greater the risks.
2. Limiting risks by the managing trader. If they make up more than 30% of the deposit, the manager either does not use stop orders, or shifts or deletes them in the expectation of a price reversal.
3. The use of various aggressive wealth management systems. The most famous in this case is the Martingale, which is described in numerous textbooks and articles on Forex. Some managers indicate the use of this approach in their offers. But even if this is not the case, it is possible to understand that the manager applies a similar method by loading the deposit and increasing losses during periods of long recoilless trends in traded currency pairs.

When planning to invest in a PAMM service, it is necessary to take into account the ratio of risk and return. This applies to a greater extent to those who will compose their own investment portfolios of managers. Many experts say that the profitability should always be 2-3 times higher than the risk. If the profitability is equal to the risk, you may face such a situation when after a certain period of time, your total profit will be equal to ... 0.

When working with PAMM services, it is very important to establish in advance the conditions for exit, that is, the completion of work with one or another manager (at least temporarily). Various criteria can be used for this, including:
1. Exceeding the maximum drawdown. This is one of the important indicators of risk that you should focus on. It says that the trader has started to work even more aggressively and there are chances of receiving serious losses.
2. Change of the manager's trading system. This is not exactly a reason to part with the manager. Rather, it is a reason for analyzing and re-evaluating the terms of this cooperation and the volume of investments. Perhaps the trader's trading system has become more flexible and efficient than in the original version. In this case, the manager can not only remain in the portfolio, but also get a larger share of investments. However, if irrational, from your point of view, changes have been made to the system, it's time to think about stopping such cooperation.


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First, a review of last week’s events:

- EUR/USD. It has become clear following the meeting of the Open Market Committee (FOMC) that the US Federal Reserve does not intend to raise interest rates until at least 2023. The Fed is not going to change other parameters of the quantitative easing (QE) program either, as long as inflation in the United States is growing, the manufacturing sector is recovering, and is pulling up the service sector. The bill signed by US President Joe Biden on a new $1.9 trillion package, according to the Fed, is quite a sufficient measure to stimulate the economy at this stage.
This position of the American regulator satisfied (or upset) both bulls and bears on the EUR/USD pair to the same extent, and as a result the pair spent the whole week in a narrow sideways channel with an amplitude of only 110 points, 1.1875-1.1985, and ended the trading session near the 1.1900 level;

- GBP/USD. As mentioned above, the US Fed refused to adjust its monetary policy. But the management of the Bank of England refused to do the same unanimously at its meeting on Thursday March 18. According to their statement, the bank "does not intend to tighten monetary policy at least until there is clear evidence of the use of untapped potential and the achievement of the 2 percent inflation target." So, one should not expect a rise in interest rates on the pound.
As a result of the identical decisions of both regulators, the GBP/USD pair continued to move sideways. Recall that last week, a third of experts voted for the growth of the pair, a third - for its fall, and the remaining third made a Solomon decision, announcing that the pair would move eastward, limiting the growth by the resistance at 1.4000, and the fall by the support at 1.3775. And this forecast turned out to be almost perfect. The fluctuations of the pair were limited to the range of 1.3800-1.4000. The last chord sounded at 1.3865;

- USD/JPY. The Japanese regulator also performed in a chorus with the US Federal Reserve and the Bank of England. The Bank of Japan left the interest rate at the same negative level, minus 0.1%, on Friday, March 19. At the same time, it will continue to buy back long-term bonds in order to maintain the yield on its 10-year securities at near zero. The statements of the Bank's management regarding the prospects for monetary policy were also consonant vague with the statements of their colleagues from the USA and Great Britain: “we are ready for changes as needed”. It is not specified what the criteria for such "necessity" are. 
The result of such a “sluggish” week was the consolidation of the USD/JPY pair in an even narrower range than EUR/USD and GBP/USD. After holding in the channel 108.60-109.35 for all the five days, it finished at 108.87; 

- cryptocurrencies. Bitcoin renewed its all-time high once again over the past week, reaching $61,670. This was followed by a quick rollback. However, the main currency managed to stay within the upward channel, having received support at its lower border, in the $53,300-53,900 zone. This correction attracted buyers waiting for a new opportunity for their purchases, and the BTC/USD pair is trading around $58,500 on the evening of Friday March 19.
One of the reasons that bitcoin has not yet been able to gain a foothold above $60,000, according to JPMorgan strategist Nikolaos Panigirtzoglou, was a decrease in institutional investment. Thus, the volume of retail investment in bitcoin in the first quarter of 2021 exceeded the investment of institutional investors, who reduced the volume of cryptocurrency purchases. Retail investors purchased over 187,000 BTC tokens, while institutional purchases amounted to approximately 172,684 BTC.
According to Compound Capital Advisors investment company calculations, bitcoin has become the most profitable investment in the last 10 years and has surpassed all asset classes by at least 10 times, providing an average annual return of 230%. The Nasdaq 100 came in second with an annualized return of 20%, followed by US stocks with a market capitalization of more than $10 billion with an annualized return of 14%. Also, studies have shown that gold has shown a meager return of 1.5% per annum since 2011, and five of the last 11 years have brought losses to this asset.
Since 2011, BTC's combined profit has been a whopping 20 million percent. 2013 was the most successful year for bitcoin as it grew by 5507%. In addition, it is important to note that BTC has shown an annualized loss in just two years of its history: it fell 58% in 2014 and 73% in 2018.
All these figures are impressive for some, and they are intimidating for others. For example, the head of the Visa payment giant agreed that cryptocurrencies could become widespread over the next 5 years. In addition to JPMorgan, the largest American bank Morgan Stanley has shown loyalty to digital assets, promising to provide its large clients with the opportunity to own bitcoin.
But Bank of America published the report "Little Dirty Secrets of Bitcoin" on March 17, in which it announced that this token is an exclusively speculative instrument. "Without rising prices, there is no reason to own this cryptocurrency," the report says. "The asset is impractical either as a store of value, or as a method of payment, and 95% of Bitcoin belongs to the owners of 2.4% of wallets." The bankers recalled the negative impact of BTC on the environment due to high energy costs for mining as well as the low transaction speed. Although, one can guess that it is not this that worries them most of all, but the prospect of losing a significant share of income due to the development of the crypto market.
Note that the total capitalization of the crypto market over the last week increased from $1756 billion to $1805 billion. However, it could not break through the important psychological level of $2 trillion: the maximum value of $1851 billion was reached on March 14, after which the indicators fell slightly. As for the Crypto Fear & Greed Index, it practically did not change over the week: 71 now versus 70 seven days ago.


As for the forecast for the coming week, summarizing the views of a number of experts, as well as forecasts made on the basis of a variety of methods of technical and graphical analysis, we can say the following:

- EUR/USD. In general, both experts and indicators have a bearish mood. Despite the US Federal Reserve's refusal to raise interest rates until 2023, investors are still guided by a favorable economic scenario. Mass vaccinations and direct payments to US citizens should support the dollar, even though some of that $380 bn will be invested in riskier assets.  
Most analysts (65%) expect the dollar to strengthen in the coming week. In their opinion, the EUR/USD pair should retest the support of 1.1835. The bearish forecast is also supported by 65% of oscillators and 85% of trend indicators on time frames H4 and D1. Recall that, from the point of view of technical analysis, the support level here is still the 200-day SMA at 1.1825. In case of its breakthrough, the next targets will be 1.1800 and 1.1745. The ultimate target is the lows of September-November 2020 around 1.1600.
As for the bulls, the resistance levels here are 1.1980, 1.2025, 1.2060 and 1.2100. And if the bullish forecast is supported by only 35% of experts now, the balance of forces changes in a mirror-like manner when switching to the forecast for April: it is already 65% who support the growth of the pair and only 35% are for its fall.
Graphic analysis also points to the pair falling. And also, not immediately. At first, according to its readings, having fought off the zone 1.1880-1.1900, the pair should rise to the level of 1.1980, and only then go south.
As for the events of the coming week, Jerome Powell's numerous speeches on March 22, 23 and 24 could be noted. However, the head of the FRS is unlikely to say anything new: everything important was already said last week. Therefore, we advise you to pay attention to the data on business activity of Markit of Germany and the Eurozone, which will be announced on Wednesday March 24. As for the American statistics, data on orders for durable goods will be published on the same day, and annual data on GDP of the United States the next day. 

- GBP/USD. The head of the Bank of England Andrew Bailey is also scheduled to speak on March 23 and 25. And just like in the case of his colleague from overseas, Jerome Powell, no surprises from his speeches should be expected. Of interest may be: data on the UK labour market March 23, and data on business activity and consumer market of this country on March 25.
It is clear that the technical indicators on the GBP/USD pair on H4 are looking to the south. However, they reflect the trend of only the last two days of the past week. As for the indicators on D1, there is complete discord: the two-week sideways trend is getting visible. Graphical analysis on both time frames also indicates a sideways trend in the trading range of a week ago - 1.3775-1.4000. There is no serious preponderance in the forecasts of experts: 45% side with the bulls, 55% side with the bears. The targets are 1.4240 and 1.3600, respectively;

- USD/JPY. The further strengthening of the dollar and the growth of the pair is indicated by graphical analysis at both time intervals, H4 and D1. 85% of trend indicators and 65% of oscillators on D1 agree with it. The rest of the oscillators are either in the overbought zone or are already colored red.
As for the experts, 55% of them expect a correction to the south, although they agree that it may be short-term. However, with the transition to monthly and quarterly forecasts, the number of supporters of the fall of the pair increases to 75%.
The nearest target of the bulls is 109.50-110.00. Support levels in case the pair falls are 108.35, 106.65, 106.10 and 105.70;

 - cryptocurrencies. The struggle between those who believe in the bright future of cryptocurrency and those who predict its destruction continues. This is especially noticeable among large institutional investors. And their opinion depends largely on the opinion of regulators.
The position of regulators in different countries is very different. For example, the Indian authorities have a bill nearly ready which prohibits operations with cryptocurrencies and introduces criminal and administrative liability for miners and traders. And the US head of the Fed Jerome Powell, on the contrary, does not deny the combination of traditional finance and cryptocurrencies. Although, of course, most likely he is pinning his hopes on the digital currency of the American Central Bank (CDBC).
Note that the governments of many large countries are considering the possibility of issuing digital counterparts of their own fiat currencies. And, most likely, they do not need competitors in the form of bitcoin and top altcoins at all. So, it is possible that we will see real battles between the public and private sectors in the near future, not only at national, but also at international platforms.
In the meantime, central banks continue to print unsecured money to support their economies in the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic. And according to the TV presenter and founder of the investment company Heisenberg Capital Max Kaiser, this will lead to a "hyperinflationary collapse" of national currencies and the growth of bitcoin to $220,000 already this year. Moreover, Kaiser believes that the advantages of bitcoin in global payments will render banks useless. As he stated, “$5 trillion a day in the foreign exchange market could be completely replaced by bitcoin.”
At the moment, according to analysts at JPMorgan, the main focus is on the growth of retail investment associated with the next portion of payments to US citizens as part of the economic stimulus program. According to a study by Mizuho Securities, of the $380 billion that US citizens will receive in the form of economic assistance, about 10% can be spent on the purchase of two types of assets: bitcoin and stocks. The study found that two out of five Americans who expect to receive checks in the coming days intend to use some of these funds for investment. According to Dan Dolev, Managing Director of Mizuho Securities, bitcoin is expected to account for 60% of the total investment, which could add about 3% to the market capitalization of the cryptocurrency.
Of course, 3% is a small figure. Perhaps that is why only 35% of experts believe that the main cryptocurrency will be able to steadily gain a foothold above $60,000 by the end of spring and even rise to $75,000. The majority of analysts (65%) predict bitcoin a sideways movement in the $50,000-60,000 channel.


NordFX Analytical Group


Notice: These materials should not be deemed a recommendation for investment or guidance for working on financial markets: they are for informative purposes only. Trading on financial markets is risky and can lead to a loss of money deposited.

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First, a review of last week’s events:

- EUR/USD. Recall that   the head of the Fed Jerome Powell literally brought down the American stock markets with his speech on February 4. Powell stayed indifferent to the surge in US Treasury yields, which closed at an annual high. At the same time, he hinted at the possibility of premature tightening of monetary policy.
And although the head of the Fed stressed that the economy is far from overheating, and he does not yet see the need to raise the interest rate, the market has had a hint of a possible change in monetary policy. In response, the Treasury yields rushed up with the dollar, and the stock market rolled down. The S&P500 lost over 120 points and the Dow Jones Industrial Average lost over 300 points.
And then, everything changed on Tuesday March 09. Strong growth in technology stocks, positive statistics from the labor market, growth in household assets and a bill signed by US President Joe Biden on a new stimulus package for $1.9 trillion pushed the American stock market up. The S&P500 index not only fully recovered from losses, but also updated its historical high, reaching the mark of 3.960. As for long-term treasuries, their profitability, on the contrary, has stabilized. And this despite the fact that the volume of submitted applications exceeded the volume of the issue by 2.38 times, and foreign investors purchased about 20% of securities of the total volume of $38 billion.
The EUR/USD pair reached a height of 1.1990 on Thursday March 11 due to these factors. However, it failed to reach the 1.2000 level. The fall of the pair and the weakening of the euro was facilitated by the statement of the ECB management on the increase in the rate of buying bonds under the PEPP (Pandemic Emergency Purchase Program). But it turned out to be not convincing enough, and nothing was said about scaling up the PEPP. As a result, the fall of the pair was insignificant, and it ended the week at the level of 1.1950;   

- GBP/USD. More and more experts are wondering if the pound has passed its high on February 24. Is it time to consolidate with the dollar? The British currency has shown an impressive growth of 2830 points against its American “colleague” (from 1.1410 to 1.4240) starting from the third decade of March 2020. And we have been observing the sideways movement of the GBP/USD pair along the Pivot Point of 1.3900 for the last two weeks. The upper border of the trading range is drawn quite clearly: this is the resistance at 1.4000. Two support levels can be considered as the lower one: the nearest one - 1.3850 and the next one - 1.3775.
The GBP/USD chart of the last week is very similar to the EUR/USD chart. This suggests that both the pound and the euro are not so much independent players in the market now as hostages of the US Federal Reserve's monetary policy and rates on US government bonds. Having started the five-day week at 1.3840, the pair was moving within the above range for the whole week, and set the last chord at 1.3925;
 
- USD/JPY. The yen has passed one milestone after another in recent weeks, and the USD/JPY pair reached the eight-month highs. Many traders are afraid to open both long and short positions in such a situation. On the one hand, the pair was already overbought, and on the other, it could still fly further upward by inertia. This is what happened in fact: it first rose to the level of 109.25, then a correction to 108.35 followed, and a new rise to the horizon of 109.00, where the pair ended the working week;  

- cryptocurrencies. Bitcoin peaked at $58,340 on February 21, after which it pulled back to $43,160, shrinking by 26%. According to Material Indicators, this decline was used by whales and institutions to buy assets from small investors. For example, the number of orders for the purchase of BTC in the amount from $0.1 million to $1 million reached record values on the Binance crypto exchange. And now, twenty days later, on March 12, Bitcoin broke the $58,000 bar again. However, at the time of writing the review, It could not update the historical high, stopping at $58,240
The BTC/USD pair rose last week amid the rise in the US stock market. Although, most likely, this is only a formal reason, and not a real reason for the activation of the bulls. It was clear that they would definitely make an attempt to rise above $60,000. And the only question was when it would happen.
According to CryptoQuant, the demand for bitcoins continues to grow, and their number on exchanges has fallen to a two-year low. As Bloomberg experts point out in their February report, bitcoin is becoming an increasingly popular asset among a wide variety of investors and is gradually replacing gold from their portfolios. According to the authors of the report, the reduction in the range of price fluctuations signals that the main cryptocurrency has actually become an alternative to traditional investment assets.
The overall capitalization of the crypto market is also committed to new heights, along with bitcoin. It grew from $1444 billion to $1756 billion over the week. And now the volume of $2 trillion will become an important psychological level for it.
Interestingly, despite the weekly growth of the BTC/USD pair by 20%, the Crypto Fear & Greed Index, on the contrary, fell from 77 to 70, which may indicate the general bullish mood of the market.
And another interesting observation. Bitcoin's market dominance has declined from 70.4% to 61.4% since early 2021. The indicators of altcoins from the TOP-10 have also gone down or remained at the same levels. But the total capitalization of smaller tokens has risen from 10.3% to 14.4%. It is unlikely that these coins can arouse the interest of large investors. Therefore, such statistics can only indicate that players have begun to use them more actively for short-term speculation.


As for the forecast for the coming week, summarizing the views of a number of experts, as well as forecasts made on the basis of a variety of methods of technical and graphical analysis, we can say the following:

- EUR / USD A meeting of the US Federal Reserve will take place on March 16-17. We are waiting for the Summary of Economic Forecasts from the Open Market Committee (FOMC), the decision on the interest rate, commentary on monetary policy and a press conference by the Fed management following the meeting. The interest rate is likely to remain unchanged at 0.25%. Therefore, the regulator's forecasts will be of particular interest. High expectations will once again highlight the gap between the pace of economic recovery in the US and the Eurozone. Investors will also be concerned about the possibility of tightening monetary policy and the attitude of the Fed management to changes in government bond yields. Consolidation of 10-year yields in the 1.5-1.6% range will help the stock market and push the EUR/USD pair above 1.2000.
So far, the advantage is on the side of the dollar. 70% of experts, supported by graphical analysis, 85% of oscillators and 80% of trend indicators on D1, expect the pair to drop to the 1.1800-1.1850 zone. Support here is still the 200-day SMA at 1.1826. The nearest support is 1.1900.
An alternative view is held by 30% of analysts, supported by graphical analysis on H4. As for the technical indicators on this time frame, their readings are still confusing. Note that when switching from a weekly to a monthly forecast, the number of experts supporting bulls increases to 60%. Resistance levels are 1.2025, 1.2060, 1.2170, 1.2200 and 1.2270;

- GBP/USD. In addition to the meeting of the US Fed, a meeting of the Bank of England will take place on Thursday March 18. It is likely that its results will not affect investors as much as those of their peers on the other side of the Atlantic. However, information on the course of the British economic recovery and its prospects will certainly be given. The market will also be concerned about what is going on in relations with the European Union after Brexit.
The opinions of experts are divided equally at the moment. A third of them, together with graphical analysis on H4, believe that the pair will hold within the 1.3775-1.4000 trading range. Another third, supported by graphical analysis on D1, expects a rise to the February 24 high of 1.4240. And finally, the remaining third is waiting for the pair to fall to the 1.3600 zone;

- USD/JPY. It should become clear in the coming week whether the Japanese currency will stop its decline, and the USD/JPY pair - its rapid rise. There are three determinant factors: the yield of American bonds, the US Federal Reserve meeting and the meeting of the Bank of Japan on Friday, March 19, at which it should determine its policy for the near future.
The rise in US bond yields is pushing the yen down, and the Japanese regulator is expected to react to this catastrophic collapse. Whether the BOJ will insist on controlling the yield curve is open for now.
It should be noted that the last fall in the yen and the growth of USD/JPY on March 12 took place at increased volumes. This indicates that the interest of major players in the continuation of the uptrend of the pair has still not dried up. The trend can be reversed down by either the consolidation of the yield on US securities, or an active sale of risky assets.
But at the time of this writing, 55% of experts expect that the pair will still be able to rise to the 109.50-110.00 zone. 20% are in favor of sideways movement and 25% are for the fall of the pair. Almost 100% of the trend indicators on both H4 and D1 are painted red. Among the oscillators on H4, there are 80% of those, but on D1, 35% are already giving signals that the pair is overbought, which indicates an imminent possible downward correction. In the transition from a weekly to a monthly forecast, 80% of analysts are already expecting the pair to decline and return to the 105.00 zone,. Support levels are 108.35, 106.65, 106.10 and 105.70;

 - cryptocurrencies. Recall that in early March, the head of the crypto bank Galaxy Digital Mike Novogratz sharply changed the forecast for the BTC rate for the end of 2021.  “It feels like,” said the banker, “we’ll stay for a bit between $42,000 and $60,000, and then see the next big jump to $100,000.
The Bloomberg team is also positive about the further rate of the main cryptocurrency. "After the coin broke above $50,000, it got the opportunity to test higher values. Demand for this asset is increasing, and its macroeconomic indicators are improving,” they say in their February report. According to Bloomberg analysts, bitcoin will be able to reach $100,000 this year, and its value will also continue to rise in the long term.
So how long will bitcoin hang out, in Mike Novogratz's words, between $42,000 and $60,000? Or are we on the eve of the big jump?
A number of experts are pessimistic. As the reason, they point to miners who are buying more and more video cards on new chips, which leads to higher prices and a shortage of such cards on the market. This situation is somewhat reminiscent of the end of December 2017 - January 2018, when the mining boom ended with a market collapse, the destruction of many miners and the onset of a crypto winter. There may not be a new winter this time, experts say, but strong frosts are not entirely out of the question.
In the longer term, electricity costs for mining will also hinder the growth of digital assets. They are constantly growing, and this process consumes energy comparable to that of a country like the Netherlands already. At some point, it will require the energy of the whole world to generate just one unit. And this, according to futurologists from Singularity University, will become an insurmountable obstacle for the crypto market.
However, if there are bear pessimists, then there will certainly be bull optimists. So, according to the head of ARK Investment Cathie Wood, the price of bitcoin is most correlated with real estate prices  at the moment. But in the future, she believes, bitcoin will become similar to low-risk instruments like bonds and will enter the recommended portfolio of investors. “I think the first cryptocurrency will behave like fixed income markets,” Wood said to CNBC. “We have survived a 40-year bond bull market. And we won't be surprised if this new asset class becomes part of the investment portfolio. Perhaps it will be 60% stocks, 20% bonds and 20% cryptocurrency.”
The forecast, according to which the bitcoin rate may reach $1 million or more in the next 10 years, was announced by the CEO of the Kraken crypto exchange Jesse Powell. “Right now we are only guessing, but if you value bitcoin in dollars, then you must understand that its value tends to infinity", he said. In a dialogue with Bloomberg reporters, the head of Kraken also said that bitcoin could eventually replace all major fiat currencies that are not backed by gold and other precious metals. However, he agreed that there is a risk of sharp market fluctuations, and that prices could "rise or fall by 50% any day." Therefore, according to Powell, when investing in bitcoin, it is necessary to be ready to keep it in your portfolio for at least five years.


NordFX Analytical Group


Notice: These materials should not be deemed a recommendation for investment or guidance for working on financial markets: they are for informative purposes only. Trading on financial markets is risky and can lead to a loss of money deposited.

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NordFX Brokerage company has summed up the performance of its clients' trade transactions in February. The services of social trading, PAMM and CopyTrading, as well as the profit received by the company's IB-partners have also been assessed.

The first line in the rating of the most successful traders has been taken once again by a client from Vietnam, account No. 1416XXX, who received a profit of USD 29,880 on trades, most of which were carried out in pairs with gold (XAU/USD) and bitcoin (BTC/USD). The same trader was in the lead a month ago with an income of 83.598 USD obtained on transactions with the same two trading instruments.

The second place has been taken by a client from China, account No. 1536XXX. The client earned 23,640 USD in February, and their earnings were also based on operations with gold.

But the trader who took the third step of the podium (account No. 1503XXX) used a variety of trading instruments (GBP/AUD, AUD/NZD, EUR/CAD, EUR/AUD, CAD/CHF and AUD/USD), and achieved no less impressive success. Their profit for February was USD 20,716.

According to the results of the shortest month of the year, a competition unfolded among signal providers in the CopyTrading service. Let's list the TOP-3 of February: RichieFX-EA (profit 188%, maximum drawdown 49%), GOLD RUSH Inc. (profit 129%, drawdown 51%) and VN.NO1 (profit 110%, drawdown 31%).

As for PAMM, the past month was not as successful, but if you look at the entire investment period, then, for example, the manager under the nickname WyseTrader9711 showed a profit of 61.45% with a maximum drawdown of 15.7%, and the results of the ProCapital manager were 24.9% with a drawdown of only 9.8%, which is several times higher than the income on bank deposits in USD.

