Week of 18 July 2022: Ether gains 19.35% and outpaces Bitcoin by 10.79 points
When both assets rise from the same weekly low but one advances far more than the other, what can a week of price data say about the shift in leadership, and what can it not say?
BTC rose from 20,799.58 to 22,579.68 (+8.56%) and ETH from 1,338.65 to 1,597.70 (+19.35%), a gap of 10.79 percentage points. Both set their lows at the open on Monday 18 July and their largest hourly moves in the same hour that day. The ETH/BTC ratio gained 9.94%.
What the data shows. The week opened at its bottom: BTC's low of 20,762.45 and ETH's low of 1,336.07 both came at 00:00 UTC on Monday 18 July. Monday was also the best day for both, with BTC +7.85% and ETH +18.11%, and it held the largest hourly moves, +2.94% for BTC and +4.4% for ETH, in the hour starting 23:00 UTC. BTC then set its high of 24,276.74 on Wednesday 20 July, while ETH reached 1,664.34 late on Sunday 24 July. Bitcoin closed in the middle third of its range (51.7%) and Ether in the upper third (79.7%). Dollar volume was 1.80 times the prior twelve-week average for BTC and 1.26 times for ETH. The weekly returns ranked at the 81st percentile for BTC and the 93rd for ETH against 231 weeks of history.
What it does not show. The gap between the two returns does not identify why Ether moved further. Nothing here shows who traded, how positions were sized, or what position changes drove the ratio. Bitcoin's mid-range close after a Wednesday high does not say whether that high held any meaning later.
What a careful desk would check. Both assets were about 67% below their 52-week highs (BTC -67.1%, ETH -67.04%), so a strong week still sits inside a much larger fall. Realised volatility, the swings that actually occurred scaled to a yearly figure, was 79.1% for BTC and 107.0% for ETH. A desk would ask whether limits sized on the prior four weeks' returns (BTC: 2.26%, -8.19%, 8.01%, -0.3%; ETH: 6.14%, -10.31%, 8.76%, 14.57%) fit a 4.4% hourly move.
Ether against Bitcoin. The hourly correlation was 0.84, which the data labels close, and the ETH/BTC ratio rose 9.94%. ETH outperformed by 10.79 percentage points. Funding stayed positive on average for both, 0.0088% per eight hours for BTC and 0.0069% for ETH, though ETH touched -0.0042%.
What would change this reading
- If a later week closes below this week's low of 20,762.45 for BTC or 1,336.07 for ETH, the Monday reversal reads as a rebound rather than a turn.
- If the ETH/BTC ratio gives back the 9.94% gain, the shift in leadership was short-lived.
- If BTC holds above 22,579.68 while ETH gives up 1,597.70, the relative move unwinds without a broad fall.
- If funding turns negative for both while prices hold near these levels, shorts begin paying longs to hold their positions.
Terms
- realised volatility
- how much the price actually swung over a period, expressed as a yearly percentage
- ETH/BTC ratio
- the Ether price divided by the Bitcoin price; it rises when Ether gains more or falls less than Bitcoin
- funding rate
- a regular payment between long and short holders of a perpetual futures contract that keeps its price close to the spot price