A 35-year-old Kerala native allegedly shipped drugs nationwide while laundering proceeds through privacy crypto Monero, officials say.
Monero has outperformed bitcoin this year, with an 86% surge compared to BTC's 12% rise.
Privacy and security-focused token Monero (XMR) has seen an 11.5% surge in the daily timeframe, reclaiming the $360 support for the first time in a week. Some analysts suggest that holding its current range could send the cryptocurrency to a another retest of its historical $420 resistance. Related Reading: Bitcoin Rise To $111,000 ATH Doesn’t Mean The Market Is Bullish, Certified Expert Says Monero Bounces From Range Lows Amid the crypto market pullback, Monero led the top 100 tokens by market capitalization list with a double-digit jump in the past 24 hours. The cryptocurrency surged 11.5% on Monday morning, breaking out of its seven-day downtrend. Notably, XMR has seen a 66% price increase over the past month and a half, jumping from the $220 support zone to its current levels. The token registered a significant 55% daily increase at the end of April, touching the $340 mark before retracing. The surge was reportedly fueled by a “suspicious transfer” of 3,520 BTC, worth around $330.7 million, from a potential victim of social engineering. According to crypto sleuth ZachXBT, the stolen funds were swapped for XMR, leading cryptocurrency to retest a key horizontal level. Despite this, the privacy token continued its rally during the May market recovery, which propelled XMR to a four-year high a week ago, nearing the crucial $420 resistance for the first time since 2021. Now, the market’s recent performance has sent Monero alongside the rest of the leading cryptocurrencies to retest key levels. The token retraced 21% in the past week, briefly losing its three-week price range on Saturday. However, XMR has bounced from this level over the past two days after reclaiming the $325 mark and nearing the $370 resistance. XMR Rally Hangs On This Level Analyst Sjuul from AltCryptoGems affirmed that “Monero has an impressive chart and is likely one of the few ‘dino’ coins not far from breaking its all-time high.” He highlighted that XMR is retesting the recently flipped support and resistance zone, which is key for a rally continuation. Losing the $310-$345 area could send the cryptocurrency toward the gap between this level and the next major support around the $220 mark. Similarly, analyst Rekt Capital previously noted Monero repeated its early 2021 playbook after breaking out of its multi-year accumulation range in Q4 2024, surging above the $286 resistance and hitting last cycle’s high levels. He recently pointed out that XMR has historically ended its bull market around the key $422 resistance, with “this sort of price action for XMR occurs once every four years,” and price rallies into the major resistance “often briefly upside wicking beyond there.” Related Reading: $3 XRP Dream Delayed—No Bull Run Before November, Says Top Analyst Amid its recent rejection from the $419 cycle high, the analyst considers that Monero must hold its current range, “if price wants to go against the grain of history and break the $422 resistance over time.” If it fails to hold above the $300 mark, Rekt Capital affirmed that the $286 support is the next crucial level, but added that historically, XMR’s retest post-rejection usually fails. As of this writing, Monero trades at $366, a 32.2% increase in the monthly timeframe. Featured Image from Unsplash.com, Chart from TradingView.com
The price drop follows a meteoric rally from $165 to $420.
Monero's price has more than doubled this year.
XMR has rallied over 100% since the early April panic selling.
Monero rose by 45% after a flurry of spot buys, but open interest increased by 107%.
