On the Chain: Bitcoin holds near US$77,000 as crypto braces for Fed rate hike

Bitcoin is holding around US$77,000 as cryptocurrency markets head into a potentially decisive week, with traders increasingly convinced the US Federal Reserve will raise interest rates on Wednesday.

The world's largest cryptocurrency was trading at roughly US$77,000-US$77,200 on Monday morning, September 14, little changed over the past 24 hours and around 6% below the three-month high above US$82,000 reached earlier this month.

Ethereum has shown greater resilience, trading around US$2,540, while Solana was holding just above US$101. CoinDesk's latest market snapshot had Ethereum up around 2.9%, Solana 1.4% higher and Bitcoin marginally weaker.

The relative strength in major altcoins comes after a volatile week in which hotter US inflation data, sharply higher Treasury yields and surging oil prices repeatedly knocked Bitcoin back from attempts to reclaim US$80,000.

Fed rate decision dominates

The immediate focus is the Federal Reserve's September 15-16 meeting.

Markets have moved aggressively towards expecting a 25-basis-point rate increase after August consumer prices rose 0.4% month-on-month and 3.4% from a year earlier.

Interest-rate markets were assigning roughly an 85% probability to a rate increase heading into the meeting, up sharply from expectations earlier in September.