Week of 15 July 2019: Bitcoin rises 4.08% while Ether ends the week flat
When both assets swing more than 22% inside one week but close in opposite directions, what does the split say about the move, and what can it not say?
BTC rose from 10,174.18 to 10,589.45 (+4.08%); ETH went from 225.83 to 225.38 (-0.20%). Both traded a range near 22.5% (BTC 9,060–11,100; ETH 191.84–235.58) and closed in the upper third of that range. BTC volume ran 1.43 times its prior 12-week average.
What the data shows. Both assets swung hard and then recovered. BTC fell from its Monday high of 11,100.00 to a Wednesday low of 9,060.00 at 11:00 UTC, then rallied, closing at 10,589.45 in the upper third of its weekly range. The worst day was Tuesday (-12.87%); the best was Thursday (+9.91%), which also carried the largest hourly move, +9.37% starting 14:00 UTC. ETH hit its low in the same Wednesday hour (191.84) and its best hour in the same Thursday hour (+7.48%). The two prices moved closely hour by hour (correlation 0.91), and BTC volume was 1.43 times its prior twelve-week average, so this was an active week, not a quiet drift.
What it does not show. Hourly candles show how far and how fast prices moved, not who moved them or why. The data has no funding rates for this week, so the cost of leveraged positions cannot be read here, and no open-interest or order-book figures to size any crowding. The recovery into the close does not establish that the Wednesday low held permanently.
What a careful desk would check. Realised volatility, the size of the swings that actually happened scaled to a yearly figure, reached 124.4% for BTC and 133.4% for ETH. This data gives no longer-run volatility figure for comparison, so a desk would work from this week's own swings when sizing positions and margins, and would test whether its stops could survive a 12.87% down day followed by a 9.91% up day in the same week.
Ether against Bitcoin. The two closed in opposite directions, so the ETH/BTC ratio fell 4.11%. ETH also sits 53.46% below its 52-week high against BTC's 24.15% gap. The divergence is real in this week's closes, but one week does not establish a trend.
What would change this reading
- If the ETH/BTC ratio keeps falling after this week's 4.11% drop, the flat ETH close reads as the start of a relative move rather than a one-week split.
- If BTC trades below its weekly low of 9,060.00 in a later week, the Thursday recovery reads as a bounce inside a broader decline.
- If volume falls back towards its prior twelve-week average, this week's 22%+ ranges will look like a volatility episode rather than a new normal.
- If BTC closes a later week above its Monday high of 11,100.00, the week reads as consolidation before a higher move.
Terms
- realised volatility
- how much the price actually swung over a period, expressed as a yearly percentage
- ETH/BTC ratio
- the price of one Ether measured in Bitcoin; when it falls, Ether is losing value against Bitcoin
- percentile
- the share of past weeks with a lower value; the 72nd percentile means 72% of past weeks were lower