An analyst has suggested that Monero (XMR) could repeat its 2021 cycle-high amid its recent price jump. However, a renowned on-chain sleuth has linked the surge to suspicious Bitcoin (BTC) transactions. Related Reading: XRP Price Shoots For 20% Surge To $2.51 Amid Pullback To Breakout Zone Monero Soars After $330 Million BTC Theft Privacy and security-focused token Monero saw its price soar 52% to a four-year high on Monday. The cryptocurrency surged from its recently reclaimed $220-$230 support toward the $340 resistance, hitting $347 in the early hours of Monday. Amid the massive surge, on-chain detective ZachXBT has linked the pump to a “suspicious transfer” from a potential victim of social engineering. The crypto sleuth explained that a suspicious transfer of 3,520 BTC, worth around $330.7 million, was made on Sunday night. According to the post, the funds were laundered via more than 6 instant exchanges shortly after the initial transfer, being swapped for XMR, seemingly based on timing analysis and the Monero price jump. An X user suggested the stolen Bitcoin was “likely from the Bitstamp hack that occurred in 2014.” The internet detective denied the idea, stating that the victim was likely an OG Bitcoiner. Meanwhile, others questioned whether the wallet owner made the transactions or if it was a theft. ZachXBT detailed multiple factors that led him to believe it was likely a theft, including the wallet being a longtime BTC holder and a Gemini, River, and Coinbase user. Additionally, he noted that the $330 million in Bitcoin was suddenly moved and transferred in small increments to instant exchanges, creating hundreds of orders. This would make the owner lose multiple 7-figures to fees, making it inefficient for a normal person. The crypto sleuth also considers that the theft isn’t likely related to North Korea’s Lazarus Group, which recently stole $1.5 billion worth of Ethereum (ETH) from crypto exchange Bybit. Is XMR Near A Breakout? Since the pump, Monero has retraced around 25% from today’s high to trade between the $250-$260 range. Crypto analyst Rekt Capital noted that XMR has successfully retested its $214 range’s low as support amid the market recovery. Notably, the cryptocurrency has been moving within the $112-$214 price range since 2022, surging above the range’s resistance line amid the November post-US elections breakout. After the Q3 2024 rally, Monero entered its key $214-286 range, which has previously worked as a key support and resistance area. After breaking out of the range’s upper boundary, the cryptocurrency rallied to its 2018 all-time high (ATH) of $542 and its 2021 high of $480. During the Q1 2025 retraces, the XMR dropped below the $214 mark, testing the $200 area as support before bouncing. Similarly, the early April pullback sent the cryptocurrency toward this level, finally reclaiming it two weeks ago. Since then, the cryptocurrency has rallied toward the $220-$230 range, fueled by the ongoing market recovery, but was ultimately rejected at the key resistance level. Today’s recent pump has seen Monero break above the $230 mark for the first time since February. Related Reading: Cardano (ADA) Bulls Push for Breakout — Is a Sharp Rally Next? Despite the alleged laundering-driven surge, the analyst affirmed that the cryptocurrency has now “repeated early 2021 history,” where the token reclaimed its current range and retested its lower boundary before breaking out to cycle highs. If history repeats and XMR’s price holds its current range, it could position itself for a surge above the $300 barrier. Featured Image from Unsplash.com, Chart from TradingView.com
XMR spiked nearly 40% early Monday following a 'suspicious transfer,' the on-chain researcher said.
Trading volumes for XMR zoomed from an average of $50 million on a seven-day rolling basis to over $220 million in the past 24 hours
Monero has shown a long-term bullish shift with a golden crossover, breaking out of a consolidation pattern.
Crypto analyst El Crypto has raised the possibility of an altcoin season happening soon. The analyst alluded to Bitcoin’s dominance rising to a major rejection zone, which could be bullish for altcoins. Altcoin Season May Be Imminent As Dominance Hits Major Rejection Zone In an X post, El Crypto suggested that the altcoin season may be imminent as Bitcoin’s dominance hits a major resistance zone. He revealed that BTC’s dominance again touched a zone that has led to rejection every time in the last one and a half years. He added that the Stochastic Relative Strength Index (RSI) is also in the overbought area, while a bearish cross has now happened again. Related Reading: Waiting For An Altcoin Season? Analyst Says A Weekly Close Above This Level Would Trigger A Rally Based on this, the analyst remarked that the market looks to be in for some fun, hinting at an altcoin season. Crypto analyst CryptoElites also affirmed that Bitcoin’s dominance has reached its peak. He further affirmed that next up is a massive altcoin rally, which will usher in the alt season. In another X post, the crypto analyst alluded to the USDT and USDC dominance ratio. He claimed that the market was at a critical trend reaction point right now. CryptoElites then mentioned that if the stablecoins’ dominance breaks down, then the altcoin season will officially begin. Crypto analyst Kevin Capital also looked to provide a bullish outlook towards the altcoin season. In an X post, he highlighted the global liquidity index overlaid with the Dogecoin price. In line with this, he remarked that it might be time for market participants to start paying attention to this. So far, altcoins have been mirroring Bitcoin’s price action, suffering a similar downtrend amid the trade war. However, if the altcoin season were to kick into full gear, these altcoins could easily decouple from the flagship crypto and outperform. Ethereum is known to lead this altcoin season, but that may not be the case this time, as ETH has underperformed throughout this cycle. Still Bitcoin Season For Now Blockchain Center data shows that it is still Bitcoin season for now, as the flagship crypto continues to outperform most altcoins. In the past 90 days, only seven out of the top 50 coins have outperformed the flagship crypto. These coins include Mantra, GateToken, Monero, LEO, Tron, and FastToken. Related Reading: Altcoin Season: Crypto Expert Reveals Why $425 Billion Is Important For it to be altcoin season, 75% of the top 50 coins would need to outperform Bitcoin over the last 90 days. Although almost all coins have witnessed declines within this timeframe, BTC has suffered a 22% drop, which is less than what these altcoins have seen during this period. At the time of writing, the Bitcoin price is trading at around $80,900, down over 1% in the last 24 hours, according to data from CoinMarketCap. Featured image from iStock, chart from Tradingview.com
Privacy tokens have been suffocated as governments around the world fight darknet markets – so it's back to bitcoin for purchasers of illicit goods.
