Bitcoin is back above $60K, stocks rally on cooler jobs data

The price of bitcoin was back above $61,000 this afternoon in New York while stocks rallied on reports that hiring is starting to slow. 

Bitcoin was up more than 4% over 24 hours at time of publication, paring losses from earlier in the week that saw the largest cryptocurrency dip as low as $56,500, per Coinbase. Ether similarly bounced Friday, once again hitting the $3,000 level after hovering in the high $2,000 range for most of the week. 

US stocks broadly opened higher Friday after the latest jobs report showed the economy added 175,000 positions in April, finally coming more in line with the pre-pandemic average of 183,000 job gains per month.

The SP 500 and Nasdaq Composite indexes were up 1% and 2%, respectively, at time of publication. The end-of-week rally was enough to push both indexes into the green over the past five trading days. 

Crypto-related stocks posted mixed returns midway through Friday’s session. Coinbase lost 3% even after earnings released Thursday showed that revenue beat expectations by close to 20%. MicroStrategy and mining operation Marathon Digital, on the other hand, were in the green, posting around 8% and 3% gains, respectively, Friday. 

The latest jobs data comes days after the Federal Reserve announced that interest rates would be holding steady for the time being. Central bankers will need to see further evidence that inflation is falling and the labor market is cooling, Fed Chair Jerome Powell said. 

Even after Friday’s promising report, Fed fund futures markets still showed only a 14% chance of a rate cut in June, according to data from CME Group. The delayed cut cycle could bode well for risk assets like cryptos, though, analysts said. 

“With rate hikes off the table and markets already pricing in little to no cuts for 2024, we think that this bodes constructively for risk assets as the worst of stagflationary headwinds might be behind us,” analysts from Ryze Labs said in a note Friday.

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