Commission fees of NordFX IB-partners almost doubled in February compared to January, which indicates a serious growth in trading activity. The TOP 3 of the month is as follows:
- the largest commission, USD 17282, was credited to a partner from India, account No.1527xxx;
- next is a partner from Sri lanka, account number 1483xxx, who received 11.749 USD;
- and, finally, a partner from China, account No. 1336xxx, who received 11.233 USD as a reward, closes the top three.


Notice: These materials are not investment recommendations or guidelines for working in financial markets and are intended for informational purposes only. Trading in financial markets is risky and can result in a complete loss of deposited funds.


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First, a review of last week’s events:

- EUR/USD. There is a saying, “a new broom sweeps clean”. If the previous US President Donald Trump were in the shoes of Joe Biden now, he would probably call the head of the Fed Jerome Powell a "traitor" for the fact that his speech on Thursday February 04 literally brought down the stock markets of America. Powell stayed indifferent to the surge in US Treasury yields, which closed at an annual high. At the same time, he hinted at the possibility of premature tightening of monetary policy.
And although the head of the Fed stressed that the economy is far from overheating, and he does not yet see the need to raise the interest rate, the market has had a hint of a possible change in monetary policy. In response, the 10-year Treasury yields rushed up with the dollar, and the stock market rolled down. The S&P500 lost over 120 points and the Dow Jones Industrial Average lost over 300 points.
The decline in stock prices is forcing investors to seek refuge in the dollar. As a result, the DXY dollar index reached a three-month high of 91.83 on Thursday, its growth continued Friday, March 05, and the DXY exceeded 92.00 at the time of this writing.
The data from the US labor market added optimism to investors. The number of new jobs outside the agricultural sector (NFP) increased from 166K to 379K, with the forecast of 182K. As a result, the forecast, for which the majority (70%) of analysts voted last week, turned out to be absolutely correct: the EUR/USD pair continued its movement to the south, reaching a local bottom at 1.1895 and ending the week slightly higher, at 1.1915;

- GBP/USD. Graphical analysis on D1 suggested last week a sideways movement of the pair within 1.3860-1.4240. However, the channel turned out to be narrower: it was trading in the range of 1.3860-1.4000 until Thursday. And then, thanks to the statement of the head of the US Federal Reserve Jerome Powell, the dollar began to grow stronger, and the GBP/USD pair, having broken through the lower border of the channel, dropped to the horizon of 1.3775. The last chord of the five-day period was set at the level of 1.3840;

- USD/JPY. The multi-month downtrend of this pair was stopped on January 6, it reversed and moved north for almost all of 2021. When making a forecast for the last week, a third of the experts sided with the bears, a third took a neutral position, and a third voted for the growth of the pair. And even fewer experts agreed that it would be able to reach the zone 108.00-108.50, they were only 25%. And they were right: the week's high was recorded at 108.60, followed by a slight bounce down and a finish at 108.35.
The reason for the rise of the pair is still the same: against the background of the growth in the yield of American bonds, which outstrips the yield on Japanese securities, investors get rid of such a protective asset with a negative interest rate as the yen. Along with the Japanese currency, gold and the Swiss franc are also particularly affected. In addition, the mentioned statement by Jerome Powell added fuel to the fire, after which the USD/JPY pair reached an eight-month high;

- cryptocurrencies. There is good news for the bulls: Bitcoin hasn't dropped below $43,000. But there is good news for the bears too: Bitcoin has not gone above $52,000. Having drawn a sinusoid, the BTC/USD chart returned on the afternoon of Friday, March 05 to where it started seven days ago. The question of whether this is a correction or the beginning of a new "crypto-winter" remains open.
The news background looks quite controversial as well. Leading payment systems such as Mastercard, Visa and PayPal are playing on the side of the bulls, seeking to attract the "crypto generation". Skrill and Neteller are doing the same. The Opera browser has been enriched with new algorithms that will allow users to perform transactions with many popular cryptocurrencies. Another Opera feature would be creating a digital wallet without going to third-party sites. Such a giant as Google also turned to cryptocurrencies: the Google Finance platform added a tab for monitoring the prices of digital assets.   
User activity is growing. The trading volume on cryptocurrency exchanges in February exceeded $1 trillion. Such numbers were achieved for the first time in history, according to experts. Even during the first bitcoin rally, the trading volume reached only $650 billion. According to experts of the analytical platform Block Research, large investors prefer to carry out transactions from one account to another through third-party services in order to maintain complete anonymity. Therefore, the real number of transactions can even be twice the official amount. 
However, not everything is as rosy as it seems at first glance. We already wrote that regulators can (and most likely will) become the main problem for digital assets in 2021. 
According to analyst Sven Henrich, the head of the USA Ministry of Finance janet Yellen has actually declared war on bitcoin. Her announcement led to a massive profit taking by the whales on February 21-23, and a sharp 23% drop in bitcoin quotes. And now the North American Association of Securities Administrators (NASAA) has published an annual list of the most dangerous financial products, calling cryptocurrencies the top investment risk this year.
In the framework of the struggle of states for control over financial flows, one should not forget about the imminent appearance of the digital yuan, which can deal a serious blow to bitcoin. The United States and a number of other countries do not exclude the possibility of launching their own digital currencies (CBDC) as well.
In the meantime, as we wrote above, the market is at a crossroads. The total market capitalization for the week grew very slightly: from $1,410 billion to $1,444 billion. And the Crypto Fear & Greed Index left the neutral zone (55) again and headed towards the overbought zone, reaching 77 points out of 100 possible.


As for the forecast for the coming week, summarizing the views of a number of experts, as well as forecasts made on the basis of a variety of methods of technical and graphical analysis, we can say the following:

- EUR/USD. Judging by the latest indicators, the US economy is doing much better. Vaccinations are in full swing, the labor market is recovering, and GDP in the first quarter is ready to grow by almost 10%. According to Jerome Powell, consumer prices may even slightly exceed the target level of 2% as early as this summer.
However, there is still a long way to a complete recovery. It is this weekend, March 06-07, that the Senate will begin voting on amendments to the budget. And if legislators approve them, US citizens will receive a new gratuitous aid of $1,400 per person, and the overall stimulus package (QE) will amount to $1.9 trillion.
This injection of almost 2 trillion new dollars into the market could cause a serious weakening of the US currency and a return of risk appetite for investors. In this case, the sell-off of shares will stop and stock indices will go up again.
When making a forecast for the coming days, most experts (60%) do not exclude the continuation of the downtrend and the fall of the EUR/USD pair to the zone 1.1800. 100% of trend indicators and 75% of oscillators on H4 and D1 are looking down. But the remaining 25% is already signaling that the pair is oversold.
The picture changes radically with the transition to monthly and quarterly forecasts. Here 70% of analysts expect that the scales will tilt towards the euro after the $1.9 trillion in aid appears on the US market, and the pair will go up. Resistance levels are 1.2025, 1.2060, 1.2170, 1.2200 and 1.2270.
As for the events of the coming week, the publication of data on GDP in the Eurozone on Tuesday March 09, statistics on the US consumer market on Wednesday March 10, and Germany on Friday March 12, as well as the decision of the European Central Bank on the interest rate on Thursday March 11should be considered. According to forecasts, the rate is likely to remain unchanged, at zero. Therefore, the press conference of the ECB leadership, which will be held on the same day, will be of greater interest;

- GBP/USD. Bank of England Governor Andrew Bailey is scheduled to speak on Monday, March 8, where he intends to outline the main parameters of the country's monetary policy while it tries to cope with the financial damage caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. According to ING analysts, “overall, fiscal support should highlight the constructive prospects for the pound sterling in the second quarter of 2021. Further fiscal assistance will contribute to economic recovery and make the pound sterling a leader in the currency market of the G10 countries."
But until this happens, 50% of analysts expect that the GBP/USD pair will break through the support in the 1.3775-1.3800 area and rush to the 1.3600-1.3760 zone. This forecast is supported by 85% of trend indicators and 100% of oscillators on H4, but only 65% of their “colleagues” on D1.
25% of experts, supported by graphical analysis on both timeframes, expect the pair to grow, and another 25% have taken a neutral position. At the same time, as in the case of EUR/USD and for the same reasons, the number of bulls' supporters increases to 60% when switching to the monthly forecast. The resistance levels are 1.3900, 1.3950, 1.4000, 1.4085 and 1.4185, the target is the February 24 high of 1.4240;

- USD/JPY. After the pair literally soared by 215 points last week and reached eight-month highs, it is clear that 100% of the trend indicators are colored green. But as for the oscillators, 35% are already signaling fully that it is overbought. Graphical analysis also points to the south. Many traders are afraid to open both long and short positions in such a situation. 
As for the experts, the scales have already begun to tilt in favor of a downward correction: there are 50% of bears' supporters now. 25% expect the USD/JPY pair to continue to rise, and another 25% remain neutral. In the transition from a weekly to a monthly forecast, 80% of analysts are already expecting the pair to decline and return to the 105.00 zone. Support levels are 108.00, 106.70, 106.10 and 105.70; Resistance - 109.80;

 - cryptocurrencies. A Glassnode study found that only 4 million bitcoins are in free float on the market. The third halving in May 2020 halved the miners' reward for the mined block from 12.5 BTC to 6.25 BTC. It further enhances the shortage of coins in the market. And as you know, it is the limited emission of bitcoin that is one of its main advantages over gold and fiat currencies. 
“Suddenly, buying bitcoin is no longer insignificant or risky,” wrote Mike Novogratz, head of Galaxy Digital crypto bank. On the contrary, it has become risky not to have BTC in the portfolio when central banks continue to print money. We don't have enough time to hire sales managers to reach all the institutional clients who want to understand and participate in the market."
Even such a supporter of gold as Euro Pacific Capital president Peter Schiff has supported Novogratz. It was just recently, that this bitcoin skeptic called bitcoin the largest bubble in history and unflatteringly spoke about the mental abilities of cryptocurrency investors. And now he has admitted his mistake. “When I first heard about bitcoin, I didn't think that smart investors would be stupid enough to buy bitcoin. I was wrong," Schiff wrote.
Going back tothe head of Galaxy Digital, Mike Novogratz, we should note that he has dramatically changed the forecast for the BTC rate for the end of 2021 upwards.  “It feels like,” says the banker, “we’ll stay for a bit between $42,000 and $60,000, and then see the next big jump to $100,000. I will not be surprised if we reach this mark by the end of this year."
An unexpected conspiracy forecast was given by an expert in the field of competitive intelligence. He believes the creation and support of the Bitcoin hype for years is no coincidence. In case the American financial elite manages to convince its creditors that having bitcoins is better than dollars, it can transfer all external debt of the US to this cryptocurrency over time. "As soon as this happens, the cryptocurrency will only have to collapse, and America's gigantic debt will actually be zeroed," the expert reflects.
Time will tell whether it is true or not. In the meantime, events in the US stock market play one of the leading roles in influencing bitcoin. Recall that about a year ago, the fall in the stock market due to the panic around the COVID-19 pandemic provoked a collapse of the cryptocurrency market.
And in conclusion, another funny crypto life hack. We have already talked about an American fortune teller who predicts bitcoin rates by observing the movement of the planets. There was also a story about another resident of the United States who placed a mining farm in the trunk of his BMW. The farm receives energy from the car's battery, to which it is connected using a DC inverter, which allows the owner to mine cryptocurrency while the car is moving.
And now a gamer and crypto enthusiast from China named Yifan Gu has become known. He managed to bypass the technical limitations for cryptocurrency mining, set in the Sony PlayStation 5, and adapted this game console for Ethereum mining, gaining a profitability of about $50 per week. Earlier, Yifan Gu adapted his MacBook Air with Apple M1 chip for mining this leading altcoin. However, at the ETH current rate, you can earn only $0.14 in one day on the MacBook Air. 


NordFX Analytical Group


Notice: These materials should not be deemed a recommendation for investment or guidance for working on financial markets: they are for informative purposes only. Trading on financial markets is risky and can lead to a loss of money deposited.

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First, a review of last week’s events:

- EUR/USD. As we expected, the speech by the head of the Fed turned out to be quite interesting. Jerome Powell presented to Congress a semi-annual report on monetary policy, from which it followed that not everything is as good as we would like as far as the recovery of the US economy is concerned. The surge in economic activity in the summer of 2020 was followed by the slowsown of the growth rate. The decline in unemployment has slowed down, and household expenditures are not growing either.
After the unrest and turmoil of 2020, a lot of attention is paid to socio-demographic differentiation, but the picture is not the rosiest either. Unemployment among "white" Americans, according to the Fed, is 5.7%, while among Hispanics - 8.6%, and among African Americans it is even higher - 9.2%. There is also discrimination based on gender: for the last month of 2020, men gained 16,000 new jobs, while women, on the contrary, lost 140,000.
All of the above raises certain doubts about the early recovery of the American economy, leads to a decrease in risk sentiment, and strikes a blow on the stock market and the US dollar. Investors are shifting attention to long-term government bonds. Since the beginning of 2021, the yield on 10-year treasuries has jumped from 0.91% to 1.56%, and their growth has become especially noticeable recently. As for stock indices (especially stocks of technology companies), they, accordingly, go down sharply. For example, the S&P500 was losing up to 3.8% in just two days - February 25-26, while the Nasdaq Composite was sinking by more than 3%. The DXY dollar index is also gradually approaching 2018 lows, losing about 9% this year.
In such a situation, most analysts (65%) expected the dollar to weaken and rise to the 1.2200-1.2300 zone, which happened: at the week's high, February 25, the EUR/USD pair was approaching 1.2245. However, then it seems that investors changed their minds and began to realize that the growing yield of long-term Treasury securities directly affects the growth of rates on current consumer lending. And that immediately brings to mind the 2008 mortgage crisis, which marked the beginning of a series of major bankruptcies. As a result, the dollar strengthened a little and the EUR/USD pair dropped to the zone 1.2070-1.2100 - the place where it has already been several times since last December. This can only say about one thing: the confusion of the market and the lack of clarity about the prospects of the European and American economies;

- GBP/USD. As predicted, Prime Minister Boris Johnson's speech on Monday 22 February, as well as the expectation of positive data from the UK labour market on Tuesday 23 February, continued to push the pair GBP/USD to the highs of 2018, raising it to the height of 1.4240.
And of course, the dynamics of the pair could not but be affected by what was happening in the United States. Therefore, repeating the EUR/USD parabola, the GBP/USD pair went south on Thursday February 25, especially since it was overbought, and some reason was simply needed to take profit on the pound.
On Friday, having lost 355 points, the pair found a local bottom at 1.3885. This was followed by a rebound and a finish at 1.3930;

- USD/JPY. It was said last week that this pair was moving within the medium-term side channel 102.60-107.00. Only 35% of experts believed then that the pair had not yet completed its movement to the upper border of this trading range. True, 75% of oscillators and 80% of trend indicators on D1 were on their side, which gave additional weight to this forecast, which turned out to be absolutely correct. The USD/JPY pair recorded a 26-week high at 106.70 on the second half of Friday, February 26. As for the final chord, it sounded at the height of 106.55;

- cryptocurrencies. We have repeatedly written that the presence of large institutional investors in the crypto market is a double-edged sword. On the one hand, they can strongly push the market up, and on the other hand, they can crash the quotes if they fix profits. In addition, the actions and sentiments of such institutions are highly dependent on the actions and sentiments of regulators and other government agencies. We felt all this in full last week.
After bitcoin hit an all-time high of $58,275 on February 21, investors were looking forward to taking the $60,000 high. However, there was a sudden reversal and a sharp drop of 23% to $44,985. Then the rebound to $50,000, and a fall again - to $44,000.
According to many experts, the trigger of the massive profit fixation by "whales" was the statement of the former head of the Fed and now the US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen on the speculative nature of cryptocurrency and the possibility of using it for money laundering. According to analyst Sven Henrich, the head of the Ministry of Finance has actually declared war on bitcoin.
“Digital currencies can provide faster and cheaper payments. But there are many issues to be explored, including consumer protection and money laundering,” Janet Yelen said, also mentioning the possibility of launching the Central Bank's own digital currency (CBDC).
The fall in bitcoin could also have been facilitated by the fall in global indexes of technology companies and the beginning of large-scale vaccinations against coronavirus, but the main thing is the position of the US Government.
According to Bloomberg, against the background of the decline in the bitcoin rate, the head of Tesla and SpaceX, Elon Musk, lost the first place in the ranking of the richest people on the planet. Tesla shares fell by 8.6%, as a result of which Musk lost $15.2 billion. At the same time, the fall in bitcoin, according to Bloomberg, may be partly due to the statement of Musk himself, who called the prices of cryptocurrencies too high. It is not for nothing that they say that a word is silver, and silence is gold. Musk would be better off keeping his mouth shut ?. 
Of course, someone loses, and someone finds. Thus, for example, due to technical failures, some customers of the Philippine crypto exchange PDAX were able to buy bitcoin almost 10 times cheaper than the market price, Bitpinas reports. One of the users admitted that he bought bitcoins for 300,000 pesos ($6,150), while the average market price of BTC was about $50,000, after which he transferred the cryptocurrency to his wallet. A day later, PDAX sent him a letter demanding the return of the bitcoins, but the buyer's lawyer claims that "the transaction was legitimate, in accordance with applicable laws, and PDAX cannot withdraw transactions unilaterally."
Another client of this crypto exchange unexpectedly found 40 billion Philippine pesos or about 820 million dollars in his account. It is not reported whether he was able to withdraw this "gift" from PDAX.
In general, the reliability of crypto exchanges is still a rather painful topic. According to BDCenter Digital agency, Kraken, Coinbase and Binance are the safest exchanges. The brokerage company NordFX can also be noted here, whose clients can also make transactions and store deposits in cryptocurrencies. In the 13 years of this broker, it has not had a single hack and not a single penny of client funds has been lost.
On Friday evening, February 26, the BTC/USD pair is trading in the $46,000 zone. The total market capitalization fell over the week from $1,625 billion to $1,410 billion. AND The Crypto Fear & Greed Index has finally come out of strong overbought zone to neutral levels, dropping from 93 to 55.
When it comes to altcoins, there is both good news and bad news. For example, the largest developer of GPUs - American technology company Nvidia announced plans to release a series of graphics cards specifically for mining Ethereum. According to CNBC, they can be expected to appear on sale this March.
But it looks like the hard times will not end for Ripple. One of the world's largest money transfer services, MoneyGram, refused to use the product based on the XRP token due to the claims of the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) against Ripple. Against the backdrop of SEC claims, in addition to MoneyGram, Coinbase and OKCoin, Galaxy Digital, Bitstamp, B2C2, eToro and Kraken have already refused to support the XRP token. Asset management company Grayscale Investments announced the liquidation of an XRP-based investment trust, and 21Shares has removed the Ripple token from its exchange-traded products. As a result, the Ripple lost up to 45% of its value last week, and the XRP/USD pair was trading at $0.42 on the evening of February 26.


As for the forecast for the coming week, summarizing the views of a number of experts, as well as forecasts made on the basis of a variety of methods of technical and graphical analysis, we can say the following:

- EUR/USD. The figures given in the first part of the review confirm the opinion of the US Federal Reserve management that it is still very, very early to talk about any curtailment of the quantitative easing (QE) program, as well as about raising interest rates. Therefore, the Fed will continue its soft monetary policy, even as inflation expectations rise caused by a doubling of the Fed's balance sheet over the past year.
However, not only the US has the problem of increasing national debt. Europe is experiencing similar problems, and the interest rate there is even lower than on the other side of the Atlantic. The profitability of European government securities is also growing. Thus, the rate on 10-year bonds in Germany has already reached an 11-month high.
In general, we can say that the balance between the problems and achievements of the Old and New Worlds remains on average at the same level, experiencing minor temporary fluctuations, which is reflected in the three-month sideways trend of the EUR/USD pair. If you look at its chart, it can be seen that, since December 2020, most of the time it moves in a fairly narrow trading range of 1.2050-1.2185, with emissions up to 1.1950 and 1.2350.
If we talk about the short term, 70% of analysts believe that the pair will continue to decline to the 1.1950-1.2000 zone. They are supported in this by 75% of oscillators on H4, the remaining 25% give signals that the pair is oversold. As for the oscillators on D1, there are approximately equal shares of red, green and gray-neutral colors. 95% of the trend indicators on H4 and 65% on D1 are painted red.
But graphical analysis on both timeframes gives preference to the upward movement of the pair. Resistance levels are 1.2170 1.2240 and 1.2270. However, after this push to the north, graphical analysis on D1 draws a decline in the pair during March to support at 1.1950.
And now about the events of the coming week, of which there will be quite a few. Firstly, we are waiting for the speeches of the head of the ECB Christine Lagarde on Monday March 01 and the head of the US Federal Reserve Jerome Powell on Thursday March 4. Statistics on the consumer markets of Germany and the EU will be released on March 01, 02 and 04. As for the US macro statistics, the indicators of ISM business activity in the manufacturing and private sectors will be known on Monday and Wednesday. And in addition, data on the labor market will be published on Wednesday and Friday. Moreover, according to forecasts, a significant increase in new jobs created outside the US agricultural sector (NFP) is possible - from 49K to 148K;

- GBP/USD. First, the readings of technical indicators. Oscillators: 90% on H4 are looking south, 10% are in the oversold zone; only 15% are looking to the south on D1, 50% to the north, and 35% are neutral. Trend indicators: 80% look south on H4, 20% look north, 25% look south on D1, 75% look north.
Graphic analysis on D1 draws a side trend in the range 1.3860-1.4240. And it is clear that since the pair finished the previous week closer to the lower border of this channel, it will move upward. 60% of experts agree with this forecast. Resistance levels are 1.3960, 1.4055, 1.4085 and 1.4175.
The remaining 30% believe that the pair will break the lower border of the channel 1.3860, then support around 1.3800 and will go to the 1.3600-1.3760 zone. It should be noted that, when moving from weekly to monthly forecast, the number of supporters of the bears increases to 65%.

- USD/JPY.  The multi-month downtrend of this pair was stopped on January 06, and it turned north, moving to the upward channel. According to the graphical analysis on D1, the USD/JPY pair has almost reached its upper border now, which is in the zone 106.70-107.00, and should soon bounce back to the south. Such a scenario is supported by 25% of the oscillators giving signals about the pair being overbought. It is clear that the remaining 75% of oscillators and 100% of the indicators on both time frames are colored green so far. 
As for experts, a third of them sides with the bulls, a third votes for the bears, and a third takes a neutral stance. However, in the transition from weekly to monthly forecast, 75% of analysts vote for the pair to stay within the medium-term trading range of 102.60-107.00 (it was mentioned in the first part of the review), and therefore await its return to its central zone at 105.00. Support levels are 106.10 and 105.70; The remaining 25% of experts believe that the pair will be able to reach the zone of 108.00-108.50;

 - cryptocurrencies. The popularity and prominence of cryptocurrencies continues to grow. According to BDCenter Digital, 12 out of 100 Twitter posts are about cryptocurrency. In just the week of February 7-14, Twitter users mentioned bitcoin over 675,000 times. The last record was set on January 10, when the weekly number of posts mentioning bitcoin reached 576,000. In total, the number of cryptocurrency users has stepped over 200 million people from more than 150 countries. 
Despite the drop last week, 2021 started off well for bitcoin overall. The pair started at $28,800 on January 1 and is trading at $46,000 at the time of writing, having gained almost 60%. And now, importantly, the Crypto Fear & Greed Index has finally emerged from a strong overbought state, dropping from 93 to neutral 55.
Of course, this does not mean that the quotes of the BTC/USD pair will immediately fly up. However, what is happening gives investors hope for the fulfillment of the positive predictions of many experts and crypto gurus. recall that Lisa Edwards, sister of self-proclaimed bitcoin creator Craig Wright, has predicted that the first cryptocurrency would rise to $142,000. Based on Elliott Wave Theory, she suggested that digital gold would rise to $90,000 by May 2021, decline to $55,000 by January 2022, and skyrocketing to $142,000 in March 2023.
According to the co-founder of Morgan Creek Digital Assets Anthony Pompliano, the main cryptocurrency may reach $500 thousand by the end of this decade, and even $1 million in the long term.
However, the growth of cryptocurrency quotes may stop due to the rapid recovery of the global economy after the recession caused by the coronavirus epidemic. In this case, central banks will begin to roll back their quantitative easing programs, raise interest rates, stop buying assets and printing cheap money. As a result, investment flows into bitcoin, as one of the most attractive safe havens, can dry up very quickly.
So, what did we observe last week - a temporary correction or the beginning of a new "crypto winter"? The question is still open. However, the overwhelming majority of experts (70%) believe that the BTC/USD pair will reach the $ 60,000-75,000 zone in spring. The pessimism of the remaining 30% of analysts is expressed in the figures of $30,000-35,000.


