Bitcoin Held Near $6,600 as Ether and XRP Outpaced It

Bitcoin remained near $6,600 on September 29, 2018 while ether and XRP posted markedly stronger 24-hour gains, according to both an aggregate market snapshot and Kraken’s exchange-specific daily report.

CoinMarketCap’s September 29 historical snapshot listed bitcoin at $6,601.96, down 0.48% over 24 hours and 1.63% over seven days. Ether was $231.63, up 4.69% over 24 hours but still down 3.56% over seven days. XRP was $0.5712, up 6.15% over 24 hours and 0.31% over seven days.

The divergence mattered because it narrowed the capitalization gap between the market’s second- and third-ranked assets without changing their order. CoinMarketCap assigned ether a circulating market capitalization of $23.69 billion and XRP $22.78 billion. The difference was approximately $913.6 million, a Coinburn calculation using the snapshot’s unrounded figures.

One date, two market measurements

Kraken’s September 29 report recorded $90.8 million traded across all markets on that exchange. Its daily figures put bitcoin at $6,575, down 1.25%, on $29.5 million of Kraken volume. Ether was $232.30, up 4.88%, on $33.3 million, while XRP was $0.5658, up 4.73%, on $17.7 million.

Kraken therefore reported ether turnover exceeding bitcoin turnover on its own venue, even though bitcoin remained the largest asset by circulating capitalization in CoinMarketCap’s broader snapshot. Ether represented about 36.7% of Kraken’s reported $90.8 million total and bitcoin about 32.5%; those percentages are Coinburn calculations from Kraken’s rounded figures.

The differences between Kraken and CoinMarketCap are not contradictions. Kraken measured activity on one exchange across the daily window used for its report. CoinMarketCap aggregated prices and reported 24-hour volumes across multiple venues. Crypto traded continuously, with no universal closing auction, so the selected exchanges, currency pairs and observation time could produce different prices and returns.

Regulated futures showed a divided picture

A Commodity Futures Trading Commission report updated September 29 provided a lagged view of regulated U.S. bitcoin futures positions as of September 25. CME bitcoin futures, whose contract represented five bitcoin, had open interest of 2,746 contracts, only four more than on September 18. Non-commercial positions included 1,625 long contracts, 1,952 short contracts and 332 spreading positions.

The parallel Cboe report showed 3,815 open one-bitcoin contracts, down 1,029 from September 18. That was a 21.2% weekly contraction, calculated from the CFTC figures. Cboe non-commercial positions included 1,792 longs, 2,965 shorts and 299 spreading positions.

Those figures did not measure September 29 trading and should not be combined as if the contracts were identical. They were Tuesday positions published later, the exchanges used different contract sizes, and category totals can include spreading activity. They nevertheless showed that regulated futures participation was not moving uniformly: CME open interest was almost unchanged while Cboe open interest contracted sharply.

What the session established

The defensible conclusion for September 29 is narrow. Bitcoin remained comparatively stable near $6,600, while ether and XRP gained more strongly during the measured daily windows. Ether retained second place by circulating capitalization, but by less than $1 billion over XRP in CoinMarketCap’s snapshot.

The records do not establish a single cause for those moves. Nor does market capitalization represent dollars invested or realizable liquidation value; it applies a marginal quoted price to a selected circulating-supply estimate. Exchange fragmentation, differing cutoffs and rounded historical data limit any claim of a definitive market-wide close.