The crypto market is moving in slow-motion this Wednesday, with investors closely monitoring the upcoming Federal Reserve policy meeting. There was concern amongst market participants, and thus modest gains and losses for top cryptocurrencies. Bitcoin could not support critical levels, and altcoins like XRP and Solana witnessed steep declines, adding risk to the market.

Bitcoin Struggles Below $83k

Market leader Bitcoin (BTC) could not sustain above the $83,000 mark. The top cryptocurrency was trading at $82,979.37, which is about 0.12% down over the past 24 hours. BTC was moving between $81,179.99 and $83,505.6, reflecting the volatile nature of the market. Bitcoin’s market dominance declined slightly by 0.22% to 60.57%.

Despite the slow trading in the meantime, there was good news. US spot Bitcoin ETFs posted an impressive reversal on Monday with $274.6 million of net inflows which was the highest one-day inflow in a half month.

This drastic turn of events from the last five weeks of outflow drained over $5 billion in Bitcoin assets.  As a result of recent interest, the combined net inflows for Bitcoin ETFs have now exceeded $35.9 billion, suggesting that institutional investors may be becoming increasingly confident.

Ethereum Finds Some Strength Amid Weakness

While Bitcoin was faltering, Ethereum (ETH) held firm. The second-largest cryptocurrency was trading in the green, up more than 1.95% to $1,937.04. ETH’s 24-hour trading range was $1,872.51 to $1,947.77. Ethereum remains under pressure, however, after falling below the psychological level of $2,200 on March 9.

The token has dropped approximately 14% this month so far, a deeper decline than the remainder of the crypto market’s 4% decline. This relative weakness has cooled investor sentiment for ETH, even though the overall market remains defensively bullish in expectation of macroeconomic releases.

XRP and Solana Face Declines

XRP grew by 0.44%, trading at $2.29. The token’s trading range for the day was between $2.23 and $2.30, showing some volatility. Meanwhile, Solana (SOL) also faced mild declines, down 0.4% at $124.68, with its daily trading range between $121.94 and $125.98.

This week witnessed Solana reach a historic milestone by having its futures listed on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME). This historic step brought in institutional involvement, it lacked the same level of hype surrounding the CME listings of Ethereum and Bitcoin futures.

On the first day of trading, the notional daily volume was only $12.3 million, and open interest stood at $7.8 million, numbers that were much smaller in comparison to the BTC and ETH futures listings.

Market Outlook: Waiting for the Fed

Generally, the world’s cryptocurrency market softened, with total market capitalization falling 0.12% to $2.71 trillion at the time of writing. The trend in trading volume had a brief fall of 1.13%, with the total market volume standing at $71.65 billion in the last 24 hours.

As investors wait for the Federal Reserve’s next policy move Traders are keeping positions tight, waiting for effective news on interest rates and monetary policy. In the meantime, risk aversion and volatility will be the day’s agenda in the world of cryptocurrencies.