NordFX Analytical Group


Notice: These materials should not be deemed a recommendation for investment or guidance for working on financial markets: they are for informative purposes only. Trading on financial markets is risky and can lead to a loss of money deposited.

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At the end of 2020, the Forex-Awards.com expert council named NordFX Best Forex Broker Middle East. The two-tier NordFX affiliate program was also awarded a prestigious award.

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Forex-Awards.com is a team of professionals headquartered in Hong Kong, which specializes in the analysis and evaluation of brokerage companies since 2010, aiming to identify the real market leaders. Based on the opinions of both independent experts and the trader community, Forex-Awards.com employees compile regular ratings of brokers, identifying their strongest and most attractive sides. The winners in each of the 30 nominations are then determined based on the results obtained. A convincing victory was won by the brokerage company NordFX in two of them in 2020.

More than one and a half million accounts have been opened by clients from almost 190 countries during 13 years of NordFX work, among them many traders from the Middle East. Back in 2013, at the 12th MENA Forex Show, the company won the prize as Best Forex Arabic Platform. And now the new award confirms the high level of services that NordFX provides to clients from this region: the first place in the Best Forex Broker Middle East nomination.

Another victory at the Forex Awards was won in the Best Affiliate Program category. Since 2016, thanks to its effectiveness and popularity, NordFX's two-tier affiliate program has been receiving the highest marks. It has been recognized as the best by expert committees of not only Forex-Awards.com, but also by Academy Masterforex-V and Saigon Financial Education Summit. More than 25,000 of the company's partners have already been paid more than $30,000,000 as commission until now, and these figures continue to grow steadily.


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First, a review of last week’s events:

- EUR/USD. The sharp rise in bond yields in the US and Europe has hit not only the stock market, but also the “carry trade”, providing support to funding currencies, primarily the euro and the US dollar. Recall that the funding currency is usually a currency with a low interest rate. Implementing the carry trade strategy, traders borrow it and then deposit it in another currency, such as developing countries, with a higher rate. And now the fall in risk sentiment has led to an exit from such deals, and the strengthening of both EUR and USD. Apparently, this can explain the consolidation of this pair. And if the preponderance was on the side of the dollar in the first half of the week, then, investors began to buy up the cheaper euro starting from Wednesday, February 17. As a result, having started the week at the level of 1.2120, the EUR/USD pair ended it almost there, at the level of 1.2115; 

- GBP/USD. The pound continues to push north, approaching the 2018 highs. The pair broke through the psychologically important level of 1.4000 on Friday, February 19, recording a weekly high at the height of 1.4035. It completed the trading session at the same level 1.4000, after a slight rebound.
The American currency lost to the British one amid weak data from the US labor market. Investors expected a decrease in the number of initial applications for unemployment benefits from 848 thousand to 765 thousand, while, on the contrary, it rose to 861 thousand over the week. The number of secondary applications was not encouraging either, it decreased from 4.558 million to 4.494 million, instead of the forecasted 4.413 million. Investors were fast to recall the statements of the FRS officials that it would take more than one year to return the labor market to the previous levels, and that it was necessary to take new measures to support the US economy.
But the data on the consumer market and business activity, released in the UK last week, looked pretty good. The Markit index in February was at 49.7 against 39.5, only slightly short of 50, the threshold that separates growth in economic activity from its fall. These figures have once again strengthened the confidence of buyers of the British currency that the Bank of England will refrain from allocating new funds under QE and from cutting the interest rate. As a result, the GBP/USD pair went further up, taking the next important milestone - 1.4000;

- USD/JPY. The main trends of this pair, as well as EUR/USD, were determined last week by disappointing data from the US labor market and a sharp rise in government bond yields. The Japanese GDP data released on Monday 15 February, although was significantly better than the forecast (3.0% versus 2.3%), had no effect on market sentiment, once again showing that the rate of this pair is being formed in the USA.
Recall that the opinions of experts last week were divided almost equally: 40% supported the growth of the pair, 30% were for its fall and as much for lateral movement. And, in general, everyone turned out to be right. The pair grew for the first half of the week, reaching a height of 106.20, then it fell, and the finish of the five-day period took place near the place where it had already started on February 08 - at 105.40;

- cryptocurrencies. As we predicted, bitcoin has hit the $50,000 bar and is quoted at $55,000 at the time of writing. Starting from February 01, the main cryptocurrency added about 60% in weight, the growth of Ethereum (ETH/USD) amounted to a little less than 50%, the leader in this three was Litecoin (LTC/USD) with 80%.
In general, the situation for the digital market is quite positive. Even conservative structures such as American banks have turned their views in its direction. The oldest US bank, BNY Mellon, has announced the start of work with bitcoin and other digital assets. Another major US bank, JPMorgan Chase, is also ready to support bitcoin trading. It became known that JPMorgan Chase organized a virtual meeting in January with the participation of thousands of traders and sales professionals from different parts of the world, during which it inquired about their interest in trading BTC. And last week, another bank, Goldman Sachs, held a closed forum for employees and customers on the topic of cryptocurrencies, at which the speaker was Mike Novogratz, CEO of Galaxy Digital. 
The statements of a number of US politicians and officials also have a positive impact on the price of digital assets. For example, Miami Mayor Francis Suarez announced that he had already taken a number of steps to legalize cryptocurrency. “We have made bitcoin an available currency for potential investors. In addition, employees can receive salaries in cryptocurrency, which is a huge step forward,” he wrote on Twitter. Candidate for mayor of New York and former candidate for US President Andrew Young supported his colleague, saying that he will try to make the financial center of the world become a center for cryptocurrencies as well. And St. Louis Fed chief James Bullard called bitcoin a rival for gold.
Institutional investors continue to buy both cryptocurrencies and shares of miners and crypto funds. So, the Grayscale Investments fund added 20,000 ETH to its Ethereum portfolio last week, bringing its volume to $6 billion. Another impetus for the growth of the BTC/USD pair was MicroStrategy's decision to raise another $900 million to buy bitcoins.
Overall, the supply / demand ratio remains in favor of bitcoin: 150,000 BTC coins were mined and almost 360,000 were bought back over the last five months of 2020, and investors hope that this balance will continue in the future.
At the same time, buyers look at the head of Tesla Elon Musk, whose tweets alone push the quotes sharply upward. However, the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is now interested in his "creativity" on Twitter, considering that the billionaire's calls to buy digital assets fall under the law on the offer and advertising of securities and can be regarded as unregistered brokerage activities and attempts to manipulate the market. If proven, Elon Musk could face huge fines. In the meantime, the entrepreneur said that he was taking a break and would no longer post tweets, at least in the near future. 
As for the total cryptocurrency market capitalization, even without Musk's tweets, it grew over the week from $1,458 billion to $1,625 billion. And the Crypto Fear & Greed Index is slowly but inexorably approaching its maximum value of 100 points. It has now reached 93, which indicates a strong overheating of the market.


As for the forecast for the coming week, summarizing the views of a number of experts, as well as forecasts made on the basis of a variety of methods of technical and graphical analysis, we can say the following:

- EUR/USD. The European Union is still under blockade of restrictions due to the COVID-19 pandemic. But in the United States, not everything is as rosy as expected. Weak data on the labor market, the growth of initial applications for unemployment benefits put pressure on the dollar.
It can be understood from the statements of ECB executives that even if bond yields in Europe continue to rise, the bank is unlikely to increase the volume of the quantitative easing (QE) programme. Officials from the Governing Council of the ECB believe that the measures they have taken are quite sufficient, it just takes some time for them to have the maximum positive effect.
The situation is exactly the opposite on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean. Judging by Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen's appeals to the US Congress and the Federal Reserve minutes published on February 18, QE volumes will continue to increase. The soft monetary policy will continue until the economy of this country shows steady growth. The next measure will be the adoption of another stimulus package worth $1.9 trillion.
In such a situation it is logical to expect a weakening of the dollar in the medium term, and the rise of the EUR/USD pair first to the zone of 1.2200-1.2300, and then return to the January high of 1.2350. 65% of analysts agree with this scenario. But as for the weekly forecast, the picture is different.
The majority (70%) of experts believe that the pair should retest the support in the 1.2020 zone in the near future and try to reach the February 05 low of 1.1955. This bearish development is supported by 15% of the oscillators on H4 and D1, which give signals that the pair is overbought.
The rest of the oscillators, as well as 75% of the trend indicators, are colored green. But graphical analysis on both time frames draws consolidation in the range 1.2020-1.2155.
As for the events of the week, here the speeches of the head of the ECB Christine Lagarde on Monday 22 February and the head of the Federal Reserve Jerome Powell in the US Congress on Wednesday 24 February are of interest, as well as annual data on GDP and the volume of orders for capital and durable goods in the United States to be published on Thursday 25 February;
 
- GBP/USD. It is clear that 100% of the trend indicators and 85% of oscillators on H4 and D1 point north. The remaining 15% of the oscillators give signals that the pair is overbought. The overwhelming majority of analysts (75%) are also awaiting a correction to the south. True, in their opinion, this may not happen in the coming week, but in the first half of March. Support levels are 1.3950, 1.3850, 1.3775, 1.3600. 
The potential for British currency growth has not yet been exhausted so far. And everything will depend on whose structural problems, the US or the UK, will put more pressure on their national currencies. This refers not only to quantitative easing and interest rates, but also the issue and yield of government securities, as well as the risk of high inflation due to excessively high budget spending.
We outlined in the first part of the review how the data from the US labor market affected the pair's behavior. Similar macro statistics on the UK labour market are expected to be released in the coming week, on Tuesday 23 February. And if it looks quite optimistic, you can expect the continuation of the uptrend of the GBP/USD pair. Other events include a speech by the British Prime Minister the day before. Although, most likely, Boris Johnson will do without much specifics, and will enthusiastically talk about the successes of his Cabinet in the fight against the pandemic, the record pace of vaccinations, and how relations with the EU are developing after Brexit;

- USD/JPY ... 104.40-105.40 is the zone that the pair has visited many times over the past 30 weeks. This allows us to speak of it as the Pivot Point of the medium-term sideways channel 102.60-107.00. By the way, the maximum trading range of 440 points on the semi-annual segment is actually not so great. In October, for example, the pair made 240-point throws in just one day.
At the moment, only 35% of experts believe that the pair has not yet completed its movement to the upper border of this trading range. True, 75% of oscillators and 80% of trend indicators on D1 are on their side, which gives additional weight to this forecast. Resistance levels are 105.70, 106.20, the target is 107.00.
The opposite view is held by 65% of analysts, with the number rising to 80% when moving from a weekly to a monthly forecast. They have a similar number of indicators on their side, on H4 this time. Support levels are 105.00, 104.40, 103.60, the target is 102.60.
Graphical analysis shows fluctuations of the pair in the trading range 104.40-106.20 with a predominance of bearish sentiment.

 - cryptocurrencies. As bitcoin prices grow, there are fewer buyers in the market. The most cautious ones left back in December, when the coin reached its previous all-time high of $20,000. The next phase of closing long positions followed after bitcoin's rise to $40,000. Only the most die-hard investors and crypto fans have made it to the $50,000 level.
Bitcoin is overbought. But after the price stepped over $55,000 on Friday evening February 19, there was no active sale. The market froze in anticipation. Alarming signals are already coming, though.
First, the share of sellers is growing, which has increased from 18% to 35% over the past two weeks. Second, about 2/3 of traders buy perpetual futures contracts using leverage, resulting in higher funding rates and commission costs while maintaining long positions. And third, the shares of miners went down.
According to CoinDesk, weekly earnings of bitcoin miners reached a new high of $354 million from February 08 to 14. The previous record figure in seven days was $340 million and was recorded in December 2017. But despite this positive, for example, Riot Blockchain Inc shares lost 20% in price only on February 18.
However, according to a number of experts, it is not worth waiting for the onset of a new crypto winter. Though it may be a deep one, it is just a correction. Moreover, at small volumes there is a probability of growth of bitcoin up to $60,000-65,000 even by inertia. And there, a new wave of purchases can be triggered by FOMO - Lost Profit Syndrome (Fear Of Missing Out). After all, fear and greed are known to drive the market.
Lisa Edwards, sister of self-proclaimed bitcoin creator Craig Wright, has predicted that the first cryptocurrency would rise to $142,000. Based on Elliott Wave Theory, she suggested that digital gold would rise to $90,000 by May 2021, decline to $55,000 by January 2022, and skyrocketing to $142,000 in March 2023. After that, according to Edwards, the cryptocurrency market expects a bearish trend.
But even though the growth of the BTC/USD pair may continue in the near future, you need to be very cautious about purchases at current levels. Most analysts consider them to be quite risky and suggest waiting for a rollback, and only then open new long positions.


NordFX Analytical Group


Notice: These materials should not be deemed a recommendation for investment or guidance for working on financial markets: they are for informative purposes only. Trading on financial markets is risky and can lead to a loss of money deposited.

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Finding patterns, repeatability and historical cyclicality is one of the main tasks of a trader. Some use graphic patterns to look for the silhouettes of geometric shapes. Some study the characteristic price movements: acceleration, braking, and interaction with graphic objects. However, there is a huge category of traders who are engaged in technical analysis of Forex using indicators. They allow you to predict the market, study its various characteristics and use these patterns in your own trading. Even beginners who have just heard about the existence of technical analysis will be able to analyze the market with their help.

One of the largest categories of the entire variety of instruments is Forex trend indicators. They are based on a simple pattern of price movement, namely, the tendency to trend movements.  A trend is a forward movement of the price up or down, in which the rewriting of extremes is characteristic. It is formed under the influence of majority positions in the market when there is a prolonged imbalance between buyers and sellers.

By identifying a trend, you shift the likelihood of success of the trade to your own direction. We will tell you in this article what Forex trend indicators are used for, what you should pay attention to when working with them, and what place they can take in the trading system.

Purpose and Methods of Using Trend Indicators

The overwhelming majority of books on technical analysis are based on the fact that the trend is the basis around which strategies are built. You should always stick to its direction and open trades in its direction. A trader must be able to identify it and build trading in its direction. However, it is difficult to determine it in a timely manner and without errors.

This is due to market noise, which blur the overall picture of what is happening. Trend indicators were created to combat it, that, depending on the formula embedded in them, average the price or in other ways indicate the global price movement, helping to determine the direction of future transactions.

Most often, their use is reduced to the filter function in the strategy, when the signals from the oscillator are matched with a global trend. For example, it can be a bundle of EMA and Stochastic, RSI, any other indicators of building channels and levels can be used. If they match in their readings, a trade is opened, and in case of a discrepancy, a trade should not be opened.

In addition to the filter, they can give signals to enter the market. This could be both a change in global and short-term trends. One way or another, indicators of this type can be a source of data for opening future positions by a trader.

In some cases, trend indicators can also be used to set Stop Loss. A prime example is setting a stop order under EMA, where the indicator line is the main pointer to limit risk.

Three Main Trend Indicators

Technical Analysis is world famous for its range of instruments around the world. A huge number of custom developments allows you to create a wide variety of trading systems. As mentioned above, a trader can take any trend-type instrument as a basis and attach an RSI indicator or any other oscillator to it. As a result, you get a balanced basis for developing a trading strategy.

The following TOP-3 trend indicators on Forex can be distinguished among all the tools that the MetaTrader terminal allows you to use. This is Moving Average, MACD, Bollinger Bands. They are present by default in all existing terminals and are considered standard. By the way, NordFX broker allows you to work with them through the MT4 terminal, which can be installed not only on a computer, but even on your mobile phone.

Moving Average Review

The Moving Average indicator is a classic trend indicator that draws a price line on a chart by averaging its value over a specified number of candles. SMA is considered a basic tool for technical analysis. First, it is a medium-arithmetic value, easy to calculate, and therefore was created one of the first. Secondly, many modifications and other indicators have been created on its basis. Thirdly, a trader can implement absolutely any strategy on its basis (Fig. 1).

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There are several types of moving averages:

1. Simple moving average (SMA);
2. Exponential Moving Average (EMA);
3. Weighted moving average (WMA).

It is difficult to see the difference between them  at a first glance. The fact is that they differ in the type of price averaging, which entails some differences in sensitivity and lag. The last one on the list is the slowest and roughest of market noise. EMA is on the contrary the fastest and is more commonly used in practice.

The line you see on your chart can generate the following signals:

1. Crossing of the line and the price;
2. Crossing of the moving average lines between each other;
3. Average with a large period as a line of support and resistance.

We also want to pay attention to the angles of inclination and the position of price relative to the line. If it is above the line, the current trend is upward, if it is below the line, it is downward. It is worth reminding once again that in strategies Moving Average is almost always used in tandem with oscillators: Stochastic, RSI and others, which help to determine the beginning, continuation or end of the current trend.

A simple example of how the Stochastic indicator exits the overbought zone confirms a downtrend in the SMA and gives a command to open a sell trade is shown in Figure 2 below:

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MACD Overview

This indicator is sometimes mistakenly considered an oscillator. This is not the case, because it is based on price averaging. The MACD algorithm is based on the convergence and divergence of two Moving Averages, and the histogram shows the distance between them. So MACD, unlike Stochastic or RSI, is not a stochastic oscillator, but a classic trend indicator (Fig. 3).

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It is a huge source of signals, as it is able to find short-term and medium-term changes of the trend, generate signals to change the global trend. Its most formidable weapon is divergence. It has become a common signal for a huge number of Forex indicators.

Divergence is a reversal type of signal that is formed due to the mismatch of the extremes of the instrument with the real price. Simply put, if the price curve is still going down, and the indicator curve has already turned upstairs, this is a strong signal that the trend reversal should soon be expected. Thus, MACD, like other reversal indicators, is able not to post facto, but to warn in advance about fractures in price movements. The example is given in Figure 4:

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You can see divisions above and below the 0.00 mark on the histogram. At moments when the graph crosses this zero line, a global trend change is fixed. It is clear that if the intersection occurs from bottom up, then the trend has changed from downward to rising. Accordingly, at the reverse level crossing, the trend changes from ascending to descending.

Also note how the MACD histogram interacts with the signal red dotted line. Their intersection generates a signal of a short-term change in the price movement and helps to determine the moment for opening orders either for buy or sell (Fig. 5).

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Some Forex traders use this indicator not only together with other technical analysis tools, but also on their own. This is explained by the strength and accuracy of the MACD signals, especially if divergence occurs on the chart.

Bollinger Bands Review

Bollinger Bands round out the top three Forex trend indicators. They are an ordinary moving average, at a distance from which a trading range is built. It is interesting that this indicator is able to find and give the trader information not only about the direction of the trend, but also about the market volatility, as well as give signals to pull back from the boundaries of the range (Fig. 6).

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Bollinger Bands demonstrate the strength and potential of the trend with its range. When the channel narrows, a transition from trend to flat or accumulation stage should be expected. Expansion, on the other hand, indicates an increase in volatility and trend activity. Trading can be based on the interaction of the indicator lines and the price, which can bounce back from them, break them or test them. This allows you to trade either on the break, or on the breakdown of the range. Both options will be correct. An example of how the Relative Strength Index indicator works in tandem with Bollinger Bands to rebound from the range boundaries can be seen in Fig. 7:

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Strengths and Weaknesses

The strong point of trend indicators is the ability to cut off minor price fluctuations and identify the main trend of its movement. Фlmost all trend instruments use the averaging algorithm to combat market noise. On the one hand, it frees you from noise, makes the market picture clearer and more understandable. On the other side of the scale is the signal delay. Moreover, the more noise the indicator cuts off, the more delayed its signals.

It should also be borne in mind that signals such as, for example, divergence, can occur quite rarely. Therefore, having missed one such signal, you can wait a long time for the next one to appear. Especially if you trade on large time frames.

However, the usefulness and effectiveness of Forex trend indicators is beyond doubt. They allow not to be mistaken with the global direction of the price, due to which they are able to become the basis of a high-quality trading strategy and bring stable profits both in manual trading and in automatic trading with the help of robot advisors.


Notice: These materials should not be deemed a recommendation for investment or guidance for working on financial markets: they are for informative purposes only. Trading on financial markets is risky and can lead to a loss of money deposited.

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First, a review of last week’s events:

- EUR/USD. It often happens that monthly forecasts come true faster than weekly ones. That was what happened this time as well. Recall that only 30% of experts expected the EUR/USD pair to grow in the weekly perspective. In the transition to the monthly forecast, those were in majority already, 60%.
We started talking about the paradoxes of the relationship between stock indices and the dollar seven days ago. With the outbreak of the pandemic at the end of last February, an inverse correlation was clearly visible between them: thanks to fiscal stimulus (QE), lower interest rates and pumping the US economy with cheap money, the S&P500, Dow Jones and Nasdaq stock indices went up, and the DXY dollar index - way down. And that was logical.
And here came 2021, and everything turned upside down. Against the backdrop of good economic data and expectations of a new injection of financial "vaccine" for almost $2 trillion, the growth of risk sentiment and stock indices continued. But in parallel, the yield of long-term US Treasury bonds and the dollar grew.
But the surprises with overturns did not end there. Based on the same fiscal incentives and rapid vaccination in the United States, Wall Street Journal experts are raising their forecasts for US GDP for 2021 from 4.3% to 4.9%. In Europe, the opposite is true: there are a lot of delays with vaccination, the EU countries, one after another, are tightening anti-covid measures once again, there is no end in sight to lockdowns. As a result, the European Commission lowers its forecast for the Eurozone economy to 3.9%. But at the same time, the euro is growing, and the American currency is falling.
According to a number of experts, it's all about the long-term policy of the US Fed, which is not going to wind down the QE program until the end of 2021 and will not raise interest rates on the dollar earlier than 2023. This should lead to the recovery of not only the American but also the global economy, including the EU, making the euro a reasonably attractive currency for some, primarily Chinese, investors. China's interests in Europe are great, and appetites are constantly growing, which supports the demand for a pan-European currency.   
As a result, having started at 1.2050, the EUR/USD pair rose by 100 pips and reached a weekly high at 1.2150 on Thursday, February 11. This was followed by a correction and a finish at 1.2120;

- GBP/USD. The released macro statistics looks quite contradictory. Due to the coronavirus pandemic, investment cuts and Brexit problems, UK GDP contracted 9.9% which is a record drop in more than 300 years. At the same time, monthly and quarterly GDP were better than expectations. GDP growth in Q4 2020 amounted to +1%. Industrial production figures were lower than forecasted, but the trade balance report pleased investors. 
Solid monetary policy of the Bank of England, positive interest rate, and the first in Europe and third in the world (after Israel and the UAE) in terms of vaccination rates also played on the side of the pound. At the time of writing this review, 20.67% of the country's population was already vaccinated (the figure in the USA is 14.02%).
Recall that the majority of analysts (65%) also sided with the British currency. The main forecast assumed that the pair would succeed, having broken through the resistance at 1.3750, to rise to the height of 1.3800, and possibly 25-50 points higher. And so it all happened: the high of the week was fixed at 1.3865, and the last chord of the GBP/USD pair set at 1.3850.
 
