Bitcoin is still under pressure despite some positive developments.

Just a few days ago, Bitcoin experienced a rapid drop to $27,137 before bouncing back up slightly. This drop was likely due to the news that Coinbase is planning to move out of the United States. Some analysts point out that Coinbase, one of the largest cryptocurrency platforms has received a license to operate in Bermuda and may launch a cryptocurrency platform unrelated to domestic regulation next week.

Coinbase's departure from the United States is due to the fact that it has been scrutinized by the SEC for not complying with securities laws. This led to speculation that Coinbase was preparing to leave the United States. However, if Coinbase one of the world's largest platforms leaves the United States many traders in the cryptocurrency market may leave as well, feeling the squeeze of U.S. control. This may lead to a significant decrease in the value of the cryptocurrency market which explains why Bitcoin dropped yesterday.

Tarek, an analyst at Cryptoquant, observed that the drop in Bitcoin's value has brought it closer to the mining cost which is currently around $27,200. This has forced miners to sell their coins creating pressure on the value of the digital currency.

Although the cryptocurrency market has been declining, a whale (presumably the same one) made a huge bet, according to Lookonchain a blockchain analysis platform. The whale deposited a large amount of ETH and Wrapped Bitcoin (WBTC) into the decentralized finance (DeFi) protocol. With DeFi protocols investors can deposit both ETH and WBTC and borrow stablecoins as a reward. The stablecoins are then transferred to popular digital currency exchanges like Binance where they are used to purchase additional ETH and BTC.

This strategy appears to be betting on the future value of these cryptocurrencies even though their prices have faced pressure in recent days. In one case an individual deposited 10,100 ETH (worth $18.81 million) into Morpho AAVE, a DeFi protocol in the past 24 hours. They then borrowed stablecoins worth $11.5 million, which were transferred to Binance.

Glassnode has provided new information about the Bitcoin Lightning Network, showing that Lightning Network is significantly cheaper than traditional payment networks. The average fee or transaction cost for sending value over the Lightning Network is 0.0029% which is significantly lower than the processing fees charged by Mastercard or Visa which can be up to 1,000 times higher.

James Check, head of analysis at Glassnode, told Cointelegraph that the current average fee or cost for sending 1 BTC over the Lightning Network is 3,000 satoshis “it is equivalent to $0.84 for sending a value of $28,800 representing a fee of 0.0029%”. It's quite astounding when compared to traditional payment networks like Visa and Mastercard that charge merchants around 2-3% per transaction.