The decline in the United States financial markets continued for the third straight week due to reactions to uncertainty on the Federal Reserve’s future steps and a lukewarm reception to the seemingly positive August jobs report.

This morning, the global crypto market recovered slightly and went up by 0.62% to $982.44 billion. The global crypto trading volume was up by 9.61% to $48.54 billion at the time of writing. Stocks are yet to bounce back, as the Nasdaq Composite has fallen for six days in a row for the first time since 2019.

Terra might be making a comeback!

Terra LUNA Classic (LUNC) continues climbing higher amid plans to revive the chain and tempt investors back. LUNC spiked as high as $0.00031131 since August 26, equating to more than 2,400% gains. Since LUNC’s all-time low of $0.000000999967, on May 13, the previously “dead” token is up an astonishing 27,000%.

Data shows that the adjusted on-chain volume of stablecoins increased by 32.9%, from $655.2 billion to an all-time high of $866.2 billion in August. The increase was likely attributable to the sanctioning of Tornado Cash by the U.S. Treasury, according to a report.

Also, NFT sales jumped 26.76% higher this week, as NFT sales statistics show that $180.43 million in NFT trades were recorded this week compared to last week’s $142.33 million.

Our take

Although the sentiment remains negative and it is difficult to call a bottom, investors who believe in the long-term prospects of cryptocurrencies could take the opportunity to gradually build positions at lower levels instead of trying to catch the bottom. However, investors could avoid chasing prices higher during bear market rallies and look to buy when the price falls to strong support levels.

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Last week, the Bitcoin Lightning Network capacity touched an all-time high of close to 5,000 Bitcoins. The Lightning Network is the Layer-2 scalability solution for the Bitcoin network, making transactions faster and cheaper.

A bitcoin whale address also caught the eye by becoming active for the first time in nine years and moving 5,000 Bitcoins worth $100 million to crypto exchange Kraken.

Following the August second-half sell-off, the Bitcoin price plunged to $19500 support and initiated a consolidation phase. Earlier this week, the BTC price attempted to recover higher but failed to surpass the nearest resistance of $20750. As a result, the coin price entered a narrow consolidation between $20750 and $19500.

Key takeaway

As Bitcoin struggles to settle above $20,500, there’s a consensus that it could decline heavily if there is a clear move below the $19,500 support zone.

Ether (ETH) has maintained a similar level of crypto price stasis after the end of the U.S. Labor Day weekend. The second largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization was recently changing hands just below $1,600. ETH’s price is now up by more than 1% in 24 hours, with its trading volume also up by 6.63% at $9,585,892,786.

Ethereum investors now await the Bellatrix upgrade tomorrow, the 6th of September. This enhancement on the Beacon Chain will be responsible for setting the rest of the Merge process in motion.

As expected, traders have continued to bet on the Merge nonstop, as ether derivatives soared in August while bitcoin declined.

Cardano's native asset, ADA, was one of the top gainers for the week, up by 12.39%. This could be attributed to the announcement of a confirmed date for its Vasil update and listing on Robinhood.

Elsewhere, Solana's (SOL) price was up by 2.21% at $32.17in the last 24 hours, while Ripple (XRP) rose by 0.2% at $0.3309, and Binance (BNB) was up by 0.02% to $278.39

In the last 24 hours, the top gainer is Ravencoin (RVN), which is up by 8.05% at $61.29. The top loser is Yearn.finance (YFI), down 3.49% at $9,448.27.