- USD/JPY. The movement of this pair in most cases depends on what is happening not in Japan, but in the United States, on where stock indices, as well as the yield of American state bonds and the DXY dollar index are moving. This happened last week as well.
DXY climbed to 91.21, USD/JPY grew to 105.66 on February 8. On February 10, the dollar index dropped to 90.26, followed by a bottom at 104.40. On February 12, we see an increase in the DXY to 90.71 and an increase in USD/JPY to 105.17, then a slight drop: in the index to 90.39, in the pair to 104.95. So, if anyone wants to try the DXY as a leading indicator for this pair, they can try it;

- cryptocurrencies. At the end of 2020, Forbes compiled a list of the wealthiest representatives of the cryptocurrency business with capitals of over $1 billion. The top three included Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong with $6.5 billion, FTX head Sam Bankman-Fried with $4.5 billion and Ripple co-founder Chris Larsen with $2.9 billion. In total, Forbes counted 11 billionaires, although, given the rise in the price of digital assets in January-February, there may have already been more of them. Suffice it to say that the total cryptocurrency market capitalization increased by 87% in less than a month and a half in 2021, from $776 billion to $1,452 billion.
The past week was one of the most successful this year. The rally began with the news that Tesla bought $1.5 billion of bitcoins. At the same time, its head, Elon Musk, said that he plans to sell cars of this brand for cryptocurrency in the near future. Bitcoin went up in price by 23% on this news, on February 8.
But this did not end there. Global payments giant MasterCard has announced that it plans to provide merchants with the ability to receive payments in cryptocurrency starting later this year. As a result, bitcoin once again renewed all-time highs, reaching $48,930 in the afternoon of Friday, February 12. The capitalization of BTC has risen to $885 billion at the moment and exceeded the volume of the money supply of such a large country as Russia, for the first time.
The Crypto Fear & Greed Index has reached 92 (it was 81 a week ago) and is in the overbought zone. At the same time, the BTC Dominance Index has decreased from 70.36% to 61.06% since the year started. But, according to many experts, this does not indicate a deterioration in investor attitudes towards bitcoin, but an improvement in their attitude towards altcoins.
So, the Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME) launched trading in Ethereum futures on Monday, February 08. The turnover reached $30 million on the very first day, and the open interest - $ 20 million, which indicates the stable interest of investors in this token. The capitalization of ETH has increased by 32% since the year started and amounts to more than $203 billion as of February 12.
Another top coin that we have already paid attention to in the previous review is Litecoin. Over the past three months, aggregate open interest in LTC futures has grown by 285% to $584 million. And, although the share of Litecoin in the total cryptocurrency market capitalization is quite small (8th place with 0.85%), it now occupies an honorable 3rd place among derivatives after bitcoin and Ethereum.


As for the forecast for the coming week, summarizing the views of a number of experts, as well as forecasts made on the basis of a variety of methods of technical and graphical analysis, we can say the following:

- EUR/USD. Throughout the coming week, China is celebrating the New Year, which will cause a significant portion of trade volumes to leave the global markets. However, this does not at all promise a calm or a decrease in volatility. Although right now, investors are at a crossroads. US stock indices, after a powerful upward leap in January, have gradually moved to consolidation and look overbought. No surprises are expected from the Fed any time soon, and the report of the Open Market Committee meeting on Thursday February 18 is likely to be boring enough. On the same day, the report on the ECB meeting on monetary policy will be released, but it will be highly likely filled mostly with general streamlined phrases. Therefore, the main drivers for the EUR/USD pair will again be news about the successes in the fight against the Covid-19 pandemic on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean.
As for experts, 60% of them, together with graphical analysis for H4 and D1, expect the pair to decline, at least, to support 1.2050. In case of a breakout, the next target for the bears will be the February 05 low at 1.1950. The nearest support is in the 1.2100 zone.
40% of analysts adhere to the opposite scenario. However, when moving from weekly to monthly forecast, the number of bulls' supporters increases to 60%. 85% of trend indicators on H4 and D1 are also painted green. But the readings of the oscillators on both timeframes cannot be analyzed: there is complete chaos of red, green and neutral gray colors there. The nearest resistance level is 1.2150. The bulls' targets are first a return of the pair to the 1.2200-1.2300 zone, and then the January high at 1.2350.
As for the economic calendar of the week, in addition to the already mentioned meetings of the Fed and the ECB, we are waiting for: on Tuesday, February 16 - data on GDP of the Eurozone, on Wednesday, February 17 - data on retail sales in the United States (a noticeable increase from -0.7% to + 0.7% is expected), and at the end of the working week, on Friday, February 19, statistics on business activity of Markit in Germany and the EU will be published (here, although not so noticeable, but still growth is predicted);

- GBP/USD. A quarterly GDP growth of 1% means that the country has every chance of getting out of the recession. The high rates of vaccination will also contribute to this (although there are concerns about new strains of coronavirus). Prime Minister Boris Johnson plans to unveil a plan to exit the quarantine towards the end of the month, or rather February 22, which should clarify the prospects for the recovery of the UK economy.
In the meantime, analysts' votes have been distributed as follows: the pound has reached 34-month highs, and 45% of experts believe that it would be time for it to stop and play back a little down. 20% vote for the continued growth of the pair, while the remaining 35% take a neutral position. 100% of trend indicators and 75% of oscillators on H4 and D1, together with graphical analysis on H4, point north, targets are 1.3900 and 1.3950. The remaining 25% of the oscillators give signals that the pair is overbought.
As for the graphical analysis on D1, it shows a rebound from the resistance of 1.3865 and the decline first to support in the zone 1.3700, then 1.3630 and 1.3575.
As for economic statistics, one should pay attention to data on the UK consumer market, which will be released on Wednesday February 17, and business activity in the service sector on Friday February 19; 

- USD/JPY. Graphical analysis on D1 predicts the movement of the pair in the channel along the Pivot Point 104.85 during the month. Moreover, it will first rise to the upper border of the channel at 105.75, and then descend to its lower border at 104.40. On H4, the oscillation amplitude is naturally less, from 104.85 to 105.30.
Apart from the green colored 75% of the trend indicators on D1, the readings of the other indicators and oscillators look quite confusing. It is also difficult to draw any conclusions from the opinions of experts, who are divided almost equally: 40% for the growth of the pair, 30% for its fall and the same amount for the sideways movement.
The GDP data for the IV quarter of 2020, which the Japanese Cabinet of Ministers will publish on Monday February 15, may somehow influence the formation of the short-term trend of the USD/JPY pair, especially if this indicator differs greatly from the forecasted +2.3%; 

 - cryptocurrencies. We wrote about bitcoin's readiness to storm the $50,000 high two weeks ago. And its rise to $48,930 on February 12 is a clear confirmation of the correctness of this forecast, which is supported by 80% of experts in a monthly perspective. 
The growth of bitcoin and other top coins pulls up the entire crypto market. Its members look forward to following the example of Tesla and MasterCard and other S& P500 companies listed on the NYSE to announce their readiness to work with digital assets. As, for example, did the Bank of New York Mellon, which said it would allow digital currencies to pass through the same financial network that it uses for traditional financial assets.
The fact that every company in America will soon follow the example of Tesla, was mentioned by the founder of the crypto bank Galaxy Digital Mike Novogratz in an interview with Bloomberg. According to the billionaire, this will help bitcoin grow to $100,000 by the end of this year.
In the longer term, the BTC/USD pair may rise even to $600,000. At least, this is the opinion of specialists of the financial and investment company Guggenheim Partners. According to the company's investment director, Scott Minerd, everything will depend on the number of coins in the public domain. “Cryptocurrency can rise to very high values. It is possible that we are talking about 400 or even $600,000 per coin... Bitcoin used to be unjustified for institutional investors, but now everything has changed,” Minerd said.
According to the specialist, the concern is caused by the rapid growth of the asset in the past few weeks. It is possible that we are talking about speculation in which institutional investors are involved, capable to manage the value of the coin with the help of large investments. So far, bitcoin is in a difficult situation, as the departure of large depositors will lead to a return of the negative trend. This development of events is unlikely, says the director of Guggenheim Partners, but it should definitely be taken into account.


NordFX Analytical Group


Notice: These materials should not be deemed a recommendation for investment or guidance for working on financial markets: they are for informative purposes only. Trading on financial markets is risky and can lead to a loss of money deposited.

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First, a review of last week’s events:

- EUR/USD. The dollar has been growing throughout the week, fueled by optimism about the imminent recovery of the US economy. The incidence of coronavirus is down sharply: in just three weeks since the peak, the 7-day moving average has dropped by almost 50%. And a successful vaccination, complete with a new economic aid package, can generally lead to an economic boom in the country.
And that is where the confusion begins, which has puzzled many economists. With the outbreak of the pandemic at the end of last February, an inverse correlation has clearly emerged between the dollar and stock indices. After an initial sharp collapse, thanks to fiscal incentives (QE), lower interest rates and pumping the US economy with cheap money, stock indices, S&P500, Dow Jones, Nasdaq, went up, and the DXY dollar index went down.
And here came 2021, and everything turned upside down. Against the backdrop of good economic data and expectations of a new injection of financial "vaccine" for almost $2 trillion, the growth of risk sentiment and stock indices continued. But in parallel, the yield of long-term US Treasury bonds and the dollar grew.
“But it shouldn't be that way,” many experts exclaim. A soft monetary policy and pumping liquidity into the market should lead to a weakening of the currency, but not vice versa. Or maybe it's not the dollar's strength at all, but the weakness of its competitors? First of all, the euro? 
Starting on Monday at 1.2135, the EUR/USD pair groped the local bottom at 1.1950 on the morning of Friday 05 February, breaking through 1.2000 support for the first time in 10 weeks. After that, the correlation between the stock market and the dollar once again changed its sign, from plus to minus this time: the S&P500 continued to grow, while the DXY began to fall. As a result, the EUR/USD pair went up again and finished the five-day period at 1.2050;

- GBP/USD. We predicted that at its meeting on Thursday 04 February, the Bank of England would leave both the volume of bond purchases of ?895bn and the interest rate at 0.1% unchanged. And so it happened, no changes in monetary policy took place. But at the same time, in just a couple of hours the pound has strengthened sharply against the dollar, jumping up 135 points, from 1.3565 to 1.3700. 
The whole point was not in the results of the meeting of the Bank, but in market expectations. The Bank's committee unanimously decided to leave key parameters of its policy unchanged. Some investors expected that a split in the ranks of the Committee would happen, and that a number of its members would support the introduction of negative rates. The split did not occur, the result of the vote was 9:0.
A negative rate, no doubt, would have led to a collapse of the pound, but the situation was saved by the optimism of officials regarding the growth of the UK economy. In their opinion, thanks to vaccination, the country's GDP will reach pre-COVID indicators during the current year, and the consumer price index will rise to 2% at the beginning of 2022.
The Bank of England's unanimous decision to abandon negative rates for the near future should encourage capital inflows into the country. And this was clearly demonstrated by the GBP/USD pair, which continued its growth on Friday February 05, and ended the weekly session at 1.3735;   

- USD/JPY. The movement of this pair in most cases depends on what is happening not in Japan, but in the United States, on where the DXY dollar index, stock indices, as well as the yield of American state bonds are moving. This happened last week as well.
Back on January 27, the pair broke through the upper border of the medium-term descending channel, along which it had been descending since the end of last March and went up sharply. And although the overwhelming majority of oscillators and trend indicators on both ?4 and D1 indicated an uptrend, only 30% of experts voted for further growth among analysts. But it was their forecast that turned out to be absolutely accurate: at the high on Friday, February 05, the pair reached a height of 105.75, after which a correction followed and then a finish at 105.35;

- cryptocurrencies. We noted in our last review that the bulls are gaining strength again, forming another upward momentum in bitcoin. It also said that the main problem of the crypto market in 2021 will be regulators, whose goal is to take this segment under their maximum control.
Starting from the second half of 2020. institutional investors have become the main drivers of growth. In addition to specialized funds like Grayscale Investments and technology companies such as MicroStrategy, Harvard, Yale and Michigan universities have begun to acquire cryptocurrencies, using their endowment funds for this. Even conservative giants such as US government pension funds like CalPERS have been seen buying digital assets. However, due to regulatory issues, these institutions are acting very cautiously, investing in bitcoin, for now, very small amounts in their scale.
Recall that as soon as the BTC/USD pair renewed its all-time high on January 8, rising above $42,000, and the crypto market capitalization exceeded $1 trillion, the head of the European regulator Christine Lagarde immediately stated that this was a very speculative asset, which is used to conduct a rather "strange business" and money laundering activities. The new US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen also joined her from across the ocean, according to her, "cryptocurrencies are of particular concern, and many of them are used to finance illegal activities." Both Lagarde and Yelen indicated that there is a need for serious regulation of this market. However, both kept silent about the main reason for such concern. Although, it is clear that governments are most concerned about the loss of their control over monetary resources.
Be that as it may, but after the statements of the President of the ECB and the US Treasury Secretary, the price of bitcoin fell below $30,000. However, by the end of January, the market came to its senses, and the main coin rate went up again.
On Friday evening, February 05, the BTC/USD pair is trading in the $38,000 zone, and the total capitalization of the crypto market hits highs, rising to the level of $1.16 trillion. As for the Crypto Fear & Greed Index, it reached 81, and although it is in the overbought zone, it is still far from the maximum values.
According to Glassnode specialists, the number of unique active BTC addresses reached 22.3 million in January. “This is the highest rate in the history of bitcoin to date,” analysts say. The January surge in activity beats the previous record of 21 million active addresses in December 2017.
BTC miners also showed indicators close to the record ones. Despite a 30% drop in the price of bitcoin, January was a very good month for this "strange business". Mining the main cryptocurrency brought them $1.1 billion (the maximum of $1.2 billion was recorded in December 2017). The production of Ethereum showed a record result of $0.83 billion, exceeding the figure of December 2020 by 120%.


As for the forecast for the coming week, summarizing the views of a number of experts, as well as forecasts made on the basis of a variety of methods of technical and graphical analysis, we can say the following:

- EUR/USD. So far, the situation seems to be still in favor of the dollar. In anticipation of the explosive growth of the US economy, investors are ready to turn a blind eye to another increase in the country's national debt, which will follow the next package of economic stimuli. The yields on long-term treasuries are growing, and the spread between US and European bonds is growing, strengthening the dollar, and putting pressure on the European currency. Thus, the yield of 10-year American state bonds has already reached about 1.15%, and the growth potential has not yet been exhausted. Here you can also recall the statements of Christine Lagarde that the ECB is not at all against the weakening of the euro.
The above has led to the fact that 70% of experts, supported by 85% of oscillators, 70% of trend indicators and graphical analysis on D1, agreed that the dollar will continue to grow in the coming days, and the EUR/USD pair to fall. Support levels are 1.1950, 1.1885, 1.1800 and 1.1750. However, the situation is changing with the transition from weekly to monthly forecast and here it is already 60% of experts together with graphical analysis who are waiting for the pair to return to the zone 1.2200-1.2300. The target is the January high of 1.2350, the nearest resistance is 1.2175.
As for important economic events in the coming week, we can note data on consumer markets in Germany and the United States, which will be released on Wednesday February 10;

- GBP/USD. Will the market still be able to maintain its bullish optimism about the British currency for some time? 65% of analysts believe that at least briefly the pair will still succeed, breaking through the resistance of 1.3750, to rise to the height of 1.3800, and possibly 25-50 points higher. Graphical analysis, 85% of oscillators as well as 100% of trend indicators on H4 and D1 agree with this. However, 15% of oscillators are already giving clear signals about the pair being overbought. 
The remaining 35% of experts consider the 1.3700-1.3750 zone as an insurmountable obstacle, according to them, having broken through the support at 1.3700, the pair will first go down 100 points and then reach the 1.3485-1.3500 zone.
Among the events to which attention should be paid, of interest are the speech of the head of the Bank of England, Andrew Bailey on Wednesday, February 10, and the publication of GDP data for the IV quarter of 2020 on Friday, February 12;    

- USD/JPY. Most experts (70%) supported by graphical analysis on D1, 75% of oscillators and 80% of trend indicators, expect the pair to continue to grow at least up to 106.00-106.25 zone. The next goal is 107.00. The nearest resistance is 105.75.
The remaining 30% of analysts believe that the pair will return to the level of 104.00, and graphical analysis on H4 predicts an even greater drop, to the low of January 21, 103.30. Supports are at 104.75, 104.00 and 103.50 levels.

 - cryptocurrencies. What is good, and what is bad. 
The support of cryptocurrencies from large institutional investors is, of course, good. It can provide further growth for bitcoin. However, the fact that the crypto market now largely depends on the sentiments of this rather small group, and that, in turn, on the sentiments of government officials, is bad, and can lead to a collapse of the quotes. A clear example is the January drop in the BTC/USD pair by 30%.
However, government actions can not only put pressure on the crypto market, but also push it up. Thus, US President Joe Biden has confirmed his readiness for a new stimulus package for almost $2 trillion. And this is good, since with an almost 100% probability, some of these funds will flow to the digital asset market.
But, for example, is Chinese New Year good or bad? It is definitely good for people, a fun holiday, gifts, fireworks... But, according to a number of experts, on the eve of this joyful event, the value of bitcoin may fall again. Moreover, in this case, the price of the main coin is threatened not by the central banks, but small investors, who will begin to transfer their crypto assets to fiat for the purchase of New Year's gifts.
Currently, it is in China that the bulk of the owners of bitcoin wallets with savings of up to 10 thousand dollars are concentrated. And, according to the specialists of the investment company Stack Funds, “since it is customary to celebrate the New Year in China very splendidly, small investors will definitely begin to withdraw funds before the holidays. In addition, - they explain, “charts over the past few years show that it is in the run-up to the holidays that the capitalization of bitcoin is greatly reduced.” We do not have long to wait for either a confirmation or a refutation of this prediction: the New Year in China is this Friday, February 12, and the holidays will last from February 11 to 17.
Now about Ethereum. This leading altcoin continues to deliver impressive results. It has increased in price by 130% since the beginning of the year, and its increase was 448% in 2020. The main impact on such dynamics is the expectation of the launch of futures on it on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME), which is scheduled for Monday, February 8.
The forecasts for this event are mixed. Optimists (and they are the majority) recall that the launch of bitcoin futures on the CME allowed this cryptocurrency to break the $20,000 mark at the end of 2017. Pessimists say that it was this event that marked the beginning of the crypto winter of 2018. So, the question of whether futures is good or bad remains open.
In December 2020, when the BTC/USD pair reached its previous high of $20,000 and ETH/USD was still very far from its similar mark, we noted a significant potential for the Ethereum growth. Now a similar situation is observed with another token, Litecoin, which we have not thought about for a long time.   
This coin appeared in October 2011, becoming an early fork of bitcoin, from a technical point of view is almost identical to it. Litecoin's all-time high of $370 was recorded on December 19, 2017. Then crypto winter came and, a year later, the price of the coin dropped to $20, having lost almost 95% of its value. At the moment, the quotes of the LTC/USD pair are at the level of $155, which is more than twice below its historical maximum, which can lead to its growth. Moreover, Litecoin even surpasses the main cryptocurrency in some important parameters. So, for example, the transaction speed with it is four times higher than with bitcoin.


NordFX Analytical Group


Notice: These materials should not be deemed a recommendation for investment or guidance for working on financial markets: they are for informative purposes only. Trading on financial markets is risky and can lead to a loss of money deposited.

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NordFX brokerage company has summed up the performance of its clients' trade transactions in the first month of 2021.

The maximum profit in January was received by a client from Vietnam, account No.1416xxx, whose profit amounted to 83.598 USD. This solid result was achieved mainly in gold (XAU/USD) and bitcoin (BTC/USD) trades.

The second place in the rating of the most successful traders of the month is taken by a client from China, account No.1416xxx. Their profit was 40.902 USD, and was received on transactions with the same gold and bitcoin, as well as with a currency that is quite exotic for Chinese traders, the South African rand (USD/ZAR).     

The third place on the January podium went to the representative of India (account No. 1518xxx) whose result of 40.217 USD was achieved mainly due to transactions with two cryptocurrency pairs, BTC/USD and ETH/USD. It should be noted that this trader occupied the third place in the previous, December TOP-3 as well, and their total profit for two months has amounted to almost 80 thousand USD.

As for traders focusing exclusively on Forex currency pairs, here the leader was a resident of Sri Lanka (account number 1528xxx), who earned 33.684 USD on transactions with the British pound - GBP/AUD, GBP/CAD and GBP/USD.  

The passive investment services:
- in CopyTrading in January the largest increase of 382% was shown by the sab aq4x signal, however, its maximum drawdown was more than impressive, 74.15%. But KennyFXPRO  demonstrates a small, but stable growth with a very moderate drawdown (growth in January 34.57% with a maximum drawdown of 12.30%). We can also note another non-aggressive signal - NordFX Pro (increase 24.08%, drawdown 11.31%);
- in the PAMM service, the manager Nacarino achieved the maximum profit for the month (increase 82.82%, drawdown 77.42%). The minimum drawdown of only 1% with a gain of 12.53% was shown by a trader with the nickname COPY CAT 01.

Among the IB partners, NordFX TOP-3 is as follows:
- the largest amount of commission, USD 9.461, was accrued in January to a partner from China, account No. 1336xxx;
- next is also a partner from China, account number 1175xxx, who received 6.124 USD;
- and, finally, a partner from Sri Lanka, account No. 1483xxx, who received 6.123 USD as a reward, closes the top three.


Notice: These materials should not be deemed a recommendation for investment or guidance for working on financial markets: they are for informative purposes only. Trading on financial markets is risky and can lead to a loss of money deposited.

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First, a review of last week’s events:

- EUR/USD. The trade wars unleashed by the previous US President Trump have just seemingly subsided, but now we can "congratulate" everyone on the start of a new - currency - war. And it could prove equally exciting and unpredictable. This time, it was the European Central Bank, headed by Christine Lagarde, that declared hostilities. The adversary was, as you might guess, the US Federal Reserve System.
We have repeatedly written that the growth of the euro was caused by the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic. The European currency rose against the dollar by more than 1700 points from March 20, 2020 to January 15, 2021. For the time being, the ECB leadership pretended that the problem lies not in the current level of the EUR/USD rate, but in the rate of its growth. But it turns out now that the current quotes are also of great importance for the EU economy, and that it would not be bad for them to go down.
The heads of the Banks of Finland and the Netherlands have started to speak actively about the fact that the ECB is very concerned about the euro exchange rate and should take decisive steps to stimulate inflation, hinting at a further decrease in interest rates. And Janet Yelen will definitely not like it. Recall that the former head of the Federal Reserve, and now the new US Treasury Secretary, Janet Yelen promised in every possible way to stop other countries' attempts to artificially reduce the rates of their currencies.
So, we can assume that the challenge has been posed and accepted, and the duel has begun. And right from the start, the EU has been let down... by its main support, Germany. It turns out that inflation in this country in January jumped from -0.7% to + 1.6%, which will certainly affect the growth of the total indicator of the Eurozone. Whether this will entail an accelerated curtailment of the ECB's quantitative stimulus (QE) program remains in question. The market is at a crossroads, which can be clearly seen from the EUR/USD quotes: the pair has been moving in a rather narrow sideways channel 1.2055-1.2185 for the last two and a half weeks. And even the fall of US stock indices on January 27-29 could not push it out of this corridor. As for the end of the week, the pair put the final point at 1.2135;

- GBP/USD. Last week, most analysts (65%) refused to share the bullish optimism of technical analysis. The reason is the poor performance of the British economy and the statement of the country's Prime Minister Boris Johnson warning that the third round of the lockdown could last well into the summer. This is forcing investors to not just revise their forecasts for the pound, but also to re-start discussing a scenario with negative Bank of England interest rates.
Looking at the chart of the pair, we can state that the bullish momentum has exhausted itself for the time being. Even fresh positive data on the UK labor market, published on January 26, did not help the pound. The pair cannot break above resistance 1.3750 for the second week in a row. Its volatility has also plummeted. If it exceeded 400 points a week at the end of December, the figure has now fallen to 150 points. As for the end of the five-day period, the final chord sounded in the zone of another strong resistance level, at 1.3700;

- USD/JPY. The medium-term trend for this pair was laid back at the end of March 2020, when it began to slide smoothly along the descending channel. There have been many discussions among experts, whether the pair will be able to reverse this trend and break through the upper limit of this channel.
It was only 30% of analysts who voted for such a development a week ago, but they were the ones who were right. The zone 104.70-105.00 was indicated as the target of the bulls, which was reached by the pair USD/JPY on Friday, January 29. Unlike the euro and the pound, it reacted quite actively to both positive reports on the labor market and the US trade balance. But the main impetus was given by the redistribution of financial flows caused by the fall of the American stock indices S&P500, Dow Jones and Nasdaq. As a result, the pair reached the 10-week high at 104.95, and ended the trading session slightly lower at 104.70;

- cryptocurrencies. We were certainly joking, but it seems the forecast of a fortune teller from New York is starting to come true. Last week we talked about Maren Altman, who determines the trends of the BTC/USD pair based on the stars movement. So, she absolutely accurately predicted the beginning of the January correction of bitcoin, since the trajectory of Mercury (the price of BTC) was to be crossed by Saturn (the limiting indicator) on that day. Her latest forecast spoke of "some favorable signals at the end of January."
For the past three weeks, the main cryptocurrency has been clinging to support in the $30,000 zone, trying to break even lower and thereby instilling pessimism in many experts and investors. For example, Scott Minerd, the director of investments at Guggenheim Partners, said that the bitcoin rate would not stay above $35 thousand or even above $30 thousand, since there is no institutional demand now that can support the quotes at these levels.
However, the end of the month showed that the fortune teller could win in a duel between a fortune teller and an expert, . Having found the local bottom at $29,200 on Wednesday January 27, the pair turned around and reached $38,100 on Friday January 29. But then another sharp reversal followed, and it dropped to the level of $33,500. So, the outcome of the fight at the time of writing the review remains in question. 
Scott Minerd is certainly right that big professional investors are not digital currency fans at all. And what happened in the second half of 2020 can rather be considered an experiment on their part, which they went to, constantly looking back at the reaction of regulators. But the director of Guggenheim Partners may not have taken into account that, in the absence of institutions, retail investors can also move bitcoin up, as was the case in 2017. Moreover, if then they were young enthusiasts, now the middle generation has joined them.
A study conducted by specialists of the Wirex platform together with the company Stellar Development Foundation showed that most of cryptocurrency investors are not at all young millennials, as the case was recently, but people over 45 years old. Investors aged 25 to 45 are only 22%. 
The active buyback of bitcoin after the drawdown below $30,000 and the absence of panic sell-off showed that many investors still believe in the growth of bitcoin to new heights. The total capitalization of the crypto market once again broke the psychological mark of $1 trillion over the past seven days, rising from $0.933 trillion to $1.08. As for the Crypto Fear & Greed Index, it also began to grow along with the growth of quotations. If at the end of last week the index was at around 40 points, it climbed to 77  on Friday, January 29. This is already close to the overbought zone, but the maximum values are still far away. Recall that the index values were constantly in the zone 95-98 out of 100 possible during the rally in December - the first week of January.


