Cryptocurrency Prices Today: Bitcoin, Ethereum trade in green; Budget brings crypto in 30% tax ambit

Bitcoin's market dominance dipped 0.07 percent to 41.75 percent and the currency was trading at $38,033.97 today. (Representative image)

The global cryptocurrency market capitalisation dipped 5.66 percent over the last 24 hours to $1.65 trillion, while the trading volumes were up 29.45 percent to $82.63 billion.

While decentralised finance (DeFi) accounted for 14.47 percent of the 24-hour cryptocurrency trading volume at $11.96 billion, stablecoins constituted 69.03 percent at $83.54 billion. Bitcoin's market dominance rose 0.43 percent to 41.96 percent and the currency was trading at $38,584.91 in the morning on February 2.

In rupee terms, Bitcoin rose 1.26 percent to trade at Rs 30,74,481, while Ethereum rose 3.31 percent to Rs 2,20,994.5.

Cardano rose 4.07 percent to Rs 86.79 and Avalanche gained 6.89 percent to Rs 5,891.8. Polkadot gained 4.63 percent to Rs 1,597.27 and Litecoin was up 4.9 percent to Rs 9,080.6 in the last 24 hours. Tether was also up 0.52 percent to Rs 79.9.

Memecoin SHIB rose 2.25 percent, while Dogecoin rose 1.26 percent to trade at Rs 11.38. Terra (LUNA) increased by 1.69 percent to Rs 4,187.77.

Acknowledging that a large segment of the population is involved in crypto-related transactions, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharama in her Budget speech  yesterday pulled crypto taxation from the shadows of ambiguity.

The government has decided to bring virtual digital assets under the tax scanner by levying a 30 percent tax on their sale and purchase online.

The FM also specified that an additional 1 percent TDS will also be levied on such crypto transactions that exceed a certain threshold, thereby establishing a trail of details. The subsequent amount or the virtual digital asset gift will be taxable in the hands of the recipient.

Additionally, losses incurred during the transfer of such assets could not be written off against any other income, with no deduction provision allowed except that of cost of acquisition.

Sports Illustrated, a magazine in circulation for over 68 years, has announced an alliance with NFT startup OneOf to launch a sports NFT series on Polygon, with an initial lineup of nine sporting icons, including Muhammad Ali, Wayne Gretzky, and Mia Hamm.

These NFTs will offer reimagined versions of classic magazine cover photos for each of its initial partnered athletes, all designed by artist Jonathan Winbush.

American internet entrepreneur and Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian has raised $500 million across two new funds via his venture firm 776, which he expects to invest in crypto startups. Ohanian told the Wall Street Journal that crypto startups currently account for about 40 percent of 776's portfolio, including metaverse game Axie Infinity, crypto tax manager Coin Tracker, and Bitcoin rewards app Lolli. However, crypto "will be the majority of this portfolio by the end of this year."

As of 8:25 am, these were the prices of various cryptocurrencies in the Indian market (Data from WazirX.com)