The virtual currency market surged on March 1 after the US Treasury Department imposed new sanctions on the Russian central bank.
As of 8:50 a.m. on March 1 (Vietnam time), Bitcoin is up more than 13% to $43,341, while Ethereum jumped more than 9% to $2,926.
The green color spread throughout the virtual currency market, other coins in the top 10 also increased strongly. Terra is up nearly 20%, Cardano is up 12%, Solana 13% and Avalanche 17%.
“In the past, there was a high correlation between the sell-off of traditional assets and the drop in digital assets,” said Leah Wald, CEO of Valkyrie Funds. “But now we don't see that and whether this pattern is permanent.”
New sanctions by the US administration will prevent Americans from doing business with the Russian central bank and freeze Russian assets in the US.
This move further reinforces the role of cryptocurrencies in the Russia-Ukraine conflict. This young asset class has never had the opportunity to show its potential before.
Since February 24, when the Russian offensive began, transactions in Russian rubles and Ukrainian hryvnia on Bitcoin exchange surged to a multi-month high, according to data from company Kaiko.
“Trading volume in Rubles and Hryvnia grows much faster than other pairs, like Bitcoin-USD. This shows that the crisis directly affects trading behavior,” according to Kaiko.