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Bitcoin has been pushing lower after breaking the wedge pattern marked in red on the hourly chart below. It seems that upside momentum has been capped recently despite the halving event coming up in May.
Even though the price has moved lower it could be worse. People usually associate volatility with cryptocurrencies but today oil traders have seen crypto-like moves in one of the worlds most traded commodities. In fact today you could buy 1,500 barrels of oil for the value of 1 bitcoin!
With industrial activity forced to a snail’s pace by the coronavirus, a massive surplus of oil is causing prices to tank. The most recent in a series of crashes now sees crude oil trading at just less than $1 per barrel.
With much of the world still living under coronavirus movement restrictions, industrial activity is currently a fraction of what it used to be. Fewer cars on the roads, less manufacturing, and virtually no travel mean that crude oil just isn’t getting used like it usually is.
To house the surplus, traders have been forced to charter enormous oil tankers capable of carrying 2 million barrels each. [The Guardian] Such vessels have never seen such high demand. The previous record for the most oil stored in this way was 100 million barrels in 2009. Today, with available storage starting to run out, oil is selling at rock bottom prices as traders attempt to dump the asset [Financial Times].