As for the forecast for the coming week, summarizing the views of a number of experts, as well as forecasts made on the basis of a variety of methods of technical and graphical analysis, we can say the following:

- EUR/USD. The currency war referred to in the first part of the review is not a matter of one week and not one month, it can stretch for years. The US economy “shrank” by 3.5% in 2020. And this is not only the first negative indicator since 2009, but also the largest drop since the end of World War II. However, investors expect a low interest rate and huge cash injections into the US economy ($900 billion from Donald Trump and $1,900 billion from Joe Biden), together with successful vaccination against COVID-19, will help it return to growth in 2021. Although, this will happen gradually, incrementally.
In contrast to the United States, support for the Eurozone economy was much more modest - €750 billion, therefore, the Eurozone GDP growth will be more moderate (according to forecasts + 1.5%). And the rate of vaccination is lower here than overseas. If we add to this the efforts of the ECB to weaken the common European currency, we can expect that the EUR/USD pair will be under certain pressure. But, as already mentioned, US Treasury Secretary Janet Yelen will make every effort to prevent this from happening.
After two and a half weeks of sideways movement of the EUR/USD pair in the channel 1.2055-1.2185, technical indicators are in confusion, giving no clear signals in either direction. As for the experts, most of them (65%) expect that in February, despite all, the dollar will continue to lose its positions and the pair will return to the 1.2200-1.2300 zone. The target is the January high of 1.2350, the nearest resistance is 1.2185. The nearest support is 1.2055, the main goal of the bears is the zone 1.1800-1.1900.
As for important economic events, there will be a lot of them in the coming week. Data on business activity and the labor market in the US will be published on Monday February 01 and Wednesday February 03. We will find out preliminary data on GDP On Tuesday February 02, and on the Eurozone consumer market on the next day. Finally, on February 05, on the first Friday of the month, data on the number of new jobs created in the United States outside the agricultural sector (NFP) will traditionally be released. This indicator is predicted to show an increase from -140K to +85K, which may lead to a short-term strengthening of the dollar, although this is often taken into account in advance by the market;

- GBP/USD. We will be waiting for a meeting of the Bank of England on Thursday February 04, where questions will be resolved about the planned volume of asset purchases under the programme to support the economy, as well as the interest rate reduction. Will Britain's regulator surprise investors? According to our forecasts, it is unlikely. It is likely that the volume of purchases of bonds on the open market will remain the same - ? 895 billion, and the rate will remain at 0.1%. Therefore, the market will wait for any signals, explicit or implicit, from the head of the Bank of England Andrew Bailey, whose speeches are scheduled for February 04 and 05.
As for analysts, 70% of them believe that the GBP/USD pair will still manage to break through the resistance at 1.3750 and rise to the height of 1.3800 for at least a short time. Graphical analysis and 85% of oscillators on D1, as well as 100% of trend indicators on H4 and D1 agree with this. At the same time, 60% of experts, along with graphical analysis, believe that after a dash to the north, the pair will return to the zone 1.3615-1.3700. The next support level is around 1.3500;

- USD/JPY. Most experts (70%), supported by graphical analysis on D1, believe that the pair's movement to the south will continue. However, now it has changed echelon, and the upper border of the medium-term descending channel will now become a support line for it. The main resistance level is 105.00, support is at 104.00, 103.55 and 103.00 levels.
The remaining 30% of analysts expect that the pair will be able to rise even higher and reach the zone of 105.70-106.10.
Among the trend indicators, 100% look up at ?4 and 85% at D1. As for the oscillators, 75% on H4 and 60% on D1 are colored green, the rest give signals that the pair is overbought;

- cryptocurrencies. According to a number of experts, the January drawdown is now fully redeemed, and the BTC/USD pair is ready to grow to $50,000. Those who wanted to take profits and transfer their crypto assets to fiat have already done so. And now the bulls are regaining strength, forming another upward momentum. Central bank interest rates, which are close to zero, the huge scale of fiscal stimulus, putting pressure on the dollar in the first place, and stock market fluctuations, drawing attention to Bitcoin as a hedge asset, can still act as arguments for the rally to continue. 
It is likely that 2021 will be the scene of a struggle between the crypto market and regulators. And if we set aside the optimism of crypto fans, it remains questionable whether digital assets can seriously strengthen their positions.
So, for example, Bank of Singapore, which is one of the largest Asian financial organizations, called bitcoin a promising instrument that can not only compete with gold, but also shift it from the first place on investments security. At the same time, the bank's experts believe that "we are unlikely to see widespread adoption of bitcoin soon, since regulators simply will not allow users to independently decide how transactions with millions or even billions of dollars will be performed." Governments are making it increasingly clear that they will not allow attacks on their main instrument of power - national currencies.
As for the second most important cryptocurrency, the market is waiting for the launch of futures on Ethereum. It is this factor that allowed the ETH/USD pair to hold its positions even in the days of January, when bitcoin sought to break through support in the $30,000 zone.
Recall that one of the factors that allowed bitcoin to surpass the $20,000 mark at the end of 2017 was the launch of futures for this cryptocurrency by the Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME). And now, on February 8, 2021, the same exchange is awaiting regulatory approval of the application for listing Ethereum futures, which may lead to a further increase in its quotations.
And in conclusion, another funny life hack from the life of cryptocurrencies. Last time we talked about an American fortune teller who predicts bitcoin prices by observing the movement of the planets. Now we are talking about another resident of the United States, Simon Berne, who placed a mining farm in the trunk of his BMW i8 sports car. The farm receives energy from the car battery, to which it is connected using a DC inverter. The battery power of the BMW i8 is 3500W, while the mining plant only consumes 1500W. According to Berne, this is a great way for him to make money even while traveling.


NordFX Analytical Group


Notice: These materials should not be deemed a recommendation for investment or guidance for working on financial markets: they are for informative purposes only. Trading on financial markets is risky and can lead to a loss of money deposited.

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What is Forex? This is a huge over-the-counter marketplace where various currencies are exchanged. Its turnover exceeds 5 trillion dollars a day! (For comparison: the turnover of all world stock markets is "just" about 85 billion dollars, that is, almost 60 times less).

Forex was created for international commercial activity, but today there are not only companies conducting such work, but also private traders who have received access to trade, as well as investors whose main purpose is to profit from fluctuating quotations.

In this article, we will look at the history of the emergence and formation of the international currency exchange market, the main participants in this market, as well as the principles of trading.

Is Forex an Exchange or Not?

You can often find on the internet the opinions of traders who say that Forex is an exchange. In fact, this is not the case. An exchange is a separate platform for trading. Forex is an over-the-counter market, that is, there is no common platform for currency exchange transactions.

At its core, the Forex market is a set of market makers (banks) that offer their services to everyone who wants to exchange certain currencies. Some banks are merging into larger aggregators to increase liquidity. Subsequently, all those who want to participate in trades connect to market makers and gain access to their Depth of Market (table of orders for buying and selling currencies).

Forex Market History

We owe the emergence of the modern international currency market to the 37th President of the United States, Richard Nixon. It was he who abolished the gold standard and the possibility of converting American currency into gold.

The Bretton Woods Agreement was signed In 1944, which set the dollar standard. The American currency, in turn, turned out to be pegged to gold. However, this system lasted less than 30 years.

The Smithsonian Accord was signed In 1971 in response to the economic crisis of the time. In fact, it was this document that caused the subsequent devaluation of the American currency. The agreement was signed by 10 states at the Smithsonian Institution.

The agreement resulted in three key decisions that the American president described as historic. First and foremost, the criteria for revising the exchange rates were agreed. This led to the subsequent decline of the US dollar. At the same time, the value of other currencies of countries from the so-called “Group of Ten” rose against the dollar.

Another important result is the setting of a limit for exchange rate fluctuations. This made it possible to temporarily exclude floating exchange rates and their sharp fall.

Finally, the United States agreed to remove the 10% foreign duty surcharge. As a result of this agreement, the price of gold rose to $ 38 per ounce, exchange rate fluctuations increased to 2.25% in relation to par, and, finally, the value of many currencies changed.

Despite the fact that the Smithsonian Agreement played an important role, it was the Kingston Meeting of the IMF member countries that laid the foundation for the modern Forex market. Let's look at the main changes in the world monetary system:
- Cancellation of the exchange of dollars for gold. From this point on, no other currency is tied to the gold standard. Gold has become a commodity market instrument.
- IMF member countries have been able to choose their own exchange rate regime. In total, there are three main types: a free floating rate, limited (a corridor to some currencies and floating to others) and fixed.
- There is a new type of international means of payment: SDR (Special Drawing Rights).
- Countries have received more opportunities to conduct independent financial policies.

Forex Market Key Participants

Forex market participants include banks, various funds and financial organizations, brokers, dealing centers , private traders and investors. Let's take a closer look at each of the groups.

Central banks are among the key players in the currency market. Their main task is to maintain the stability of the national currency exchange rate and fulfill certain economic and financial goals.

In modern realities, Central Banks have several mandates, among them, for example, achieving certain inflation or labour market targets. The Central Banks achieve their goals, among other things, by targeting (controlling) the exchange rate levels in the international arena.

Central banks can influence the currency market through direct interventions, as well as through interest rate changes or verbal influence (when executives make comments in which they can point out too overvalued or, conversely, undervalued national currency).

Commercial banks are the main players in the international currency market. The vast majority of operations go through them. They are intermediaries between companies engaged in foreign economic activity. Commercial banks are also aggregators and providers of liquidity, that is, market makers.

Various financial organizations and funds can also be noted here. Their main goal is to increase clients' capital and work with assets. The best known is George Soros's Quantum. Also, notable organizations include “Omaha Oracle” Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway. Although the latter is unlikely to resort to investment strategies aimed at dealing with currencies. They definitely use Forex services to buy securities on local stock exchanges.

Dealers and brokers are another group of Forex market participants. These are companies providing services to private traders and investors. Here, clients can open trading accounts, make transactions using a variety of trading platforms, undergo training, work with analytics and much more.

What is the difference between a broker and a dealing center? The key is that the broker acts as an intermediary between the trader and the market. The dealing center is also a market maker, that is, it itself acts as a market for its clients.

However, at present there are almost no purely dealing centers. All companies, basically, work on a mixed principle. For clients with small trading accounts and turnovers, they act as a counterparty, and for larger traders and investors - as a broker, that is, an intermediary connecting traders with liquidity providers such as large international banks.

Traders and Basic Principles of Work in Financial Markets

As mentioned above, traders are also participants in the Forex market. They, among other things, maintain the level of liquidity, which is a positive point for currency trading. These market participants perform their trading operations through the trading terminal offered by the broker.

Before starting trading, a trader needs to complete some preparatory activities. First of all, you need to learn how to open a trading account and where to do so. To do this, you can familiarize yourself with the trading conditions of the broker NordFX and open your account with this company.

The Forex trading scheme is quite simple - you open a trading account, download the trader's terminal and start making trades. However, in order to trade Forex profitably, this is clearly not enough. You need to gain some knowledge, develop your own trading system, fund your trading account and carefully monitor your risks. At NordFX, transfers to a trading account can be made from bank cards and accounts, as well as through electronic payment systems and even cryptocurrencies.

As for the trading platform, NordFX experts have selected the most popular software in the professional community - MetaTrader (MT4). Moreover, such a platform is available both for desktop solutions (PCs and laptops) and for the most popular mobile operating systems (Android and iOS).

The MetaTrader terminal is one of the most functional solutions on the Forex market. It offers a rich toolkit not only for opening positions and tracking quotes, but also for analytical work, using trading robot advisors and even testing strategies.

Moreover, MetaTrader is written in an open source language, which allows you to create your own indicators, scripts and algorithmic programs (advisors) that will trade for you in a fully automatic mode.

To work successfully on Forex, a trader must be familiar with the following aspects:
- Types of market analysis.
- Work with analytical tools (graphics, indicators, news).
- Creation of one's own trading strategy and system.
- Learning the basics of money and risk management.
- The psychology of trading.

Trading is carried out with real money. But before you start, you can try your hand at a demo account . This is a special training account that allows a trader not only to study the trading terminal without any financial risk, but also to work out their own strategies.

You can open a demo account at the brokerage company NordFX. All quotes that come to the terminal on such a training account are real. That is, you will be able to try your hand at real market conditions.

Once you have completed your training, you need to top up your trading account and then you can get to work. As noted above, trading strategies are fundamental. They allow the trader to predict future asset fluctuations in the Forex market.

Such strategies can be both borrowed and created by the broker'sclient itself, if they have enough knowledge to do so. The most popular among traders are indicator trading tactics, based on indicators of technical analysis.

They are easy to find in the MT4 terminal. But you need to carefully study how each indicator works before using it. Today, four main groups of such instruments are distinguished:
- Trending.
- Oscillators.
- Indicators that reflect the volatility and strength of the trend.

Working with the MetaTrader trading platform, you can simultaneously use one or more indicators already built into it and add to it your own ones created by you or other traders.

Some Forex Trading Recommendations

It is not enough to have a good trading strategy for successful trading. It is very important to follow certain rules and recommendations that we give below.

Study the asset carefully.

Before you start working with a particular currency, you need to carefully study it. It is important to pay attention not only to the chart, but also to the schedule of important economic events and publications. Among them, for example, meetings of Central Banks, business activity indices, data on the labor market, statistics on inflation.

Even if you do not plan to engage in news trading in the future, you will need to know the exact time of the news release, since these are periods of sharp jumps in rates and increased volatility in the financial markets.

Work systematically.

The biggest problem for many novice traders is that they do not know how to work systematically. Even with a rather interesting and profitable strategy behind them, such market participants, under the influence of emotions, often deviate from its main provisions and open trades at random, intuitively. As a result, they lose their money easily and quickly.

In trading, discipline is one of the key factors. Traders who do not have it do not succeed. Those who strictly follow their trading system are much more likely to increase their deposit.

Controlling emotions.

Emotions and psychological state play a very important role in trading. You need to learn to rule out negative thoughts from your work. The mistake of most traders is that, having made one or several unsuccessful trades, they start trading in order to win back. It happens the other way around ­— under the influence of greed, a person opens one trade after another instead of stopping in time.

A professional trader makes decisions based solely on the situation on the chart, their own analysis and trading system. Emotions are completely excluded from their work. If you cannot cope with them, it is better to use the opportunities for automatic or social trading that the broker NordFX provides to its clients - this is the use of robot advisors in MT4 and PAMM accounts, and the automatic copying of trades of experienced traders in the Copy Trading system.


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First, a review of last week’s events:

- EUR/USD. We published a chart seven days ago that clearly showed how the correlation between the S&P500 index and EUR/USD was broken in early January. But now everything is back to normal: the S&P500 continued its growth, reaching a historic maximum of 3859.84 on January 21, and the EUR/USD pair went up with it, fully justifying the forecast of the majority (65%) of experts. Groping on Monday the local bottom at 1.2053, the euro then rose to 1.2190, the final chord sounded slightly lower, at 1.2170. 
The end of the week was quite calm, thanks to the head of the European Central Bank. Christine Lagarde was never able to weaken the European currency, but also did not allow it to seriously overtake the dollar. And this can be considered a certain success.  
In her speech following the ECB meeting on Thursday 21 January, Madame Lagarde explained what is good and what is bad. The "Good" section includes the start of vaccinations, the success of the EU economic recovery and the reduction of political uncertainty in the US. The "Bad" section includes the worsening epidemiological situation, increased lockdowns, the likelihood of a double recession in the eurozone and low inflation, which is reluctant to grow because of the strong euro. At the same time, the ECB refused again at its meeting last Thursday to adjust monetary policy, only stating that “the package of the Pandemic Emergency Purchase Programme may not be used in full.” That news pushed the euro up. However, not by much since no specifics followed. And what criteria will be used to determine the scale of PEPP has remained a mystery to investors;

- GBP/USD. The pound grew along with the euro for the first half of the week. And it even broke through the upper boundary of the channel 1.3450-1.3700, reaching the height of 1.3745. However, the ending of the five-day period turned out to be blurry. The rally in the pound was not supported either by retail sales (an increase of 0.3% instead of the forecasted 1.2%), or business activity indicators: in the service sector, the Markit index fell from 49.4 to 38.8. British Prime Minister Boris Johnson added pessimism, saying that the third round of the lockdown could last well into the summer. As a result, the pound made a reversal, returned within the designated channel, and finished at 1.3680;

- USD/JPY. Recall that the main forecast, supported by 65% of analysts, said that this pair would hold within the downward medium-term channel, which began in the last days of March 2020 of the year. Levels 103.60 and 103.00 were called as supports.
That scenario turned out to be perfectly correct. The pair moves for the second week in a row unsuccessfully trying to break the upper bound of this channel. The first attempt last week was made on Tuesday January 19, when it bounced off the support at 103.60 and reached 104.07. The next rebound, on Thursday January 22, from the level of 103.30, was stopped at 103.90, after which the pair ended the working week where it had already visited repeatedly in January, in the 103.80 zone;

- cryptocurrencies. Is this atemporary correction or the beginning of a new crypto winter? This question became dominant last week. Bitcoin dipped below $29.000 on Friday December 22, which, of course, scared many investors. Guggenheim investment director Scott Minerd predicts a further decline down to $20,000 - the zone from which the explosive rally started in the second half of December 2020, which raised the BTC quotes by 100%.
Optimists reassure: over the year, bitcoin has risen in price by 5.75 times, from $7,300 on January 01, 2020 to $41.900 on January 08, 2021, so a correction by "some" 30% is, they say, not a reason for panic. In addition, a number of analysts note that this time the fall of bitcoin is not accompanied by an exit to fiat. Investors, fixing profits on the main cryptocurrency, do not leave the digital market, but open positions on more promising, in their opinion, altcoins. For example, on ethereum, the price of which has increased more than 11 times over the year. And if by the evening of January 22, the BTC/USD pair lost 22% relative to the maximum, then the decline in ETH/USD was less than 10%.
This version is also supported by data on the crypto market capitalization. In seven days, total capitalization, including bitcoin, decreased by 9.5% (from $1.028 trillion to $0.933 trillion). At the same time, the capitalization of altcoins remained at the same level of $300 billion. It was mainly bitcoin that was losing, the dominance index of which decreased from 67.48% to 64.31%. The share of Ethereum, on the contrary, increased from 13.52% to 15.01%.
As for the Crypto Fear & Greed Index, it finally came out of the overbought zone and fell from 88 to 40 points in a week. This value corresponds to a neutral state, when it is too late to open short positions on the BTC/USD pair, and too early to open long positions. Although, according to analysts, it is during such price rollbacks that "whales" begin to actively replenish their bitcoin wallets, buying up coins of small alarmist investors.


As for the forecast for the coming week, summarizing the views of a number of experts, as well as forecasts made on the basis of a variety of methods of technical and graphical analysis, we can say the following:

- EUR/USD. Analyzing the results of the last ECB meeting, we can conclude that, despite the not very clear comments of Ms. Lagarde, the mood of the European regulator is still hawkish. The bank's Governing Council noted that EU debt markets had shown a rise in yields and concerns about a rapid strengthening of the euro had eased. Now we must wait for the meeting of the US Federal Reserve, which will be held on January 28. The interest rate on the dollar is likely to remain at the same level of 0.25%, so the main interest will be the comments of the regulator's management regarding the monetary policy in the near future. Special attention will be drawn to them also because this will be the first Fed meeting since the inauguration of the new US President Joe Biden.
Of course, we will also see the release of a fairly large volume of macro statistics next week, including the volume of orders for capital goods and durable goods in the United States (to be announced on Wednesday January 27), as well as data on the GDP of the United States and Germany, which will be released, respectively, on Thursday January 28 and Friday January 29.
In the meantime, the opinions of experts have been distributed as follows. 45% of analysts supported by graphical analysis on D1, 75% of oscillators on ?4, 90% of trend indicators on H4 and 75% on D1, side with the bulls. The nearest resistances are 1.2275, 1.2300 and 1.2350. The medium-term target is the same - rise to a height of 1.2500-1.2550.
The opposite view is held by 55% of experts. 25% oscillators on H4 signal that the pair is overbought. The nearest support is 1.2130 and 1.2060. The main objective is the zone 1.1800-1.1900;

- GBP/USD. At the time of writing the review, oscillator readings on H4 look pretty chaotic. As for the remaining indicators, most of them are still painted green. Thus, 75% of oscillators and graphical analysis on D1, as well as 75% of trend indicators on H4 and 100% on D1 look to the north.
But as for analysts, they, for the most part (65%), do not share the bullish optimism of technical analysis. The reason, as mentioned above, is the poor performance of the British economy and the statement of the country's Prime Minister Boris Johnson warning that the third round of the lockdown could last well into the summer. This is forcing investors to not just revise their forecasts for the pound, but also to re-start discussing a scenario with negative Bank of England interest rates.
The support levels are zone 1.3615-1.3635, then 1.3525 and finally the lower limit of the three-week side channel 1.3450. Resistance levels ¬- the upper limit of the channel 1.3700, 1.3745 and 1.3800;

- USD/JPY. At its meeting on Thursday January 21, the Bank of Japan, as well as the ECB, did not adjust the parameters of its monetary policy. The expectations for GDP were slightly lowered over the past, 2020, but the regulator raised its forecasts for 2021, considering that despite everything, the country's economy will continue to grow.
Based on this, 70% of experts favored further smooth strengthening of the yen and the descent of the pair to support 103.00, and in case of increased volatility - another 50 points lower. The nearest support is 103.30.
An alternative scenario, for which 30% of experts voted, assumes a breakdown of the upper border of the descending channel, and the rise of the pair first to the resistance of 104.00, then 104.40. The next goal of the bulls is zone 104.70-105.00;

- cryptocurrencies. It is no secret how highly volatile and risky bitcoin is. Its explosive growth was driven by large institutional investors who began to enter the crypto market in the second half of 2020, fueled by the COVID-19 pandemic and fiscal stimulus from the US Federal Reserve, which cut interest rates and flooded the market with cheap dollars.
And now analysts are talking about the fact that cryptocurrencies could only be a temporary measure to preserve capital, and that now institutions are phasing out purchases of digital assets. 
According to JPMorgan Chase strategists, the key to the short-term outlook for bitcoin's price is the world's largest digital asset management company Grayscale Investments, with a crypto portfolio currently valued at $23 billion. According to the calculations of bank analysts, for the BTC/USD pair to break through the resistance of $40,000, it is necessary that Grayscale Bitcoin Trust maintain the pace of inflow funds of $100 million per day in the coming days and weeks. Otherwise, a deep correction can be expected.
At the time of writing the forecast, the pair's quotes are in the region of $32,500. This is a fairly strong support/resistance level for the past three weeks. And if capitalization does not go up, and the price again manages to fall below $30,000, one can expect increased pressure from the bears and a new wave of active sales. 65% of experts agree with this.
But there are also professional market participants who maintain a moderately bullish mood, which is confirmed by positive premiums for March futures, + 3.5-5.0%. And the head of investment company Pantera Capital Dan Morehead expects to see "bitcoin for $45,000 or even more" in February. However, he advises traders and other industry participants to be as prudent as possible.
The statements of the new US administration also inspire some optimism. So the candidate for the US Treasury and former Fed Chairman Janet Yellen, speaking about possible improvements to the traditional financial system, called for encouraging the use of cryptocurrencies, if it, of course, occurs within the framework of the law. But time will tell what these laws will be. Although ... already now those who wish can use the services of ... a fortune teller.
As Reuters reported, fortune teller Maren Altman from New York makes her predictions of the bitcoin rate based on the movement of the stars. She predicted the beginning of the January correction of bitcoin absolutely accurately, since on that day the trajectory of Mercury (the price of BTC) should have been crossed by Saturn (the limiting indicator). Looking ahead, Ms. Altman sees “some favorable signals at the end of the month and especially in February and early March.” “However, a big correction will begin in mid-March,” the fortune teller says. “Mid-April also looks pessimistic. May is bullish.”
By the way, Ms. Altman already has more than a million followers on social networks, among whom there may be large institutional investors. So, it is possible that it is she, together with the stars, and not Grayscale Investments, who runs the crypto market ?.


