The COVID-19 outbreak has also taken its toll on bitcoin spending. According to Chainalysis the amount of BTC being spent with merchant services, gambling sites, and darknet markets “dropped significantly since March 9.”

Binance Research found that the price of Bitcoin was moderately correlated to the S&P 500 during the first quarter of this year. While BTC outperformed the U.S. stock market index, both saw their prices drop while gold and long-term treasuries went up.

The cryptocurrency-powered Brave browser has added one million new users last month, growing at a fast pace over partnerships it recently signed.

Top stories in the Crypto Roundup today:

• COVID-19 Effects on Global Economy Take Toll on Bitcoin Spending
• Bitcoin Moderately Correlated With S&P 500 in Q1: Binance Research
• Crypto-Powered Brave Browser Adds One Million Users in a Single Month

At the time of writing, bitcoin (BTC) is trading at $6,922.47 (3.82%) with a daily Top Tier volume of $4.40 bn. As for ether (ETH), it is trading at $144.23 (4.71%) with a daily Top Tier volume of $855.54 million. The MVIS CryptoCompare Digital Assets 10 Index is currently tracking at 2,367.57 (10.70%).

COVID-19 Effects on Global Economy Take Toll on Bitcoin Spending

Blockchain forensics firm Chainalysis has published a report showing a correlation between bitcoin’s price and BTC being spent on merchant services, gambling websites, and darknet markets.

The report found that all three spending types “dropped significantly since March 9,” over the adverse effect the COVID-19 pandemic has had over the global economy. Chainalysis noted that spending usually drops during an economic crisis, but added it found the price of bitcoin is “correlated with daily Bitcoin receiving activity for the services we’re analyzing.”

According to Chainalysis, the level of correlation for each type of service has changed, with darknet markets seeing their revenue have the highest correlation to the price of bitcoin. Per the firm, this means “darknet markets have seen unexpectedly steep revenue declines since bitcoin’s price began to drop.”

Interestingly, darknet markets’ revenue used to have a small inverse correlation to the price of bitcoin which would mean sales should’ve gone up after last month’s price drop. Chainalysis added:

“Merchant services and gambling providers, on the other hand, have seen their revenue to Bitcoin price correlation drop, meaning they’ve proven more resilient and seen less of a revenue decrease than expected.”

The report concludes by clarifying the usage patterns were affected by a black swan event. Chainalysis notes that the question for the future is whether crypto businesses will be able to “ return to their previous transaction levels and if their customers’ usage patterns will return to normal” as the crypto economy recovers.

Bitcoin Moderately Correlated With S&P 500 in Q1: Binance Research

A report published by Binance Research found there was a “moderate” positive correlation between the price of Bitcoin and the benchmark U.S. stock market index, the S&P 500, in the first quarter of the year.

The report noted that while both saw their prices drop, Bitcoin still outperformed the S&P 500. Gold and long-term treasuries, on the other hand, weren’t correlated to these assets and ended up rising by 8% and 23% respectively. The report reads:

“Over the first quarter of 2020, Bitcoin price was down by -10%, while the S&P500 displayed a -19% return. Their correlation was relatively high (0.57), which is explained by a similar pattern in daily business day returns.”

Bitcoin and Ethereum demonstrated a record-high correlation, with a rate of 0.93, while cryptocurrencies like LINK and XTZ bucked the trend. Binance’s report added that the fairly high correlation between BTC and the S&P 500 is “very unlikely to persist in the medium to long term.”

Crypto-Powered Brave Browser Adds One Million Users in a Single Month

The cryptocurrency-powered Brave browser has reportedly added one million new users in March, according to Des Martin, the company’s head of marketing.

In a tweet, Martin detailed the browser added one million new users amid the COVID-19 pandemic, alongside other companies like Slack, Zoom, and HouseParty. Brave already had 12 million monthly active users earlier this year, as it also surpassed the four million daily active user mark.

While its growth may be partly be explained by the shelter in place orders, it may have also been added by its recent partnerships. One was with the TAP Network to let its users redeem BAT for “real-world rewards” with over 250,000 brands. The other one was with Binance, to let users trade cryptocurrency directly from their new tab pages via a widget.

The Brave browser, it’s worth noting, rewards users for seeing ads they opt-in to see with its Basic Attention Token (BAT).

Flipside Friday

The Flipside Crypto Disparity Ratio is a tool helping you find out which cryptoassets are under and overvalued. The crypto disparity ratio scores cryptoassets based on market capitalization and FCAS ratings, with a score over 1 showing it’s undervalued, and under 1 showing it’s overvalued.

XYO, an ERC-20 token used for a decentralized network of devices that anonymously collects geospatial data, tops the undervalued list with a score of 1.45. It’s followed by the Raiden Network (RDN), an off-chain scaling payment solution to perform ERC20 compliant token transactions, at 1.43.

Next comes IoTeX’s IOTX, an ERC20 token used in a decentralized platform of privacy-centric blockchain for vendors to build dApps on. The undervalued list has at its bottom Polymath (POLY), a blockchain-based system to coordinate and incentivize participants to collaborate and launch financial products on the blockchain.

On the overvalued side we have Waltonchain (WTC), which resorts to RFID technology to promote blockchain from the Internet to the Internet of Things, creating a unique combination of distributed ledger technology and IoT. As a business eco chain, it ensures data on it is authentic and credible.

It’s followed by Qubitica (QBIT), a community of over 1,000 developers, IT companies and investors working to advance blockchain technology. Its community is working on blockchain and AI projects, and the QBIT token represents participation shared in Qubitica and related projects. Qubitica’s value ratio is 0.35.

Next to it comes Crypterium (CRPT), a cryptobank platform leveraging the Ethereum blockchain to provide an instant processing engine for both fiat and crypto transactions at 0.36. At the bottom of the overvalued side is DxChain Token (DX), the world’s first decentralized big data and machine learning network powered by a computing-centric blockchain

State of the Crypto by Top Tier Exchange Volume

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