Week of 21 October 2019: Bitcoin gains 15.89% as Ether lags by 11 points

What the data shows. BTC fell first, reaching 7,300 at 16:00 UTC on Wednesday 23 October, its worst day at -6.90%. It then reversed: Friday 25 October was the best day at +16.76%, and Saturday 26 brought the high of 10,370 in a single hour that moved +8.99%, the week's largest hourly move. The low came before the high, and the close of 9,529.93 sat at 72.6% of the week's range, in its upper third. Ether followed the same order — its low at 153.45 also fell on Wednesday 23 October — but rose less, closing +4.89%. The two moved closely hour by hour (correlation 0.86), yet the ETH/BTC ratio fell 9.49%, so this was Bitcoin's week more than Ether's.

What it does not show. A 15.89% weekly gain does not establish that the prior decline has ended. BTC was still 31.74% below its 52-week high, and the four preceding weeks had been mostly negative (-19.79%, -2.35%, 5.34%, -0.63%). The data identifies no cause for the reversal and no information about who was buying. It also cannot say whether the Saturday high and the following retreat marked a turning point or only a fast swing inside a wider range.

What a careful desk would check. Realised volatility, the size of the swings that actually happened scaled to a yearly figure, reached 118.9% for BTC and 87.5% for ETH. Dollar volume totalled 4.42 billion for BTC and 0.79 billion for ETH, running 1.76 and 1.75 times their prior 12-week averages, consistent with wider participation than in recent weeks. A desk would ask whether its risk limits, sized during the quieter weeks before, could have absorbed a -6.90% day followed by a +16.76% day within the same week.

Funding. BTC perpetual funding averaged 0.0097% per eight hours, with a high of 0.0309% and a low of -0.0147%. The average is near zero, so the cost of holding either side was small. No funding figures were available for ETH.