NordFX Analytical Group


Notice: These materials should not be deemed a recommendation for investment or guidance for working on financial markets: they are for informative purposes only. Trading on financial markets is risky and can lead to a loss of money deposited.

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The Forex currency market is one of the few places where everyone can try to realize themselves. The absence of superiors, the non-existent ceiling on earnings, the work schedule for which you are responsible — all this is in the trader's profession.  But becoming one is not an easy task.

Newcomers who come here face a number of difficulties. Many do not understand how to start trading Forex and what is needed for this. Therefore, they make mistakes at the beginning, which can discourage the desire to trade on Forex forever after the first attempt.

Since the path of novice traders and investors cannot be called an easy walk, we have prepared our own action plan. By following it, you will quickly find the key to understanding the market, and Forex trading will begin to generate income, for which, in fact, you came here.

Where to Start Trading on Forex

Forex market is a decentralized interbank exchange where currency is traded between its participants. In simple words, Forex is the global market for currency trading . The main source of a trader's earnings is the exchange rate difference between the price of buying and selling one currency in exchange for another. For example, you can buy and then sell back dollars for euros, or Japanese yen for Chinese yuan. But before you start predicting the benefit of a particular deal and making money from it, you should go through the following main stages. There are seven of them, and these are:
1. Choosing a broker ;
2. Opening of a trading account;
3. Downloading the platform (for broker NordFX, this is MT4);
4. Acquaintance with the theoretical part;
5. Choosing a currency pair and trading strategy;
6. Testing theory on a demo account and obtaining the necessary skills;
7. Smooth transition to real trading with real money.

How to Choose a Forex Broker

The foreign exchange market is arranged in such a way that only large capital can access it directly. We are talking about millions of dollars, because the main participants in trading are banking institutions and institutional investors, such as hedge funds. To start trading on Forex , a private trader needs to use the services of an intermediary - a broker . The latter accumulates all orders of traders into a single powerful pool and enters the market with it. Thanks to this, Forex trading has become available to everyone, even those who have very little capital.

It is important to choose a decent brokerage company. When you open a trading account , the next step is to fund it. Your money is a tidbit for scammers. There are cases when fake companies simply imitated real trading. There are also those that are doing their best to under various pretexts not to return customers profit earned by them. To do this, they use non-market quotes or fictitious server crashes. There are those who deliberately insert sticks into the wheels, juggling spreads, requotes, slippage. Therefore, choosing a broker can be compared to laying the foundation for building a house.

Regulation and Reputation

One of the basic criteria for choosing a broker is their regulation and reputation.

A law-abiding company must be legally registered to allow the appropriate type of business. Despite the fact that the conditions for each country are different, the company's activity in the financial markets is always closely monitored. These are the issuance of a license, verification of reports, payment of insurance premiums, consideration of complaints and monitoring. As soon as a broker begins to go beyond the law, at best it is fined for a very large sum, or even deprived of its license, forbidding it to work.

In addition to the license, you should carefully study the company's reputation and history. Brokers who once took the path of deception cannot exist for a long time. First, the regulator's response is imminent. Secondly, there is a wave of negative reviews.

The longer the broker stays in the market, the clearer its reputation becomes. From the position of a trader, choosing a company without history and reputation is not justified.

The brokerage company NordFX has been operating in the financial markets since 2008 and is included in the TOP-10 and TOP-20 of many international ratings. It has received more than 50 honorary awards, including those as an exceptionally reliable highly professional broker. During this time, clients from more than 190 countries of the world have opened more than one and a half million accounts in it. Agree, that says a lot!

NordFX works not only in the foreign exchange, but also in the stock and cryptocurrency markets. And during this time, unlike many cryptocurrency exchanges, there was not a single hacker hacking in the company, not a single penny of customer funds was stolen. And all this thanks to the combination of many years of experience of NordFX specialists and the advanced technologies and equipment they use.   

Trading Terms

The beginner may have the impression that the terms of the trading account are identical regardless of the broker. In fact, this is not the case. The size of the spread, commission or swap, the speed of order execution, the minimum deposit size, the variety of trading instruments, leverage - all these factors uniquely affect the final profitability of a trader's work. 

The difference becomes noticeable when studying the details. For example, some have huge spreads for the currency pair you are interested in, while others, on the contrary, have low spreads. The broker that you choose should have the trading conditions that are right for you. Trading in poor trading conditions will do no good. For example, if you trade inside the day on short time frames, the size of the swap doesn't make any difference to you. But if you keep your position open for several weeks or months, then a negative swap can “eat up” all your profits and bring only losses.

The size of the leverage is also important. Under normal conditions in the market, you may not use it, but under extraordinary conditions it can be your lifeline that will keep you from falling victim to financial storms and hurricanes. At NordFX, for example, the maximum leverage for currency pairs reaches 1: 1000, which significantly expands your opportunities for using a variety of trading strategies and hedging risks.

Speed and Withdrawal Methods, Support

It is important to check the future partner (and the broker is your partner) for the ability to solve current problems. To do this, ask Support a few questions  and assess how quickly you got the answer to your question. If the problem is not solved, ­you should think about the quality of service.

Many do not attach importance to this, but at times of real problems only effective support can minimize damage.

Pay attention to the methods of depositing and withdrawing money, their variety, the size of the commission and the speed of order execution. It is counterproductive to cooperate with a brokerage company, which has a term of withdrawal of money as one month in the regulations.

Opening a Trading Account

When you have laid the foundation, that is, decided on a reliable brokerage company, the next step is to open a trading account. Forex trading is carried out through it. One company may have several types of accounts. You should choose a specific one, focusing on your tasks, the amount of capital, and expediency.

Broker NordFX offers its clients four types of accounts. Each of them is unique in its own way and endowed with advantages that, in total, cover all the requirements that a trader can impose on them, and allow you to effectively use a wide variety of trading strategies, conducting transactions with currencies, cryptocurrencies, precious metals, oil, stock indices and shares of leading world companies.

Downloading the Platform

Trading on financial markets is carried out using special software. Depending on which terminal is selected, the number of tools for price analysis and your capabilities will depend. Indicators, advisors, scripts make trading more comfortable and efficient.

Today, in Forex, the majority of traders in the world choose the MetaTrader 4 (MT4) platform. Its interface is intuitive, which allows, just a few minutes after meeting, to make the first transaction. As for the tools and opportunities, they are huge. Study the functional features of MT4 in detail, and you will understand how much it can do for you.

Acquaintance with the Theoretical Part

A trader is a profession that, in principle, anyone can comprehend. But, like in any occupation, there are a number of secrets here, without which you cannot rise from a beginner to the level of a high-class professional. In order to become one, you need to study the theory that is dedicated to the foreign exchange market. This applies not only to methods of technical analysis of charts, but also to understanding the basics of pricing and the functioning of world markets. The following tutorials and tutorials will help you with this:
1. “How to Make a Living Trading Foreign Exchange” - Courtney Smith;
2. “A Man for All Markets: From Las Vegas to Wall Street” - Edward O. Thorpe;
3. “The Psychology of Trading: Tools and Techniques for Minding the Markets” - B.  Steenbadger;
4. " Beyond Candlesticks " - Steve Nison;
5. "How to Play and Win at a Stock Exchange" - Alexander Elder.

You can find useful content on exchange topics on thematic sites and, of course, in the NordFX educational section. There's just a huge amount of it. And when you become grounded in theory, you will naturally be able to make significantly more informed decisions when opening and closing trades.

However, the theoretical base may not be enough. The psychology of a trader has a huge impact on the financial result. And if you are still not confident in your abilities, such areas of social trading as PAMM accounts and CopyTrading can come to the rescue.

Choosing a Currency Pair and Trading Strategy

It is enough to read one book about currency, commodity, or world stock exchanges to understand the importance of system trading. In this case, you can do the following:
1. Create your own strategy based on the obtained theoretical data;
2. Take someone else's, adjusting it for yourself.

The currency pair will play an important role. We recommend that beginners pay attention to assets where the spread value is minimal. These are currency pairs such as: EUR/USD, GBP/USD, USD/JPY, AUD/USD, EUR/GBP, EUR/JPY, and a number of others.

If you wish to work with CFDs on stocks, NordFX has allocated a separate Stocks trading account to do so. Many tens of shares of the world's largest companies are available for trading on it.

Testing Theory on a Demo Account and Gaining Skills

The major advancement in the exchange business, made possible in recent decades by computers and the Internet, is electronic trading. Modern platforms store a huge historical array of quotes, on the basis of which you can automatically conduct a thorough analysis, form a trading strategy and test your ideas. It is worth learning the strategy tester built into MetaTrader-4 here.

Of course, the demo account should also be borne in mind. Thanks to it, you can trade in real time with virtual money. But the demo account has one huge drawback. The trader here does not risk losing real capital, therefore, they act much more recklessly than when trading in the real market. 

To understand psychology and how important it is in this profession, you can test ideas on a Fix account. The minimum deposit is only $10 here, so it's a great way to feel all on yourself: the grief of defeat, excitement, fear and, of course, the joy of victory.

Smooth Transition to Real Trading

The preliminary experience gained on a demo account allows you to proceed to the final stage - to start using a real trading account. It is important to be aware that there is a huge difference between the real and the demo accounts.  As mentioned above, it lies in the perception of loss. In the case of real money, losses are always taken to heart. And it is critical at this stage not to do the following stupid things:
1. Try to deviate from the terms of your trading strategy;
2. Start to recoup;
3. Forget about cutting losses;
4. Start waiting through drawdown;
5. Succumb to the excitement.

When you start trading real money, learn to stop on time, work on your mistakes. A couple of hours spent analyzing the transaction report can reveal the strengths and weaknesses not only of your trading strategy, but also of your own character. And this is often more important than knowledge in technical or fundamental analysis of Forex.

With What Amount You Can Start Trading on Forex

Among beginners, there is an opinion that a small amount of capital is enough to start making serious money. For example, a Fix account allows you to make a trade with a “capital” of just one dollar. Is that enough to begin with? From our point of view, it is. But only for a start, and not to buy a villa, a yacht and a personal plane.

Examples are often advertised on the Internet in which traders manage to get astronomical profits of hundreds, thousands, and even tens of thousands of percent. And the most interesting thing is that this is not a lie, it really happens. But this is a very risky game, which then, most often, leads to the collapse and loss of all funds.

Imagine that, having accelerated your car on the Formula 1 track to 300 km/h, you then jump out into a city intersection. How will this end? Everyone has a chance of staying alive, but it is small and has nothing to do with a professional approach. Any rider will say the speed must meet road conditions. Likewise in Forex, you need to learn to hurry slowly, give up crazy ideas and set realistic goals for yourself. Everyone has a chance of success. However, you should not treat trading in financial markets as a casino where luck decides everything.  Knowledge and experience decide everything here.

Though, some luck won't hurt either...


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First, a review of last week’s events:

- EUR/USD. Making a forecast for the past week, the majority of experts (60%) were in favor of reducing the pair first to support 1.2100, and then, possibly, another 50 points lower. Almost everything happened as forecasted: the EUR/USD pair was at the level of 1.2075 at the end of the trading week.
It should be noted that a somewhat atypical situation has developed on the market since the start of 2021. Usually, the rise in the stock market puts downward pressure on the dollar. This is exactly what happened in the previous month: fueled by risk appetites, the S&P500 grew steadily, while the dollar index, which plays the role of a defensive asset, was steadily falling. According to Bank of America Merrill Lynch, in December, large investors hoped for a quick victory over COVID-19, a surge in GDP, they were actively buyingt shares of technology companies and were also actively getting rid of the dollar. And now the situation has changed dramatically: the USD DXY index began to grow in parallel with the S&P500.
What is the reason for this? First, US stocks look overvalued at the moment. At least from the point of view of American investors. In addition, we wrote in the previous review that after the certification of the US President-elect Biden and the majority of Democrats in the Senate, the yield of 10-year American Treasuries went up sharply, pulling the dollar with it. The leaders of the Federal Reserve Banks (FRB) of Richmond and Philadelphia added fuel to the fire, hinting at a possible curtailment of the QE program and an increase in interest rates on the dollar; bulls began to close long positions in EUR/USD;

- GBP/USD. Over the past five days, this pair has drawn a clear sinusoid, moving in the 1.3450-1.3700 channel along the 1.3575 Pivot Point. At the beginning, it dropped to the lower border of this trading range, and then turned around and sharply went up, reaching the values of 2.5 years ago on Wednesday.
The pound was supported last week by the head of the Bank of England, Andrew Bailey, who not only rejected the possibility of introducing a negative interest rate, but also expressed the opinion that the coronavirus pandemic is not capable of causing any structural changes in the UK economy. As a result, the pound showed the biggest gains in the past two months. However, then, following the general trend of strengthening dollar, the pair returned to the Pivot Point and finished the week at 1.3580;

- USD/JPY. The forecast, which was voted for by the majority of analysts (55%), turned out to be absolutely correct: the pair kept within the descending medium-term channel and, having bounced off its upper border, moved to its center.
Recall that another 10% of analysts assumed that the pair would move sideways, making fluctuations around Pivot Point 104.00. And they also turned out to be right: having started the five-day week at 103.95, it completed it also within this zone, at 103.85;

- cryptocurrencies. By the evening of Friday January 15, the bitcoin chart can equally likely speak of both a return to an uptrend or a continuation of a downward correction. Reaching a historic high of $41.435 on January 08, the BTC/USD pair turned south and dropped to $30.600 by January 11. All major indicators have long been giving signals of bitcoin being overbought, and only an excuse was needed for such a deep correction. And it was found in the form of an increase in the yield on US government bonds, which caused the dollar to strengthen. As a result, the main cryptocurrency lost more than 25% in price in just three days.
Then, to the delight of investors, the pair again approached the $40,000 mark, and the USA again became the formal reason for this. More precisely, President-elect Joe Biden, who announced a new $1.9 trillion economic aid package that includes $2,000 in direct payments to Americans. Such massive fiscal and monetary stimulus is likely to drive inflation and, as a result, increase demand for risky assets, including cryptocurrencies.
All good things are known to end someday. So bitcoin stopped its growth on January 14, and failed to set a new height record. And then the head of the ECB Christine Lagarde called for global regulation of the digital currency market. Referring to the speculative nature of bitcoin, she stated that such regulation could be initiated within the G7 countries, then carried over to the G20, and eventually expanded to a global level.
Taking advantage of the situation, the bears regained control of the situation and the BTC/USD pair dropped below the $ 35,000 level again in the second half of Friday, January 15.
It should be noted that the activity of investors has significantly decreased at the start of 2021. According to CoinShares, only $29 million was invested in crypto funds in the first week of January. This is despite the fact that similar investments amounted to more than $ 1 billion the week before Christmas. Of course, such a lull can be explained by a respite for the holidays. Moreover, crypto whales also reacted sluggishly to the correction on January 8-11: withdrawal operations were recorded only on a very small number of their BTC wallets.
PayPal data show that at least the retail market is gradually waking up after the Christmas and New Year hibernation, the volume of bitcoin trading on this platform has increased by 950% since the beginning of January, that is, almost 10 times. If, according to the analytical service Nomics, platform users made transactions with BTC for only $22.8 million on January 01, 2021, their volume amounted to $242 million ten days later.
The total cryptocurrency market capitalization was $1 trillion by January 15 (it was $1.13 trillion at the high of January 10). The BTC dominance index is in the region of 68%, and the Crypto Fear & Greed Index fell from 95 to 88 points over the week.


As for the forecast for the coming week, summarizing the views of a number of experts, as well as forecasts made on the basis of a variety of methods of technical and graphical analysis, we can say the following:

- EUR/USD. Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell denied the statements of his colleagues from the regional Federal Reserve Banks, saying that one should not count on raising interest rates and curtailing soft monetary policy in the near future. These words, coupled with Joe Biden's new $1.9 trillion fiscal stimulus package, are likely to halt the rise in US Treasury yields and support the bulls on S&P500. Moreover, the hopes for vaccination, which will lead to a rapid growth in GDP, have not disappeared. Thus, Wall Street Journal experts predict an increase in American GDP by 4.3% in 2021. 
But will this break the current correlation between the dollar and the stock market? Will the dollar stop rising? It is not excluded that the growth of the S&P500 will be supported not only by American, but also by major investors from other countries. And such an infusion of foreign capital into the US economy will lead to the strengthening of the US currency.
Now, specifically about the EUR/USD pair. It is clear that at the time of writing the forecast (January 15), most indicators are painted red. 100% of trend indicators on H4, 75% on D1, as well as 75% of oscillators on both timeframes look to the south. The remaining oscillators signal that the pair is oversold.
As for the experts, their opinions are divided equally at the moment. But when moving from a weekly to a mid-term forecast, the scales are tilted towards the bulls. 65% of analysts, supported by graphical analysis on D1, expect the dollar to weaken and the pair to rise to at least 1.2500-1.2550 over the next one and a half to two months. The nearest resistances are 1.2175, 1.2275, 1.2300 and 1.2350. The main support area is 1.1800-1.1900. 
As for the important events of the coming week, attention should be paid to the ECB's interest rate decision and the subsequent press conference of the management of this regulator on Thursday 21 January. And data on business activity of Germany and the Eurozone as a whole will be published the next day, on January 22;

- GBP/USD. Not only Germany and the EU, but also the UK will release statistics on business activity (Markit in the services sector) on Friday 22 January. This data could send a signal to investors about how the attack of a new coronavirus strain has affected the country's economy. Recall that earlier Britain reported record levels of deaths and new cases over the past few weeks in London and the south-east of England.
However, problems associated with COVID-19 are intensifying in other countries as well, including the United States. Therefore, 60% of analysts, supported by graphical analysis on H4 and D1, believe that the pair will be able to return to the level of 1.3700, and perhaps rise another 100 points higher. An additional argument for its growth is the new fiscal stimulus in the US, which has been discussed above.
Support levels 1.3540 and 1.3450;

- USD/JPY. The rise of the pair from the lower to the upper border of the descending medium-term channel, which took place in the first two weeks of January, is associated by a number of experts with an increase in risk sentiment and a decrease in interest in the yen as a safe-haven currency. Based on this, they believe that the pair will still be able to break through the upper border of the designated channel and rise to the 105.00 zone. 35% of analysts and graphical analysis on D1 vote for this scenario. The next target of the bulls is 105.70, the nearest resistance is the zone 104.00-104.35.
The majority of experts (65%) are confident that the pair will stay within the designated channel. The nearest support is 103.60, the next one is 103.00. The target is located in the 102.50 area.

- cryptocurrencies. So, the total cryptocurrency market capitalization is now at the level of $1 trillion. This is an important psychological level, especially for retail investors. Further growth of this indicator will be a clear confirmation of forecasts about the rise of the BTC/USD pair at least to a height of $50.000. If the capitalization goes down, then this can cause a landslide sale of coins: the example of the 2018 crypto winter is alive in the market memory.
In the meantime, the market is still dominated by an optimistic mood. So, for example, Bloomberg crypto analyst Mike McGlone believes that $50.000 is a real target for bitcoin.  He gave a forecast a few months ago, according to which BTC was supposed to grow to a new historical high in December 2020, which eventually did happen. “I think that the asset will take the barrier of 50 thousand in the near future,” said this expert and added that the chances of BTC growth are much greater than its further weakening, and a pullback to $20,000 is now practically excluded.
Dan Morehead, CEO of investment company Pantera Capital, predicts that bitcoin's price will hit $115,000 by August 2021 and events such as the launch of the digital yuan will help further the penetration of cryptocurrencies into the global economy.
If this happens, there will be even more crypto millionaires and billionaires in the world. For now, according to Forbes, the list of the richest of them looks like this:
In first place are the founders of the bitcoin exchange Gemini, the Winklevoss brothers. The estimated value of their cryptocurrency assets, according to Forbes, is about $1.4 billion each. Bloq co-founder Matthew Roszak with $1.2 billion in digital assets ranks second, followed by venture capitalist Tim Draper. According to Forbes, the value of his assets is estimated at $1.1 billion.
In fourth place is the head of MicroStrategy, Michael Sailor, with assets worth $600 million, in fifthis the founder of the crypto bank Galaxy Digital Mike Novogratz. Forbes valued his cryptocurrency assets at $478 million. The last on the list is the co-founder of ethereum Vitalik Buterin with assets worth $360 million.
Speaking of ethereum. According to the founder of the investment fund DTAP Capital Dan Tapiero, this coin is ready for further growth. This is evidenced by the interest on the part of institutional clients of the American financial holding Northern Trust. The holding company launches a service for storing cryptocurrencies, in partnership with Standard Chartered bank. And "if Northern Trust stores bitcoin and ethereum, then they have buyers for both assets," Tapiero substantiated his point of view.


NordFX Analytical Group


Notice: These materials should not be deemed a recommendation for investment or guidance for working on financial markets: they are for informative purposes only. Trading on financial markets is risky and can lead to a loss of money deposited.

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The winners of the awards of the International Academy of Trading Masterforex-V and the International Association of Forex Traders IAFT became known at the very beginning of the new year, 2021. Among the winners is the brokerage company NordFX, which has won three prestigious professional awards.


Founded in 2005, Masterforex-V International Academy is one of the leading and most ambitious online projects in the field of foreign exchange trading. Today traders from more than 50 countries of the world are trained at the Academy. The rectorate and the students of the Academy evaluate the performance of financial organizations throughout the year, forming ratings, at the top of which NordFX has repeatedly found itself. And now, at the end of 2020, the MasterForex-V Academy community has once again expressed its trust and recognition to the company, having honoured it with the title of "World Most Reliable Broker."

The company received two more awards based on the results of the annual voting on the IAFT Awards website. It is organized by the International Association of Forex Traders (IAFT), in which more than 200,000 traders from various countries take part. Each of them can vote on the award website, which makes it possible to assess the activities of a broker as objectively as possible.

For the third year in a row, NordFX won the Best Broker in Asia nomination by a wide margin, which is an unconditional recognition of the company's active work and success in this most important region of the planet.

And another award from the International Association of Forex Traders, the title of the Best Cryptocurrency Broker of 2020, was a testament to the high quality of services that the company provides for operations in the digital asset market.


