What happened
The price of the cryptocurrency Theta (THETA -9.99%) had jumped nearly 16% over the last 24 hours as of 2:48 p.m. ET on Thursday for no obvious reason, as the stock market traded with lots of volatility today.
So what
Theta is a different kind of decentralized network in that it essentially enables peer-to-peer video streaming by allowing users to access excess bandwidth of nodes on the network. The idea is to take some of the congestion off the mainstream content delivery systems in order to speed up video streaming and enhance the quality.
Image source: Getty Images.
There does not seem to be a specific reason driving the move today, but what is interesting is that there is a lot of red in the broader crypto market. But we've previously seen Theta move in a different direction than the broader market.
One explainer for the move could be Theta's launch of its marketplace for non-fungible tokens at the beginning of this month. That launch also included the creation of another crypto token on the network called TDrop that will help manage the marketplace.
Now what
As I've said before, I think there is a lot to like about Theta, particularly because of its real-world practicality. The network also has strong backing when you look at its investors or even its validators.
While we've seen the broader crypto market get hit pretty hard since November (with Theta down 44% since then), seemingly as a reaction to the Federal Reserve's planned tightening of monetary policy, I do see this dip as a good buying opportunity.
