The start of 2023 has been good for cryptos. Following a forgettable 2022, the markets seem very bullish, at least in the first few months of the year. But is this the end of the crypto winter?
Although bitcoin and the wider crypto market have been trading well below the all-time highs reached in November 2021, the crypto market has witnessed a positive upward trend over the past three months with bitcoin rising from around $16,000 at the end of December, 2022 to around $23,000 at the end of January, 2023.
Read More: Will 2023 be an exciting year for crypto?
Too good to be true
But experts warn that it won’t be a straight climb and investors should expect turbulence on the way.
And that’s how it played out this week. Although the week started on a positive note, the majority of the top 10 cryptos are currently in the red.
Bitcoin, the largest crypto in terms of market cap, is currently changing hands at about $22,710, which is about a -2% drop from the weekly high of $23,211.
Similarly, Ethereum, the second largest crypto by market cap, is also in the red. It’s currently trading at $1,634, which is significantly far from its seven-day high of $1,679.
In the same vein, most of the other top 10 cryptos too registered a minor drop in the last seven days. The two exceptions were XRP, which clocked a weekly drop of -4.8%, and Dogecoin which had a seven-day fall of -6.5%.
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In contrast, Polygon’s MATIC continued its winning streak with an 11.3% weekly gain. The only other top 10 crypto that was still in the green was BNB, which has had an erratic 24 hours but still managed to end the week with a 1% gain.
Further down the charts, Chiliz, a sports-focused crypto, soared as much as 10% during the week, thanks to the launch of its new layer-1 blockchain. However, it has managed to lose virtually all of its gains in the last 24 hours, going from a weekly high to its weekly low.
Another crypto that has taken the exact same route is the SAND token of the virtual world The Sandbox. It surged by as much as 20% on Tuesday when it was announced that the Saudi Arabia Digital Government Authority would be partnering with the platform. However, the token has essentially wiped all its gains in the last 24 hours.
NFTs on the up
In positive news, the NFT markets appear to be on a rebound as well. According to DappRadar, organic trading volume in January 2023 grew 38% from December 2022, reaching $946 million.
Read More: The growing stature of NFTs in the crypto sphere
DappRadar points out that these trading volumes haven’t been seen since June 2022. Also of note is the fact that the sales count of NFTs also increased by 42% from the previous month, reaching 9.2 million at the end of January.
And that momentum has carried into February as well. This week, two Ethereum NFTs have changed hands for more than $1 million each.
All things considered, 2023 has witnessed bullish on-chain metrics in both cryptos and the NFT markets. Although the markets aren’t out of the woods just yet, it appears they’ve started to prepare for the winter’s end.
Top 3 winners
     Name       7 day gain
- AGIX Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â 126.4%
- Baby Doge    108.7%
- GRT Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â 88.9%
Top 3 losers
    Name          7 day loss
- APTÂ Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â -20.3%Â Â Â Â Â Â Â
- XRD Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â -18.4%
- TWT Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â -11.2%
* Data from CoinGecko
Disclaimer: This article is based on publicly available information and should not, in any way, be considered financial advice.
