Chainlink surpasses Bitcoin Cash; LINK becomes the 8th largest cryptocurrency

Chainlink (LINK), the oracle-focused blockchain protocol, surpasses Bitcoin Cash (BCH) and becomes the eighth-largest cryptocurrency as on Jan. 18. The market capitalization of Chainlink now hovers at $9 billion and roughly $500 million away from the next biggest crypto asset, Litecoin (LTC).

Why made Chainlink surge so rapidly?

The price of Chainlink rose by 13% in the last 24 hours and the momentum of LINK likely comes from the positive sentiment around DeFi.

The DeFi market as a whole has been rallying strongly throughout the recent months with AAVE and SUHI being the most recent standouts. This uptrend can be attributed to the fast-growing metric known as total value locked (TVL), which measures the amount of capital deployed across DeFi protocols.

Where does LINK go next?

On-chain analysts at Santiment found that dormant tokens are continuing to move uptrend. This trend has further fueled the bull trend of various cryptocurrencies, including Bitcoin, Ether and LINK. They said:

“Dormant tokens continue to be moved at rapid rates during this #crypto bull run, and dips in our 'Mean Dollar Invested Age' metric indicate the increased rate of $BTC, $ETH, $LINK, $LTC, and particularly $REN (which triggered its massive +60% week).'

With LINK surpassing an all-time high, it is now technically in “price discovery.' In technical analysis, price discovery happens when the value of an asset exceeds its record-high and starts moving for a new ceiling.

The network effect of Chainlink would likely act as another catalyst in the coming future, especially as Ethereum (ETH) continues to dominate the DeFi space.