Monero has topped $200, confirming a bullish shift in market trend.
Rangebound trading conditions from Bitcoin could boost the chance of a breakout in XRP, HBAR, BGB and XMR.
A bearish chart pattern could send Bitcoin price to $76,000. What will BNB, AAVE, XMR and VIRTUAL do in the meantime?
“We’re hitting CEOs, CFOs, software engineers,” the brazen scammer told Casa CEO Nick Neuman: “We don’t call poor people.”
A ransomware gang insists on being paid with $125,000 worth of baguettes, though reportedly the hackers would be happy with Monero too.
Crypto exchange Kraken has announced the delisting of Monero in the European Economic Area to maintain compliance with EU regulations.
Monero’s price fell by 8% a day after Kraken announced it would stop supporting the privacy-focused cryptocurrency.
Users can avoid sharing their IP address while using XMR by running their own node on the network, said former Monero committee member Csilla Brimer.
A copy of the now-deleted Monero tracing video was shared with Cointelegraph, and it suggests the firm can trace XMR transactions and associated IP addresses.
A strong outlier in the current market situation, Monero (XMR) moves against the broader downturn that plagues the market. According to CoinGecko, Monero gained nearly 13% since last week, putting the coin under the spotlight as one of the strongest gainers within the bear market. Related Reading: RENDER Flashes Red With 18% Short-Term Loss – Details Monero’s simplicity lends itself to its focus on privacy and reliability, providing great value for both investors and users of the platform. This led to Monero’s semi-autonomous price movement which might continue despite the market’s bearish nature. Monero Utilization Jumps On CoinCards CoinCards, a gift card vendor, recently released some statistics about cryptocurrency use on its platform. According to the platform, Monero has the monopoly beating Bitcoin in utilization. This huge utilization is due to Monero’s simplicity and utility, garnering the attention of analysts on X. Although the market is overwhelmingly bearish, analysts show bullishness with predictions about XMR’s future performance. “While everything else looks like pre-death, the privacy coin is making higher lows and higher highs. Complete decoupling from the market,” said Crypto Van Der Linde, a cryptanalyst on the X platform. Although Binance and Kraken have delisted XMR for their customers, the token still has a large user base that is mostly concerned with their privacy. With more individuals considering privacy to be a core issue, we might see cryptocurrency users using XMR despite its downsides of slow transaction times. Rally Turns Sluggish As of writing, Monero is well between the $170-$174 trading range giving the bulls a great position for more upside potential. However, the market’s bearishness has bled through to XMR’s market, slowing down gains in the long term. XMR’s less-than-significant correlation with Bitcoin makes the coin more attractive to investors scouring the market for profit-generating cryptocurrencies within the bearish market. The relative strength index (RSI) shows that although the coin has bullish momentum, XMR bulls are nearing exhaustion in the short term. Related Reading: SUI Crashes 23% As September Unleashes Market Panic—Is A Comeback Possible? The coin’s trading range is pretty weak as the bears are gathering momentum to cancel out short-term gains. Long-term, however, it seems that XMR bulls will rest and gather momentum before another attempt to regain lost ground. As it currently stands, XMR eyes a breakthrough on $190 in the short term, providing a support level for the bulls to prepare for a strong upward movement. After this movement, investors and traders can target $200 in the long term. However, if XMR succumbs to the bearish momentum within the market, the coin might retrace back to $164 with more possible losses in the short term. Featured image from Chainalysis, chart from TradingView
U.S. authorities have arrested and charged a Taiwanese national with operating darknet drug bazaar Incognito Market, which he allegedly used to facilitate over $100 million in crypto-denominated sales of illegal narcotics including fentanyl.
Monero says goodbye to Binance, but traders appear to be buying the coin’s dip. XMR has recovered 6.4% and almost erased yesterday’s losses.
The controversial coin is up again. But over the past week—and month—it is still hurting.
Binance has flagged several privacy coins with a "monitoring tag" indicating that they are at risk of being delisted from its platform.