• Bitcoin price is seeing a drag in price growth amid broader economic uncertainty.
• Fed Chair Jerome Powell’s speech may impact the stock market and the crypto ecosystem.

Bitcoin (BTC), the leading cryptocurrency by market capitalization has seen a drastic drop in its price below $26,000. This means the digital asset has lost all of Wednesday’s price gain amidst the declines in traditional markets. As of Thursday, the coin was changing hands at $25,990 after losing 3% of its Wednesday high of $26,789. 

Currently, the price of BTC is at $26,061, showing a 1.40% decline in the past 24 hours.

On the other hand, Ethereum (ETH), the second largest crypto by market cap is trading at $1,656 during the time of this writing. Ether has seen a 0.88% decrease in the last 24 hours but up to 3% drop from Wednesday’s high. A glance at CoinDesk indices trend indicators shows that both digital assets are stuck in a significant downtrend after the broad crypto price slump from last week.

Traditional assets are also caught in the sudden turbulent market; the equity market has seen a downward trend and this is led by the 1.3% decline in the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite, and also the S&P 500 which plunged by 0.08%. Artificial Intelligence (AI) giant Nvidia has lost most of its gains after posting impressive earnings, a trend that is still being contested by market makers who believe in the future of the tech giant.

Bitcoin Price Forecast as Investors Prepare for The Impact of Powell’s Speech

Market observers are looking out for the public speech from Jerome Powell, the United States Federal Reserve Chair. 

The Fed boss is meant to give a speech at the Kansas City Federal Reserve’s annual Jackson Hole Symposium on Friday in Wyoming. This meeting is a high-level gathering of central bankers and economists. Since he assumed the position of Chair in 2018, Powell has used these annual addresses as a platform to drive policy agenda, especially those that have proven difficult to tackle.

Usually, market investors watch the speech at a close range in search of signals about monetary policy outlooks. These observers are optimistic that this iteration of Powell’s speech would impact positively on market prices although this was not the case in 2022. Last year, the S&P 500 was down 2% in the five trading days before the speech, and five days after, it had gone down by approximately 5.5%. 

John Glover, the Chief Investment Officer of Ledn reiterated the possibility of a disappointing recurrence in an email. According to the digital exchange’s executive, anyone looking for an indication that the rate hiking cycle is coming to an end will probably be disappointed.

As it stands, there is every possibility that Bitcoin price could fluctuate sideways; either reaching as low as $20,000 or moving towards $30,000. Some analysts are confident that there is a higher potential for a decline towards $20,000 but it is worth noting that an approval for spot BTC Futures from the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) can impact positively on the token’s price in the long term.

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