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First, a review of last week’s events:

- EUR/USD. The dollar has been falling, and the EUR/USD pair has been rising accordingly since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic last March. And now it is no longer far from its Q1 2018 highs. True, the result of the last three weeks can be considered zero. And the blame is not only the Christmas and New Year holidays, but also the growth in the yield of US Treasury bonds, coupled with the hawkish statements of the Fed representatives.
After the certification of President-elect Biden and the majority of Democrats in the Senate, the yield of 10-year-old American Treasuries skyrocketed, pulling the dollar with it. The President of the Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond, Thomas Barkin, said that the growth in Treasury yields confirms the desire of investors to see higher interest rates on USD, and the head of the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia, Patrick Harker, predicted that the curtailment of the QE program could begin in the second half of 2021. All this sharply reduced the appetite of the bulls, who began to close long positions in EUR/USD, as a result of which the pair ended the week at 1.2225;

- GBP/USD. The storms associated with the signing of the Brexit agreement subsided, and, following the EUR/USD, the GBP/USD pair took a breather. Having reached a high of 1.3705 on January 04, by the end of the week it returned to where it had already visited in mid-late December, and finished at 1.3560;

- USD/JPY. Three weeks ago, we predicted the movement of the pair from the central line to the upper border of the medium-term channel, along which it has been sliding smoothly south from the end of March 2020. This is exactly what happened. Twice, on January 4 and 5, after bouncing off the central line, the pair went up sharply, approaching the upper border of the channel at 104.10 on January 8. A small pullback followed, and it froze at 103.95. Note that the 104.00 zone has been a strong support/resistance level for the last four months, from which the pair has repeatedly bounced off in one direction or another;

- Cryptocurrencies. it was 12 years ago, on January 3, 2009, that a person or group of people under the nickname Satoshi Nakamoto launched the main bitcoin network, mining a genesis block with 50 BTC. A few days later, on January 12, the first bitcoin transaction took place: Satoshi Nakamoto sent 10 BTC to Hal Finney. And more recently, in July 2020, information appeared on the Whale Alert Twitter account that before his mysterious disappearance more than ten years ago, Nakamoto managed to mine 1,125,150 BTC. Now, when bitcoin has reached the mark of $41,000, the value of these coins would exceed $45 billion, and Nakamoto would have taken the 25th place among the richest people on the planet.
Here, in fact, we have already announced the most important news of the past week: the quotes of the main cryptocurrency exceeded $41,000 on Friday, January 8. Thus, starting in December 2020, in just five weeks, each BTC coin grew 115% heavier.
Which pleases not only investors, but also miners. December turned out to be their most successful month in the last three years. According to the analytical service Block Research, in December the total revenue of miners reached $692 million, which is almost $1 million per hour.
At the moment, the cryptocurrency mining market is dominated by China, which, according to some estimates, accounts for more than 50% of the global hash rate. The head of Ripple even called Bitcoin and Ethereum cryptocurrencies controlled by China.
By the way, about Ripple. The last week and a half have given some hope to the owners of this altcoin. Recall that while the rest of the top coins were growing in price, the XRP/USD pair, starting from November 24, was steadily going down. Starting at $0.77, it fell to $0.17 by the end of 2020, shrinking 78%.
But this is not all either. The biggest disaster awaited Ripple in the futures market. On December 23, the price of the March futures for this token fell to $0.00023 on the BitMEX derivative platform. Investors sold 80 million coins in one minute - this is how the market reacted to the lawsuit of the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), which accused this startup of illegally selling securities under the guise of XRP for $1.3 billion.
Now the situation has stabilized somewhat, and XRP/USD is quoted at $0.31 on January 8. And if a trader placed orders in advance to buy Ripple at the minimum price, then they made a profit of 1350% in just the last two weeks.
Returning to the main cryptocurrency, we note that its volatility, of course, is not as cosmic as that of Ripple, but it still remains more than impressive, reaching 10% per hour. The Crypto Fear & Greed Index is in a very overbought zone: at 95 out of 100. But, despite this, following the BTC/USD quotes, the total crypto market capitalization continues to grow steadily, having reached $1.1 trillion. At the same time, the bitcoin dominance index came close to 70%.


As for the forecast for the coming week, summarizing the views of a number of experts, as well as forecasts made on the basis of a variety of methods of technical and graphical analysis, we can say the following:

- EUR/USD. We described in detail a week ago how analysts from the world's leading banks and financial agencies see the rate of this pair in 2021. The median forecast is 1.2500, which corresponds to the January-February highs of three years ago.
As for the near future, 60% of experts hope that this January will become, if not a month of trend reversal, then at least a sufficiently deep correction of the pair to the south, which will return it to the level of 1.2050, or even 1.1900. The nearest support is in the 1.2100 zone. However, as for the indicators, this development was supported by only 80% of indicators on H4. On D1, both oscillators and trend indicators have taken a neutral position.
40% of analysts side with the bulls, supported by graphical analysis on H4 and D1. According to them, the pair, having pushed back from 1.2200, should return to the uptrend, and we will soon see it at 1.2350. And then 1.2500 is not far off.
As for the events of the coming week, of interest are the data on the US consumer market, which will be published on Wednesday January 13 and Friday January 15. Fed Chairman Jerome Powell is also scheduled to make a speech at the end of the working week, and the market will wait whether he confirms the words of his colleagues Thomas Barkin and Patrick Harker regarding a possible increase in interest rates and curtailment of the quantitative easing (QE) program;

- GBP/USD. In general, the forecast for the next week or two here is very similar to the forecast for the euro/dollar. Technical indicators on D1 provide either neutral or multi-directional signals. 60% of experts, 70% of oscillators and 75% of trend indicators on H4 vote for the fall of the pair. 40% of analysts are for its growth, as well as the remaining indicators on H4 and graphical analysis on both timeframes. Support levels are 1.3525, 1.3485 and 1.3285. The next strong support is in the 1.3185 zone. Resistance levels are 1.3620 and 1.3725.
As for the events of the coming week, we should pay attention to the speech of the head of the Bank of England Andrew Bailey, which will take place on Monday, January 11;

- USD/JPY. How the yen will behave largely depends on both the risk sentiment of investors and the behavior of US Treasury securities. For now, most analysts (55%) are confident that the pair will stay within the downward medium-term channel and, having fought off its upper border around 104.00, will return to its central zone. This possibility is confirmed by 25% of oscillators giving signals on the pair being overbought on H4 and D1. The nearest support is 103.65, the next one is 103.00. The target is located in the 102.50 area.
35% of experts and graphical analysis on D1 vote for the fact that the pair will still be able to break through the upper border of the designated channel and rise to the zone 104.70-105.00. The next target of the bulls is 105.70; And finally, the remaining 10% of analysts are neutral, suggesting that the pair will fluctuate around Pivot Point 104.00;

- cryptocurrencies. Investors' optimism was added by the imminent coming to power in the United States of the Joe Biden administration. The founder of the Galaxy Digital crypto bank, Mike Novogratz, noted on CNBC that Trump's team was never able to stop the record growth of the main cryptocurrency, and expressed hope that financial regulators under the leadership of the new president would take a more loyal position. “I hope that after the inauguration [January 20, 2021] we will get more progressive regulators. I will be happy to wait for the new administration and get a regulatory framework that supports rather than fights cryptocurrencies,” said Novogratz.
As for the entry into the market of large institutional investors, in addition to regulatory restrictions, they are hampered by extremely high volatility of major cryptocurrencies. Thus, experts at the investment bank JPMorgan believe that the image of an alternative to gold will make bitcoin even more popular and predict its growth to $146,000. But this requires convergence of the volatility indicators of bitcoin and gold, and this is a "multi-year process."
Looking at what's been happening with bitcoin lately, JPMorgan's estimate may seem too conservative to many. According to investment analytics from Pantera Capital, the market is just weeks away from seeing Bitcoin price at $115,000. Speaking on CNBC, Dan Morehead, CEO of Pantera Capital investment company, called the limited supply of bitcoin as a key driver of growth in the value of this cryptocurrency. Currently, giants like PayPal and Grayscale are buying more BTC than bitcoin miners can mine, he explained. 
At the moment, Bitcoin and Ethereum Grayscale trusts have accumulated digital assets of $14.075 billion and $1.808 billion, respectively. And, according to analyst Kevin Rooke, this giant continues to buy bitcoins, which suggests that Grayscale is set for long-term growth in the value of the largest digital currency.
Another popular analyst, Willie Woo, agrees with this. In his opinion, after bitcoin crossed the border of $24.000, it became clear that the market finally came under the control of long-term investors.
Binance, one of the largest crypto exchanges, also raised its forecast. “We thought the $50,000 price was reasonable, but that number will definitely be higher. I think that we will reach $75.000 - $100.000 for 1 BTC, by the end of 2021” says the CEO of its US unit Catherine Coley.
And finally, the most daring predictions for the BTC/USD pair, made by Insider co-founder Henry Blodget and the CEO of the Kraken bitcoin exchange Jesse Powell: both named $1 million per coin. However, the former believes that this will happen thanks to speculators, while the latter relies on the growth of institutional investments in cryptocurrency.
As for altcoin No.1, the capitalization of ethereum has exceeded $140 billion, which is many times more than that of such auto giants as, for example, General Motors ($59.5 billion), BMW ($47.1 billion) and Ferrari ($36.2 billion). Capital inflows into ETH will be even more significant in 2021, according to Messari analyst Ryan Watkins. Some investors are already concentrating exclusively on ethereum. And the key event for this altcoin will be the launch of ethereum futures on the Chicago Exchange (CME). In general, according to the estimates of the trader of the Amsterdam Stock Exchange, Michael van de Poppe, a strong rally in the altcoin market should start after the first quarter of this year.


NordFX Analytical Group


Notice: These materials should not be deemed a recommendation for investment or guidance for working on financial markets: they are for informative purposes only. Trading on financial markets is risky and can lead to a loss of money deposited.

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NordFX brokerage company has summed up the performance of its clients' trade transactions in December, last month of the past year 2020.

The highest profit in December was received by a client from China, account number 1345xxx. His profit exceeded the milestone of 100,000 and amounted to 107.654 USD. This impressive result was obtained mainly in transactions with the EUR/USD, GBP/USD currency pairs and gold (XAU/USD).

In second place is a trader from India (account number 1518xxx), whose profit amounted to just under 40 thousand dollars (39.506 USD), and was obtained through trading in many pairs, primarily GBP/USD and GBP/JPY, as well as operations with altcoin No.1, Ethereum (ETH/USD).

The third place in the December TOP-3 belongs to another Chinese trader (account No.1465xxx), with a result of 38.409 USD, who also made transactions with the British pound and gold, GBP/USD and XAU/USD.

The passive investment services:
- in CopyTrading in December, the Mak jemah signal (increase of 111.06% with a fairly serious maximum drawdown of 37.12%) attracted attention, as well as KennyFXPRO (an increase of 27.61% with a moderate drawdown of 6.65%);
- in the PAMM service, the results are more modest. Here the leader was the manager with the nickname The Owl Midnight Scalper, who showed an increase of 18.43% over the month. However, the drawdown here was significantly lower, only 2,39%, which can be attractive for investors who prefer stable income with a moderate degree of risk.

Among the IB partners, NordFX TOP-3 is as follows:
- the largest amount of commission, USD 8.425, was accrued to a partner from Sri Lanka, account No.1483xxx;
- next is a partner from India, account number 1491xxx, who received 5.991 USD;
- and finally, the top three in December 2020 is closed by another Indian partner, account No.1328ххх, who received $5.704 as a reward. 


Notice: These materials are not investment recommendations or guidelines for working in financial markets and are intended for informational purposes only. Trading in financial markets is risky and can result in a complete loss of deposited funds.

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If someone asks which currency pair is the most important and most liquid on Forex, the answer will follow immediately. Even a beginner will say: “Of course, EUR/USD”. There is even nothing to doubt about this: the trading volume for this pair reaches $1.1 trillion per day. These currencies represent two of the world's most powerful economies, and the US dollar is the first most important reserve currency. Most central banks continue to store large volumes of their gold and foreign exchange reserves (over 60%) in US dollars. The euro comes in second with over 22%.

It should be noted that the dollar is gradually losing its positions, according to Bloomberg, its peak (45.3%) in global payments was in April 2015. Now, following the SWIFT statistics, the euro has managed, although not by much, to bypass the dollar. In October 2020, 37.8% of money transfers served by this system were in the euro, while the share of the dollar was 37.64%. (The British pound took the third place with a huge margin with 6.92%).

Despite the weakening US currency, it is certainly too early to bury the dollar. The Bank for International Settlements (BIS) announced in the summer of 2020 that about 50% of cross-border loans and international bonds are denominated in USD. Finally, about half of all trade invoices in the world are issued in dollars, even for non-US trade.

And let's not forget that market analysts evaluate the strength of different currencies by looking at the US Dollar Index (DXY). In fact, this is a basket of monetary units of six countries, the value of which is compared with USD. And the euro takes the lion's share of 57.6% in it (the remaining 5 account for only 42.4%).

All the above statistics indicate unambiguously that EUR/USD is number 1 among the major pairs on Forex. It is this pair that sets the main trends for other currencies. And that is why it is necessary for every trader to know and understand whatever happened to it, is happening and will happen.

 
A Bit of History

Surprisingly, despite its importance, the EUR/USD pair is quite young. The euro appeared thanks to the creation of the European Union in 1992, first in non-cash form, and it was only on January 1, 1999 that it officially replaced the rest of the European currencies. A few more years passed and in June 2002 the EUR became the sole means of payment in the Eurozone, displacing the then favorite, the German mark (USD/DEM) from the pedestal.

This event was preceded by two others, which had an important influence on the formation of the subsequent EUR/USD exchange rate. The first is a cut in interest rates by the US Federal Reserve in late 2000, and the second is a series of four coordinated terrorist attacks, the largest in the history of mankind, committed in the United States on September 11, 2001, including the destruction of the twin skyscrapers of the World Trade Center in New York. As a result, having started from the rate of 0.93 dollars per euro, by the middle of 2008 the pair rose to the level of 1.60. In other words, the dollar has lost more than 70% against the euro.

However, the European Central Bank (ECB) did not want to see the euro so strong, as it posed serious problems for European exports and dealt a blow to the trade balance. Therefore, verbal intervention began in the market. In addition, positive news constantly came from the United States regarding the state of the economy of this country, as a result of which the EUR/USD pair began to slide southward and recorded the low of the second decade of the 21st century near the 1.032 mark by the end of December 2016.

Many analysts then predicted a quick parity for the pair at the level of 1: 1, but this did not happen. And now the European currency is quoted in the area of 1.22 dollars per 1 euro.  

What Happened: Year 2020

Exactly a year ago, we published forecasts given by experts from leading world banks regarding the EUR / USD rate for 2020, and now we can decide which of them was right and to what extent.

Thus, back in December 2019 analysts at Deutsche Bank, Goldman Sachs, Bank of New York Mellon and a number of other banks reached consensus, predicting a fall in the US dollar in 2020. The main reason was the slowdown in global economic growth. In addition, it was predicted that on the eve of the presidential elections, the US Federal Reserve under pressure from Donald Trump will continue to reduce interest rates, or at least keep them at the current level.

Both of these forecasts proved to be absolutely correct. If at the end of 2019. the DXY dollar index fluctuated around 97, then after 12 months it fell below 90 points. The interest rate also went down: in December 2019 - January 2020 it was 1.75%, in early March it was lowered to 1.25%, and then completely dropped to 0.25%.

Recall that in December 2019, only the first outbreak of COVID-19 in Chinese Wuhan was recorded, and there was no idea of a global pandemic. But even then, the Financial Times published a forecast of Citigroup experts that the quantitative easing (QE) policy pursued by the US Federal Reserve and pumping the market with cheap dollar liquidity could cause the dollar to fall. Colleagues from Citigroup were supported then by analysts at the Swiss bank Lombard Odier, as well as one of the world's largest investment companies, BlackRock. And this scenario also came true 100%, and the coronavirus pandemic only played the role of a catalyst for this process: almost a quarter of all existing dollars were released in just one past year.

Some conspiracy theorists argue that the coronavirus was deliberately invented to implement the plan of a secret world government and help the financial elite buy up the bulk of dollar liquidity on the cheap. But exposing all sorts of conspiracies is not the purpose of this review. Therefore, let us turn to specific figures and see whose forecast turned out to be the most accurate.

According to Bloomberg, the consensus forecast of the largest market operators suggested that by the end of 2020, the US dollar wouldl "lose weight" by another 400-500 points, and the EUR/USD pair would rise to the 1.16 zone.

JPMorgan Chase specialists predicted the level of 1.14 for this pair for the end of 2020. Goldman Sachs and Bank of America Merrill Lynch called 1.15. And the German Deutsche Bank and the French Societe Generale pointed to the level of $1.20 per euro. The last two forecasts turned out to be the most accurate: the pair reached a high of 1.225 at the end of 2020. (Recall that all these scenarios did not take into account the consequences of the blow that COVID-19has inflicted on the economy).

 
What Will Happen: Year 2021

Some experts believe that for the United States, the onset of COVID-19 can be compared with the Third World War: more than 300,000 dead, a third of the working population is left without a constant source of income. The pandemic hit the country at the end of the 10-year economic growth cycle and in a presidential election year. Additional pressure on the economy was exerted by the trade wars that Donald Trump unleashed with China and Europe, as well as the growth of the dollar supply.

Most likely, in 2021, money will actively flow to Europe, and the dollar will face a deep devaluation. True, different analysts assess the depth of a possible fall in the USD differently.

So, for example, Goldman Sachs predicts a fall in the weighted USD rate in 2021 by only 6%, while Morgan Stanley expects the EUR/USD pair to rise from current levels to 1.25. (By the way, the figure 1.25 also sounds in many other moderate forecasts).

But there are also those who predict a catastrophic fall in the American currency. Prominent economists, Euro Pacific Capital President Peter Schiff and former Morgan Stanley Asia head and Fed Board member Stephen Roach estimate the likelihood of a dollar collapse in 2021 at 50%. At the same time, Roach believes that the devaluation of the dollar can reach 35%. A slightly smaller but also impressive devaluation of 20% is forecast by analysts at Citigroup. That is, in their opinion, we can see the EUR/USD pair in the 1.40-1.44 zone by the end of next year.

What can stop the dollar from falling?

Naturally, the Federal Reserve's monetary policy tightening. As of today, long-term inflation expectations have already jumped to 1.85%, which is not far from the regulator's target threshold of 2.0-2.5%. This inflation leads to the depreciation of the dollar. And at some point, lest the US currency collapse definitively, the Fed will be forced, albeit with great reluctance, to stop pumping the economy with cheap money and start a cycle of raising basic interest rates.

By the way, Europe, perhaps even more than the USA, is interested in stopping the growth of the EUR/USD pair.

Since mid-March 2020, the euro has strengthened against the dollar almost continuously. This is despite the fact that the ECB has printed over €2.2 trillion in a year and set negative interest rates.

There are calculations showing that a 10% strengthening of the euro is reducing Eurozone GDP by about 1%. And imagine that the EUR/USD pair will rise, as predicted in Citigroup, to the level of 1.40. Such growth would put all European exports at a blow. Who will then buy goods from the EU at rapidly rising prices? 

The ECB already had a chance to weaken the euro against the dollar. However, this did not happen: the European regulator has decided not to interfere in the affairs of the foreign exchange markets and simply limit itself to "monitoring the exchange rate." But, according to many analysts, with the growth of the pair to levels around 1.25, the ECB will be forced to take very serious steps to limit the further growth of its currency. And it is quite possible that the next program of assistance to the EU economy in the amount of €2 or €3 trillion will be adopted in the near future. And in the wake of Europe, similar steps will be taken by the central banks of Great Britain, Canada, China and many other countries. And if 2019-2020 can be called the time of the World Trade Wars, then 2021 will be the time of the World Currency War.

Although ... most likely we will see both wars at the same time.   

Happy New Year, 2021! It promises to be very interesting!



NordFX Analytical Group


Notice: These materials should not be deemed a recommendation for investment or guidance for working on financial markets: they are for informative purposes only. Trading on financial markets is risky and can lead to a loss of money deposited.

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Technical analysis in the Forex market provides a wide range of opportunities to study and predict prices. The number of instruments that are capable of solving the tasks set by the trader is hundreds. If the indicators are justifiably amenable to criticism for signal lagging, the levels of support and resistance find their admirers even among  people most skeptical towards technical analysis. This is not surprising. Forex levels are a benchmark that all traders, without exception, pay attention to.

Levels are abnormal zones on the price chart, near which there are sharp changes in the dynamics of quotations. Thus, when the price approaches the levels, there is a noticeable response: bounces, reversals, breakouts, acceleration or deceleration of quotes . Since this happens with enviable consistency, the trader has the opportunity to create trading strategies based on such levels. Trading with their help becomes active, impulsive and allows you to fix a good profit in a short time frame.

The Reason Why Markup is Effective

Trading in the financial markets is carried out using a huge number of instruments. However, there are only two key areas in the analysis - technical and fundamental. Textbooks on them are written and regularly published in all languages of the world. This creates a unified learning base for all traders and investors. Therefore, guided by a similar algorithm of actions, the vast majority of traders will, like you, see Forex levels and push quotes in their direction.

In addition to the same algorithm of actions, do not forget about the convenience of calculations. For example, when a trader chooses a place to place Stop Loss , it is easier for them to focus on round levels. This is convenient, because in the heat of active trading there is no time for the perfect calculation of points - everything is rounded one way or another.

The third argument is monetary policy. Each head of the Central Bank and the government sets a price corridor, which is the basis of the budget. Out-of-bounds always result in the intervention of the regulator.

Types of Levels and Their Differences

There are many ways to calculate levels, and as a result, their types. If we generalize them conditionally, we can distinguish the following main groups: horizontal, sloping, dynamic. The key difference between them is in the way they are built, and the number of elements required for this.

Ways to Build Horizontal Levels

To do the markup, your trading platform must have drawing tools. Broker NordFX offers its clients to use the world's most popular platform - MetaTrader 4 (MT4). Its graphical toolkit, among other things, includes horizontal lines.

Resistance and support are built on historical points where rebounds have occurred more than once in the past. The support level is drawn through local lows, and the resistance level is drawn through local highs.

For many, the debatable question is at what prices to draw the line. There is no basic difference. The level is marked both by the body of the candle and by its shadow. There is a concept of a zone, so a deviation of several points is the norm. Moreover, the higher the timeframe, the wider this zone will be.

An example of how horizontal Forex levels are marked in Fig. 1:

Sloping levels

These levels are no different from the previous ones, as far as their impact on price is concerned. The main difference is the angle of the lines. They are drawn at local lows/highs and completely depend on the direction of the trend. The main rule when applying is that the price should bounce. Two points are enough to draw this level. This is a simple geometric rule for drawing line segments.

In literature, they are also called the trend line. If you draw such lines parallel to each other, you can identify price channels. An example of one of them can be seen below in Fig. 2:

They are used for only one purpose - to find the entry point. It is difficult to set price targets according to them. By the way, when working with sloping levels, the extremes should be consistent, namely, above each other (for an upward market) or below (for a downward one).

Dynamic

In the classical understanding, levels are manual markup. However, progress has gone far from the textbooks of the 80s and 90s of the last century. In addition to markup, indicator techniques are gaining popularity: Moving Average, Envelopes, Donchian Channel, Bollinger Bands.

Their main feature is that they are volatile and are rearranged following the price. This is both their strength and weakness.

The principles of building the horizontal and dynamic level are different, but the properties and principles of use are the same. As an example (Fig. 3), we propose to study the most famous of them, Moving Average, and working it out as a level:

The Difference Between Support and Resistance

Beginners sometimes find it difficult to clearly define what support is, and mistakenly call it resistance, and vice versa. They have the same properties in terms of trade practice. Quotes bounce off them, and accelerate sharply after the breakout. However, the difference still exists: it is the position of the price relative to the level.

Support is the level that the price relies on during its movement. It connects important lows and occurs when traders can no longer, or do not want to sell this financial instrument at lower prices. Resistance, on the other hand, is a level that connects important highs (tops) of the market and stands in the way of growth, preventing the price from going up.

