Crypto market volatile; Terra Classic Lunc leads the laggards, Bitcoin above $19k

Cryptocurrencies are trading volatile tracking feeble global equities after recession fears in major economies like the US and Europe sparked. The US Fed's aggressive approach to tame inflation at the cost of economic growth further dampened the mood. Fed has hiked the rate by another 75 basis points. Wall Street and European stocks slipped sharply last week, while energy prices settled lower and bond yields climbed to multiyear highs. The American currency scaled past the 111 level against a basket of currencies -- making cryptocurrencies against the greenback vulnerable as well. Currently, there is a steep plunge in trading volumes of cryptocurrencies.

On CoinMarketCap, at the time of writing, the global crypto market is at $939.57 billion up by 0.28% over the last day. However, total crypto market volume dropped nearly 37% over the last 24 hours and is at $49.82 billion.

Meanwhile, the total volume in DeFi is currently at $3.11 billion -- 6.25% of the total crypto market 24-hour volume. The volume of all stablecoins is now $45.65 billion which is 91.63% of the total crypto market 24-hour volume.

Ethereum is the top trending cryptocurrency today followed by PancakeSwap and XRP.

The crypto leader Bitcoin is trading at a little over 19,000 mark at $19,090 up by 0.5%. Its market cap is nearly $366 billion. The digital coin's dominance is currently up by 0.12% over the day at 38.95%.

Meanwhile, the second largest cryptocurrency Ethereum is performing near $1,331 and is up by 0.75%. Its market cap is around $163.3 billion.

Recently, Ethereum launched the most-awaited Merge which led to a transition of proof-of-stake consensus, officially deprecating proof-of-work and reducing energy consumption by ~99.95%.

Data from Coinglass showed that Ethereum has liquidated more than $759 million since September 15.

However, both Bitcoin and Ethereum have dipped by nearly 5% and 9% respectively in the last seven trading sessions.

Among top-performing cryptocurrencies in the last 24 hours are -- Reserve Rights climbing by 9.5% followed by Chainlink up 5.5%. Algorand, Chiliz, and eCash surged by 4-5.5%.

On the other hand, Terra Classic Lunc took lead in the laggards list by plunging more than 7%, followed by XDC Network shedding nearly 5%, Stellar and DogeCoin tumbling more than 3% each. Axie Infinity, Helium, Nexo, Celsius, and Synthetix dived between 2-3%.

Terra tokens are under pressure as currently, Terraform Labs CEO Do Kwon is facing multiple jurisdictions. An arrest warrant has been issued by the Seoul Southern District Prosecutors Office against Kwon who is the forefather of TerraUSD algorithmic stablecoin and sister token Luna that wiped out reportedly $60 billion in the cryptocurrency market. Kwon's whereabouts are unknown, although, the co-founder of Terra tokens denied rumours of being on the 'run' from government agencies.

Last week, US Fed in its latest policy statement said, "the Committee is highly attentive to inflation risks."

FOMC further said, in support of these goals, the Committee decided to raise the target range for the federal funds rate to 3 to 3-1/4 percent and anticipates that ongoing increases in the target range will be appropriate. In addition, the Committee will continue reducing its holdings of Treasury securities and agency debt, and agency mortgage-backed securities, as described in the Plans for Reducing the Size of the Federal Reserve's Balance Sheet that was issued in May.

FOMC is committed to returning inflation to its 2% objective.