Ampera’s AMP rose 62% in the last 24 hours and continued its rally as on-chain metrics indicated whales have begun accumulating the altcoin, driven by its increasing utility.

AMP (AMP) soared to a high of $0.0133 on Wednesday morning, marking a jump of over 330% from its lowest point this year. The surge in price pushed its market cap over $1 billion for the first time in 29 months before settling at $978 million when writing. 

The altcoin’s rally coincided with a 750% surge in daily trading volume, which reached over $601 million, while AMP also trended on Google on the back of heightened retail interest.

Why is AMP price rising?

There are three potential catalysts driving AMP’s recent rally.

Firstly, AMP’s surge coincided with a broader rally in the altcoin market, as major cryptocurrencies like Binance Coin (BNB) and Tron (TRX) posted significantly higher daily gains of 17.6% and 68.8%, respectively, compared to Bitcoin’s modest 1.4% rise during the same period.

Second, Flexa, a digital payments platform that uses AMP as collateral, recently announced its integration with the Zcash wallet app ‘Zashi.’ The integration allows users to make purchases at Flexa-enabled U.S. stores without revealing their wallet or currency details.

As more transactions occur on the platform, the demand for AMP to serve as collateral naturally increases. This reduces the token’s available supply, creating upward pressure on its price, which is potentially fueling growth for the altcoin.

Third, AMP’s rally has been bolstered by a surge in whale activity over the past 24 hours. Data from IntoTheBlock shows that whale holder netflow jumped over 150%, shifting from a $186K outflow on Dec. 2 to $473K in inflows on Dec. 3, signaling renewed interest from large investors.

Meanwhile, on the daily chart, AMP has risen above both the 50-day and 200-day Simple Moving Averages, indicating bulls are still in control. Further, the 50-day SMA has crossed over the 200-day SMA, forming a golden cross, a major bullish sign in technical analysis.

Further, the MACD line (blue) and the signal line (orange) on the Moving Average Convergence Divergence indicator have been moving higher above the zero mark, which means the rally still holds significant momentum.

Considering these signals, AMP could potentially continue its rally, a sentiment also echoed by analyst Javon Marks, who projected that AMP could climb to $0.07048—a potential increase of over 470% from its current price.

Celcius, a global crypto and Bitcoin mining company has faced a fraud case since last year. Now, the founder pleaded guilty and agreed to be jailed for 30 years.

Alex Mashinsky, the founder and ex-CEO of Celcius Network, is set to plead guilty to fraud charges, Reuters reported on Dec. 03. The federal prosecutor accused Mashinsky of pursuing customers to invest in them and unnaturally inflating the value of the company on the crypto token.

In order to deal with prosecutors, Mashinsky agreed to be jailed in prison for 30 years or less. Therefore, his sentence is set to be announced by the court later next year on Apr. 08.

“I know what I did was wrong, and I want to try to do whatever I can to make it right,” he said.

Previously, he was counted for seven charges, including fraud, conspiracy, and market manipulation since last year. In court, he stated that he pleaded guilty to two out of those seven charges, which were commodity fraud and manipulating the Celcius token (CEL) price back in 2021.

Celcius price movement

Since the token was released, the CEL price has seen a meteoric increase of 14,700% from $0.05 to $7.4 in 2021. The surged price was only recorded in that year; after being accused, CEL saw an outflow and made the price go back to under $1 until Mashinsky’s arrest in July. 13; the token price was only $0.1.

Another development of the cases, Ben Armstrong, known as BitBoy Crypto, believes that Canadian businessman Kevin O’Leary was a key player in Celcius’s bankruptcy, as well as the FTX.

SynFutures, a decentralized exchange for perpetual derivatives trading on Base, has introduced SynFutures Foundation and announced an airdrop of its native token, F.

The SynFutures Foundation will collaborate with the community to oversee the DEX platform’s development and secure key partnerships. As a community-led governance initiative, the foundation aims to ensure the success of grants, project collaborations, and funding programs.

The F token is an Ethereum (ETH)-based mainnet asset, will grant holders governance rights, staking rewards, and fee discounts. The airdrop will distribute 10 billion F tokens to the community, with additional airdrops planned in the future.

SynFutures noted in a press release that the airdrop will benefit the community, the DEX’s backers and advisors, the foundation treasury, and core contributors. F is also reserved for liquidity and protocol development.

The community will receive 28.5% of the total F token supply, with 7.5% available for distribution during the Season 1 Airdrop on December 6, 2024. Eligible participants include users who have interacted consistently with SynFutures from v1 to v3.

Several crypto exchanges, including Bybit, Gate.io, Bitget, and KuCoin, have expressed support for the F token airdrop. Bybit will host a launchpool initiative between Dec. 2 and Dec. 5, allowing participants to earn F ahead of its listing. Gate.io is offering a similar program with 75,000 F tokens available.

SynFutures is backed by prominent venture capital platforms such as Pantera, Dragonfly, Polychain, Standard Crypto, and SIG.

The platform recently unveiled a Perp Launchpad, offering a $1 million grant to support tokens deemed under the radar. In September, SynFutures rolled out two perpertual contracts with 10x leverage that allowed traders to bet on the U.S. election.