In both cases, it is important in what trend the markup is considered. They can change places during a breakout. An example of how support turns into resistance is shown below (Figure 4):

How to Build Forex Support and Resistance Levels

You can build levels on charts of any timeframe in different ways. Professionals often and quickly do this manually using the auxiliary charting tools built into the MT4 terminal. However, it is difficult for beginners to find extremes. To simplify their detection, auxiliary indicators such as, for example, Fractals or ZigZag are used, which automatically highlight local lows/highs.

Pivot, Murray, Fibonacci formulas are also used to calculate support and resistance levels. They are implemented as separate user indicators. It should be noted that there are many other indicators that apply all types of markup without your involvement. Many of them are already integrated into MetaTrader 4, making market analysis much easier.

How Levels Are Used in a Trading Strategy

Patterns in price movements near support or resistance make it possible to use them for different purposes. One of the most important purposes in developing a trading strategy is the signal function. Trading in this case occurs both on a rebound from the level, and on its breakdown. There is also a mixed type of trading, which includes other signals for opening or closing positions as well.

The ways of trading at levels can be very different. Conservative trading , advocated by many textbook authors, involves working in the direction of the trend, while aggressive trading involves opening positions in both directions or against the trend. Each technique has a right to exist, but one should consider how strong the level is. The probability of a breakout of a strong level is extremely low, so rebounds are practiced in this case. Weak levels , which have only a couple of touches, are overcome by the price like a knife in butter. Therefore, the probability of a breakdown of a weak level is quite high. Although false breakouts often occur on Forex - cases when the price seems to have already overcome the support or resistance zone, but instead of going further, it turns back and returns to its previous positions.

At moments when the strength of traders playing to raise and lower the price is roughly equal, there can be price consolidation. If you see that the price is being squeezed like a spring - consolidation is there for you. And we can expect that at some point this spring will be open, which will lead to the appearance of a sharp impulse in the change in quotes and an increase in volatility.

Setting Stop Loss and Take Profit

According to many traders, a trading strategy without using Stop Loss is a time bomb. Beginners find it difficult to choose where to place it on the chart, because there is a possibility that the price will accidentally hook it. And it is very disappointing to see how your order closes with a loss by Stop Loss, after which the price will reverse and go in a direction that is profitable for you. That is why it is customary to place Stop Loss beyond the nearest level at a distance of several points from it. Recall that this distance depends on the timeframe you are working on. The higher the timeframe, the greater that distance must be. Thus, on the H4 time frame and above it is measured by dozens of points, forming not a line, but a support/resistance zone. It may also depend on the selected Forex currency pair, as well as the current volatility of the market. 

Also, in addition to Stop Loss, levels are used to solve one more task - to determine a price target for profit fixing. Take Profit at the opened trade is placed on a similar principle, which is described above. However, it is put on the open order direction, rather than against it. And here, again, the concept of a zone must be taken into account, because just as the price can slip several points beyond the level (false breakout), the same few points will not reach it.

A huge number of trading strategies have been created at the support and resistance levels of Forex, the effectiveness of which is also influenced by a number of other factors. This is the accuracy of quotes, the size of spreads, the speed of execution of trades, etc. And here NordFX clients have an obvious advantage, since the trading conditions provided by this broker are among the best on the market.

Strengths and Weaknesses

Working on Forex support and resistance levels has a number of advantages and disadvantages. The cons of their use are as follows:
- The presence of false breakdowns;
- The presence of slippage (backlash), which turns a thin line into a support/resistance zone, the width of which depends on many factors: the currency pair being traded, the time frame and the current market situation. All this makes it difficult to set orders and to open and close a trading position.

The strengths of the levels are as follows:
- They have a lot of information about the dynamics of the market;
- They allow you to define the price corridor, the market entry and exit points;
- They are applicable on any timeframe and for any trading instrument;
- There are many charting tools and indicators that automatically determine these levels. Many of them are already integrated into the MT4 terminal;
- A huge number of ready-made solutions -­ scripts and robot advisors that allow you to conduct semi-automatic and fully automatic trading using data levels;
- Ability to include in any trading strategy;
- A large number of signals are generated on each timeframe.

Only practice can teach you how to use support and resistance levels effectively. And in order for you to gain the necessary experience without any financial costs, we recommend using a demo account of the NordFX brokerage company. It can be opened for free, and registration will take no more than a couple of minutes of your time.


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Is it the "gold of the XXI century" or a soap bubble about to burst? We have repeatedly discussed the advantages and disadvantages of bitcoin over the past year,  and analyzed the reasons for its ups and downs. Therefore, we decided to cite only the opinions of experts regarding the prospects for the main cryptocurrency in this review.
You may decide to be patient and invest in bitcoin for a long-term profitability. Or, on the contrary, you do not want to take risks and prefer to forget this word altogether. In general, the decision to buy, sell bitcoin or simply do nothing is always yours.


Optimists' predictions: Only to the North!

1. Bestselling author of Rich Dad Poor Dad and entrepreneur Robert Kiyosaki is convinced that cryptocurrency will continue to rise to $50,000 next year amid further influx of institutional money. The entrepreneur, having said that “America is in trouble”, precludes the “death” of the US dollar and a “bright future” for gold, silver, bitcoin.
“Bitcoin's rise has outpaced gold and silver,” he wrote. - What does it mean? This means that you need to buy as much bitcoin and precious metal as you can and don't put it off. The train is already leaving. The dollar is dying. When the dollar falls, the price doesn't matter anymore. What matters is how much gold, silver and bitcoins you have.”

2. According to analysts at the JPMorgan Chase banking holding, bitcoin outperforms gold as an alternative currency and has a significantly better chance of continued growth. According to their report, the capitalization of the crypto market is not large enough yet. JPMorgan estimates that the physical gold market, including ETF backed by it, is $2.6 trillion. Bitcoin needs to hit the $130,000 mark to catch up with the precious metal in this respect.
According to JPMorgan Chase, institutional investors can invest up to $600 billion in the first cryptocurrency in the coming years. This requires American, European and Japanese insurance companies and pension funds to invest only 1% of their assets in bitcoin. However, at the moment there are still regulatory requirements for the selection of investment assets in terms of risks and performance of obligations for such traditional investors. This can limit the amount of funds available for buying BTC.

3. The well-known Dutch cryptanalyst PlanB, who developed the popular BTC stock-to-flow valuation model, believes that the price of the reference cryptocurrency may rise to $100,000 by the end of 2021, and maybe up to $300,000. PlanB admits his forecast sounds extremely optimistic. However, the rise in the price of bitcoin in the past allows him to make such predictions.
The expert notes that during periods of market corrections, the algorithms of bitcoin whales pick up hundreds of portions of 0.01 BTC from "weak hands". Later these coins “disappear” in “deep” cold vaults. This leads to a supply shock and triggers a bull market.

4. Scott Minerd, investment director of Guggenheim Investments, considers bitcoin to be a grossly undervalued asset, even at current price levels of around $23,000. “Our fundamental work shows that bitcoin should be worth about $400,000,” he said in a conversation with Bloomberg TV.
Analysts at Guggenheim Investments came to this conclusion based on two factors: the limited emission of bitcoin and its value relative to gold. There are many common characteristics that cryptocurrency shares with the precious metal, Minerd said, but bitcoin, unlike gold, "has extraordinary value in the context of transactions."

5. Popular analyst and founder of Quantum Economics Mati Greenspan believes that “we are at the very beginning of a period of mass investor entry into the cryptosphere. If demand continues to rise and supply is constrained, then there is a possibility that we will see growth of 250% or more." At the same time, Mati Greenspan excludes a scenario in which BTC will soar to $400,000. “The rally will certainly continue, but there is no need to talk about any astronomical figures yet,” the analyst sums up. He believes that, unlike in 2017, the market is now controlled not by speculators but by corporations and large investors interested in its stability. The entry of these large players leads to the fact that volatility will weaken, and this area will become more attractive.

6. Bloomberg experts believe that there is no reason for a change in the direction of bitcoin's movement now, and its cost may increase to $50,000 in 2021.  “The dollar is gradually losing its position, ducking other fiat currencies,” writes this authoritative agency, “All this is noticed by investors who are forced to switch to alternative assets.” Bitcoin has significantly more support now, which minimizes the likelihood of a pullback. Open interest in the CME bitcoin futures market has exceeded $1 billion for the first time in history, which also speaks of growing support from investors.
Looking into the longer term, Bloomberg analyst Mike McGlone has suggested that within 5 years the price of the main cryptocurrency could exceed $100,000.

7. A similar point of view is followed by the American billionaire Paul Tudor Jones, head of Tudor Investment Corporation, who said that “cryptocurrencies are facing a crazy flight on a rocket with ascents and descents along the way.” “In 20 years, bitcoin will be significantly higher than the point where it is now. From here, the road for it lies north,” Yahoo! Finance quoted him.

8. The report of the fintech company Cindicator is of great interest. This is due to the fact that the figures presented in it are not the opinion of individual specialists, but the average results of the survey of more than 156,000 participants of the crypto market, according to which bitcoin next year will rise to $29,569. The respondents with the most accurate forecasts, the so-called "superforcasters", expect even greater growth on average, to $32,056.
According to the calculations of the “Hybrid Intelligence” Cindicator, which uses machine learning algorithms to process data from a team of analysts, the BTC rate next year will not exceed $25,222.

9. According to Mike Novogratz, head of the Galaxy Digital crypto trading bank, everyone should invest 2-3% of their funds in bitcoin. “After that, it is enough to wait a little time, and you will be surprised, but cryptocurrencies will cost significantly more. If you wait for five years, the assets will multiply several times,” he wrote.

10. According to experts of Stack Funds, bitcoin is ready to rise to a new high of $86,000.

11. The Director General of Global Macro Investor Raoul Pal expects that even conservative institutional investors, who usually prefer precious metals, will start investing in bitcoin next year. Therefore, Pal made a bold assumption that the rate of the first cryptocurrency could reach $250,000 in a year and placed an order for the sale of all the gold he had in order to invest in BTC and ETH in the ratio 80 to 20.

12. Even more inspiring forecast was given by Gemini crypto exchange founder Tyler Winklevoss, one of the twin brothers who are called the first cryptocurrency billionaires. He said on CNBC that the value of bitcoin could exceed the $500,000 mark. 
"The question isn't whether bitcoin will cost $500,000 or not, the question is how quickly it will happen. In fact, even this assessment seems to me very conservative - the game has not really even started," said Tyler's brother Cameron Winklevoss.

13. A similar figure is also called by a member of the Board of Directors of the Bitcoin Foundation Bobby Lee, according to whom the price of the main coin can reach $500,000 by the year 2028.

14. According to experts from one of the shareholders of Tesla, the ARK Invest fund, the capitalization of bitcoin may exceed $5 trillion. This will take the coin up to 10 years, but massive investments can start earlier. This figure could reach $1 trillion in the next 5 years, after which growth will occur at a faster rate.

15. A forecast was presented by Tom Fitzpatrick, Managing Director of one of the largest banks in the world, Citibank. According to him, thanks to consolidation in the status of digital gold, the rate of the first cryptocurrency can reach $318,000 by the end of 2021.
In his new report, Bitcoin: Gold for the 21st Century, Fitzpatrick writes: "Bitcoin moved in the aftermath of the Great Financial Crisis of 2008, when new changes in the monetary regime took place and we dropped to zero interest rates." And further he concludes that currently, financial stimulus measures against the background of the coronavirus pandemic have led to the formation of conditions similar to the 1970s, when the dollar inflation led to the increased demand for gold.

16. Popular TV presenter and Wall-Street veteran Max Kaiser believes that at current levels, bitcoin futures traders are suppressing the price of BTC to give institutional players a chance to "load the boat." However, once the asset reaches the $28,000 mark (the intermediate benchmark set by Kaiser), the number of coins for sale will go zero, and thanks to the deficit, their price will burst up to the cosmic heights.
“For the poor of this world, the current price and availability of BTC,” says Kaiser, “is the only opportunity in life to purchase non-forfeitable hard money before the price of it rises to 40-80 times, and prices will soar to the level of golden parity at around $400,000.”
“The demand for bitcoin is growing almost exponentially,” he says, “while its supply is mathematically fixed at 900 coins per day. And in 2024, the supply will be halved to 450 BTC per day. That's why I think people simply won't have the opportunity to buy coins, since the price can soar even to $1,000,000 per BTC. Meanwhile, Gen Z, who bought a lot of bitcoins when they were under $100, will become the new global power elite. The world order is about to change...” 


Pessimists' Predictions: A Fly in the Ointment

1. Despite the optimism in general, Galaxy Digital CEO Mike Novogratz believes that bitcoin instability can be expected in the near future. Its price in 2021 will certainly not return to zero, but could fall to the $14,000mark, or even $12,000. Although a correction to such levels is unlikely, investors need to be prepared for losses of 30-40%.

2. According to the average forecast of fintech company Cindicator, the lower bar of the trading range for the BTC/USD pair in 2021 will be at the level of $15,000. “Superforcasters” are less optimistic and expect a decrease to $12,000, and according to the calculations of “Hybrid Intelligence” Cindicator, the bitcoin rate will not go down next year below $16,000.

3. Matt Maley, strategist at financial services firm Miller Tabak, believes the cryptocurrency market will face a major setback next year. According to him, the main coin may fall in price by about 25-30 percent in the first months of 2021. According to Maley, the market is overheated due to large-scale investments, which is why corrections by one or several thousand dollars may become a norm.
“I consider cryptocurrencies to be a promising asset, but the minimum correction size next year will be 10%. At the same time, the fall may be at the level of 30% or even more. Therefore, it is worth being prudent before large-scale investments,” the specialist warns.



NordFX Analytical Group


Notice: These materials should not be deemed a recommendation for investment or guidance for working on financial markets: they are for informative purposes only. Trading on financial markets is risky and can lead to a loss of money deposited.

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Dear clients and partners! We extend our warmest congratulations on the upcoming holidays.

The outgoing 2020 turned out to be not the easiest one for most of us, requiring resilience, a lot of effort and energy. It has been a difficult time, but we are confident that together we can overcome any difficulties.

Let the coming year be the year of new joint victories and achievements. Let all adversity and troubles remain behind us, and only prosperity and success lie ahead.

Let all your hopes and dreams come true in the new year. We wish you and all your loved ones good health, prosperity, endless joyful smiles, and optimism! 

Happy New Year!

 
First, a review of last week’s events:
  
- EUR/USD. According to Bank of America Merrill Lynch, the most popular strategy in the market after “buy shares” is “sell the dollar”. Speculative short positions in this currency have risen to a two-year high. The USD index (DXY) has fallen below 90, while it was at 102.82 on March 15, 2020. As for the retreat of the dollar in recent days, it is taking place against the background of the discussion in the US Congress of an additional package of fiscal stimuli. After all, every new dollar poured into the country's economy will lead to a decrease in its purchasing power.
The Federal Reserve meeting held on Thursday, December 17 had virtually no effect on market sentiment. The interest rate remained at the same level, and, one might say, a blissful pre-Christmas mood prevailed at the press conference: nothing new was said about the prospects for further quantitative easing and no worries about the current state of the economy were voiced. Although, perhaps, such passivity was caused not only by Christmas, but also by the change of the US President. The new owner has not yet settled in the White House. And the old one is already a duck lame on both legs.
True, thanks to the hopes of investors for the future growth of the S&P500 and for a positive outcome of the Brexit negotiations, the EUR/USD pair still continued its movement northward, adding about 140 points in a week. As for the final chord, it sounded at the height of 1.2250;

- GBP/USD. With the weakening USD and hopes that the Brexit talks will succeed at the last moment, the pair continues to push higher. At the week's high, December 17, it reached 1.3625, showing a gain of as much as 400 points. However, then a correction followed, and it completed the five-day period just below the level of 1.3500.
Belief in the deal is fueled by media reports that the fishing problem in British waters remains the last hurdle. The markets were encouraged by the statements of the head of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, who said that there is a "narrow path" to the agreement, as well as European Commissioner for Internal Trade Michel Barnier, who confirmed that "the possibility of a trade agreement remains."
Britain also seems to agree to the deal, but, as it was stated, "not at the cost of sovereignty, and control should include the sea as well." Prime Minister Boris Johnson has threatened to keep European fishermen out of British waters for at least eight years if his three years quota fishing proposal is not accepted.
In general, Hamlet's question “To be or not to be?”, which has been sounding for 420 years, as applied to Brexit, is still open;

- USD/JPY. The yen is stable, US Treasuries remain in the same trading range, the dollar is weakening, the USD (DXY) index is falling. All this allows the USD/JPY pair to continue its smooth descent within the downstream medium-term channel, which began at the end of last March. On Thursday December 17, it reached the midline of this channel, fixing a weekly low at 102.85. The last point in the five-day period was set at 103.30;

- cryptocurrencies. What has been expected from bitcoin for three whole years has come true. It not only renewed the all-time high, not only broke through the $20,000 level, but also soared in a short period from December 12 to 17 from $18,000 to $23,620, adding more than 30%. 
If we compare the rallies in December 2017 and December 2020, the main difference between them, according to many experts, is that in the first case, the main driving force was retail investors, but now it is institutional. According to the analytical company Chainalysis, the "population" of bitcoin whales (1000 BTC and more) has been expanded with 302 new wallets since the beginning of the year and peaked at 2274 at the end of last month, and balances at the corresponding addresses increased by 1.4 million BTC during this time.
To be fair, it should be noted that the number of retail users is also growing. The number of bitcoin addresses with a non-zero balance has approached the mark of 33 million, updating the historical maximum, according to the data of the analytical service Glassnode. The number of wallets with a balance of more than 1 BTC is also steadily growing. The indicator has set a new record at 827,105 recently, recovering from a slight recession at the end of September.    
Of course, we have written about this many times, the coronavirus pandemic contributed to the popularization of bitcoin. However, it is probably early to talk about the mass acceptance of cryptocurrencies by the population. So, in a survey conducted by Opinium and AltFi among UK residents, only 10% said they bought a cryptocurrency. And although the results of 2020 can be viewed as an undoubted improvement - a year ago the figure was half as much, 5.3% - it is still a very small percentage, which leaves significant potential for growth in the crypto market, the total capitalization of which reached $670 billion on December 17.
It should be noted that despite the fact that BTC/USD quotes have already by far exceeded the high of 2017, the capitalization has not reached its record value of $830 billion, recorded on 07 January 2018. That is, the rise in the value of bitcoin is fueled by significantly smaller amounts of fiat than before, which may indicate the pair is strongly overbought. This is evidenced by the values of the Crypto Fear & Greed Index, which rose again in seven days from 89 to 95 and is very close to the maximum value of 100 points. But while waiting for a correction, one should take into account that the end of the year is now, the Christmas holidays are coming, and the most unexpected things can happen on the thin market - from zero volatility to new spikes to the north;


As for the forecast for the coming week, summarizing the opinions of a number of experts, as well as forecasts made on the basis of a variety of methods of technical and graphical analysis, we can say the following:

- EUR/USD. Next week on Thursday, December 24, Forex trading will end at 17:00 CET, and there will be no trading at all on December 25, Christmas. (please visit the NordFX website, the Company News section for details on the trading schedule during the Christmas and New Year holidays in the currency and cryptocurrency markets, as well as on CFD contracts).
The end of the year is a period when big players close their positions, sum up and go on vacation. But it is at this point of low liquidity in the market, as already mentioned above, that traders need to be prepared for sudden surprises. And it is not necessary that they will be as pleasant as gifts from Santa Claus. The main surprise may be the agreement between the EU and the UK on the Brexit terms (or lack thereof).  
At the time of this writing, 95% of the trend indicators on H4 and 100% on D1 are green. Also, 75% of oscillators on both timeframes look up. However, the remaining 25% signals that the pair is overbought, and a correction is possible.
Graphical analysis on H4 predicts the movement of the pair in the trading range of 1.2175-1.2300, and D1 indicates the possibility of its growth to the height of 1.2355. 80% of experts support this development. The remaining 20% expect the pair to decline to support 1.2100, and in the transition from weekly to monthly forecast, the number of bear supporters increases to 65%. Closest supports are at 1.2055 and 1.1900 levels.

- GBP/USD. As we wrote last week, there are three possible options regarding Brexit.
1 - neutral soft. It is a decision to extend the current terms of the transition period for another six months or a year in order to gradually move to rules similar to the basic rules of the World Trade Organization. In this case, a catastrophic collapse of the pound would be avoided, although the pair would go south. The nearest support level in this case is 1.3275, then 1.3100, 1.3000 and 1.2850.
2 - the “hardest” Brexit, without any agreements or prolongations, which will lead the pair to fall first to the 1.2700 horizon, and over time, possibly to the lows of May 2020. in the area of 1.2075-1.2160.
3 - the conclusion of a full-scale deal between the EU and the UK. In this case, we will see a rise of the pound first to the height of 1.3500, and then perhaps to the highs of 2018 in the area of 1.4350.
We will know soon which of these options will be chosen;

- USD/JPY. 90% of oscillators and 100% of trend indicators on D1 are still colored red, expecting further decline in the pair within the descending medium-term channel. As for analysts, they, supported by graphical analysis on H4 and D1, they consider most likely the pair to move in the trading range 102.70-104.00, that is, between the central and upper boundaries of the designated channel;

- cryptocurrencies. So, is it worth waiting for a repeat of the "crypto winter" of late 2017 - 2018? Or, after a slight correction, the BTC/USD pair will again rush to new heights?
Bestselling author of Rich Dad Poor Dad and entrepreneur Robert Kiyosaki is convinced that cryptocurrency will continue to rise to $50,000 next year amid further influx of institutional money. The entrepreneur, having said that “America is in trouble”, precludes the “death” of the US dollar and a “bright future” for gold, silver, bitcoin.
The well-known Dutch cryptanalyst PlanB, who developed the popular BTC stock-to-flow valuation model, believes that the price of the reference cryptocurrency may rise to $100,000 by the end of 2021, and maybe up to $300,000. PlanB admits that his outlook sounds extremely optimistic and even somewhat amusing for some investors. However, the rise in the price of bitcoin in the past allows him to make such predictions.
According to analysts from the financial conglomerate JPMorgan Chase, institutional investors can invest up to $600 billion in the first cryptocurrency in the coming years. This requires that American, European and Japanese insurance companies and pension funds invest only 1% of their assets in bitcoin.
As JPMorgan lead strategist Nikolaos Panigirtzoglou noted, the recent $100 million investment by Massachusetts Mutual Life Insurance Company marks another milestone in the adoption of the first cryptocurrency by such organizations. At the same time, the analyst admits that it is quite difficult for such traditional investors to invest in cryptocurrency, since there are still regulatory requirements for the choice of investment assets in terms of risks and fulfillment of obligations. This can limit the amount of funds available for buying BTC.
In general, the topic of the attitude of government regulators to cryptocurrencies is one of the key factors for the development of this market. This issue has been actively discussed at the recent BlockShow conference. The speakers said that although decentralized finance needs to communicate with regulators, it cannot be full concessions to them. If we introduce complete regulation of the market, then it will hardly differ from fiat.
Now about the prospects of the BTC/USD pair for the next few weeks. According to the average forecast, the probability of its rise to $25,000-26,000 is estimated at 30%, above $30,000 - 10%. As for the fall, the probability that the pair will decrease to the $18.500-20,000 zone is 20%.
As for altcoins, those who at this stage are wary of investing in bitcoin may pay attention to ethereum. If BTC has already exceeded its 2017 high by 16%, then ETH is still to grow from its current values in the region of $670 to its all-time high of $1,420. And this despite the fact that this main altcoin showed better dynamics than bitcoin this year: it has added 640% from the March low against 465% for BTC.       
In addition, altcoin blockchain No.1 has recently been updated. Ethereum 2.0 has made the cryptocurrency safer, more efficient, scalable and, hopefully, potentially more profitable.
And here it is necessary to recall the recent warning of the co-founder of ethereum Vitalik Buterin, who urged not to get into debt or take out loans to buy any digital assets, be it bitcoin, ethereum or any other coins. He said he had “only a few thousand dollars of net equity” before Ethereum was created. “However, I sold half of my bitcoins to be sure I would not break up if the rate fell to zero,” he writes.


NordFX Analytical Group


Notice: These materials should not be deemed a recommendation for investment or guidance for working on financial markets: they are for informative purposes only. Trading on financial markets is risky and can lead to a loss of money deposited.

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