What happened
The value of some cryptocurrencies started to move higher on Monday after a brutal weekend. Polygon (MATIC -1.53%), Avalanche (AVAX 1.03%), and Uniswap (UNI -0.51%) were three of the biggest gainers in trading today even as many of their competitors continued to drop.
As of 3:30 p.m. ET, Polygon was up 6.9% over the last 24 hours and 23.1% over the past week. Avalanche was up 6.7% today but down 22.7% in a week. Uniswap is up 2.9% in the last day but has fallen 17.8% over the past seven days. Earlier in the day, all three stood more than 24% below last Friday's closing prices.
Image source: Getty Images.
So what
Polygon has made the biggest recovery, jumping 18% since 10:00 a.m. ET this morning. And it did that after a report surfaced that venture capital investors were in talks to invest $50 million to $150 million in Polygon through the MATIC token. This is a novel way for organizations to raise funds to operate, although it does require the value of the MATIC token to remain high.
Avalanche and Uniswap are two other cryptocurrencies that are moving higher today but for different reasons. Uniswap is a Layer 2 protocol like Polygon on the Ethereum blockchain. This could explain why investors are buying both Polygon and Uniswap.
Avalanche has seen a nice recovery but it's still off over 20% in the past week, so there's not a lot of strength there compared to Polygon and Uniswap.
Now what
Volatility has been incredible over the past few weeks as investors grappled with long-term market forces. The Federal Reserve is slowing its asset purchases, inflation is rising, growth stocks are getting crushed, and investors are starting to flee cryptocurrencies as well. What we saw over the weekend was a worst-case scenario as values plunged headlong in just a few hours, causing panic selling across the market.
Some cryptocurrencies recovered some from the crash over the weekend and in the case of these three names, the recovery continued on Monday. But keep in mind that values can turn as quickly as the market.
With the values of many cryptocurrencies still trading relatively close to all-time highs, it's a good idea to take some chips off the table to lock in gains rather than betting that this run will continue. Given the drops we have seen across the market and the leverage that many traders are worried about, it's possible that this weekend's crash was just a sign of things to come. If values decline, the correction could lead to even more panic selling and further declines, beginning a downward spiral. That's clearly a risk, which is why I'm cautious with altcoins today.
