Investing.com– The price of bitcoin barely budged after a volatile session on Thursday, as the Federal Reserve's forecast of higher interest rates for longer largely overshadowed some signs of cooling inflation in the near term .
The price rose 0.4% in the last 24 hours to $67,484.6 at 02:05 CET (06:05 GMT). The token saw wild swings this week, rising as high as $70,000 before falling sharply.
Bitcoin stays range-bound as Fed forecasts only one rate cut this year
Traders largely remained averse to Bitcoin and broader cryptocurrencies in the face of high US interest rates for longer.
While the Federal Reserve kept rates unchanged on Wednesday, as expected, Chairman Jerome Powell said the central bank now saw the possibility of just one rate cut this year, compared with previous expectations of three cuts.
Several policymakers also called for no rate cuts this year, saying more progress needed to be made to reduce inflation. The Federal Reserve also raised its inflation forecast for the year.
The Federal Reserve's comments came after data on Wednesday showed that US consumer inflation fell slightly more than expected in May. While Bitcoin made some gains after the inflation reading, it lost ground after the Federal Reserve's comments.
High rates bode poorly for speculative assets like cryptocurrencies, as they limit the amount of liquidity available to invest in the sector. While recent data on capital flows showed that institutional investors were still investing some money in cryptocurrencies, this was hardly reflected in the token prices.
The focus now turns to inflation data for more clues on US inflation. The reading should take place later on Thursday.
Crypto Price Today: Altcoins Fall Amid Rate Jitters
The prospect of long-lasting high interest rates in the United States also affected cryptocurrency prices in general.
The world's No. 2 token fell 0.3% to $3,499.09, further giving up gains made in the previous month.
and rose between 0.6% and 1.7%, but was trading lower during the week.
Among meme tokens, they fell 1.6% and rose 3%. But sentiment toward both was largely cooling along with waning interest in meme stocks on Wall Street.
GameStop Corp (NYSE:) lost even more ground on Wednesday, wiping out most of the rally seen in late May.
