Bitcoin, Litecoin Wait for Resolution

It’s been an uneventful week for both Bitcoin and Litecoin. Everyone’s favorite crypto-currency is down by $4 dollars or just above 0.5%. Its little brother Litecoin is down by 7 cents or 1.8 percent and is currently quoted at $3.85.

Bitcoin Hits a Roadblock

The bitcoin rally has hit a bump in the road with prices stuck around the $730 round figure. We’re now trading at $731 dollars, down by 0.54% compared to last Tuesday. On the chart below the latest 7 days of price action are shown by the second flat-lining arrow.

Despite the setback, the uptrend is still technically in place. To end it, the shorts will have to push prices below the $715 swing low, preferably taking out $710 as well. A new downtrend however requires a move below the $685 swing low as well. Further down support can be found at in the $671-$675 area. These are two former swing lows, a successful breakdown below here could lead to more BTC losses.

On the upper end, we have resistance at this month’s high of $744.99. This is also the yearly high for BTC/USD on Fxopen/BTC-E. But like we said last week, on other exchanges these levels are different. On BitStamp for example, we topped out this month at $755 but this year’s high was above here at $778. It’s important to keep these different levels for the exchanges in mind. The bitcoin market is decentralized, not all exchanges move in lockstep.

Litecoin Waits for Resolution

Litecoin has been a tough on trend traders this year. This has been especially the case in the past few months. Since late August, no clear trend can be seen in LTC/USD. The situation doesn’t look better on the lower time-frames either. On the chart below we can see that LTC has stayed in a tight range between $3.80 and $3.95 during most of November. In percentage terms, this is 3.8%, a relatively small amount for crypto-currencies.

However the longer this range persists, the more odds increase that we will see a breakout higher or lower. The two important points right now are $3.95 on the upside and $3.64 on the downside. A decisive breakout beyond either of these price extremes may lead to a sustained move. Conservative traders may want to wait for a break above the $4 round figure as well. Above here we have resistance at $4.08 and $4.15 followed by a resistance area from $4.43 to $4.52 per coin.

On the lower end, if we get a break of $3.64 the next line of support is at the $3.50 round figure. This is followed by the $3.22 swing low, the $3 round figure and the $2.89 swing low. We end the levels to the downside with the 2015 August lows near $2.50 dollars per coin.