Litecoin (LTC) Hash Rate Soars to New High, Will the Price Follow Suit?

It's been an exciting week for the market with multiple ATHs and Litecoin [LTC] was not left behind. The cryptocurrency has been on an overall uptrend in the last 10 days resulting in a pattern breakout.

Litecoin [LTC] hash rate hit a new all-time high (ATH) on 23 December despite the bear market. The hash rate was up 1.42 petahashes per second (PH/S), indicating a surge in miner profitability.

This was likely due to a recent increase in network activity, which has been building up since the start of November. According to DeFiLlama, LTC token volume had its lowest levels in November at slightly below $250 million.

However, it has since seen a massive surge, reaching a monthly high of $1.98 billion in the last 24 hours at the time of observation.

The latest volume surge was the highest that the network has seen in the last six months. This, coupled with resistance against the downside, could indicate that bullish momentum remains strong.

Demand for Litecoin was also on the rise in the derivatives segment. The level of open interest on all exchanges peaked at $309.87 million in the last 24 hours.

The last time that LTC open interest was that high was in mid-June. However, it was still at a fraction of its potential, especially compared to April levels.

The cryptocurrency concluded March 2024 with over $708 million in open interest.

Since open interest cuts both ways, an assessment of longs vs shorts was necessary. The percentage of positions going long was higher in the last three days compared to shorts.

The above data suggests that more traders have been switching to the bullish camp, indicating a surge in bullish optimism.

However, the surge in sell pressure towards the end of the week may also set up LTC for another unexpected pullback