4 Cryptocurrencies to Watch This Week: BTC, HYPE, ZEC, and KAS Face Crucial Tests

Bitcoin entered its most successful month with a bang, surging past $87,000 on Friday after the release of the weak US jobs report. Institutional demand has improved significantly over the past few months.

Meanwhile, Hyperliquid, Zcash, and Kaspa each have important protocol or market catalysts in play. Here are the key levels and developments to watch.

BTC: This Level Remains Key

Softer US inflation data, strong institutional demand, and the weaker-than-expected jobs report on Friday helped BTC recover some of the recent losses, with the asset challenging the key $87,000 resistance once again at the end of the business week.

The latest PCE data showed core inflation rising 0.2% month-over-month and around 3.0% annually, both of which were below expectations. That, alongside the relatively small number of only 29,000 added jobs in September, reduced some concerns about the need for additional monetary tightening from the US Federal Reserve.

The setup, though, is not entirely bullish. Glassnode recently cited data showing relatively limited profit-taking compared with previous market tops, but selling by long-term holders has recently increased. Trading volumes remain comparatively weak, suggesting BTC may need stronger buyer participation before confirming another major leg up.

The $87,000-$87,500 resistance remains the first notable obstacle in bitcoin’s path, as a decisive break above it could open the door toward the next big selling zone at around $95,000.

Hyperliquid’s Case

Hyperliquid’s native token has been among the strongest market performers lately, reaching consecutive all-time highs as protocol activity and ecosystem development continue to expand. One of those was the introduction of manual borrowing through HyperCore. Since September 18, users have been able to use HYPE and BTC as collateral to borrow USDC or USDT, with borrowing volume reaching almost $270 million on the first day.

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The project has also introduced trailing-stop orders for perpetual markets, while its tokenomics continue to generate persistent buy-side pressure. 99% of platform fees are directed toward the Assistance Fund to repurchase HYPE from the open market.

From a technical perspective, the next important question is whether the $90-$92 region can turn into sustained support. If it does, the bullish structure remains intact. In contrast, $85 could serve as the first major support in case of a pullback.

Zcash: Privacy Meets Network Upgrade

When we talk about massive price gainers, it’s difficult to leave ZEC out of the conversation. It has been frequently posting major gains, up by over 1,000% in the past year or so, and recently topped $1,600 for the first time in a decade.

The biggest development is the network’s seventh major upgrade, which received overwhelming support from voters and is scheduled to activate on November 5. It will reduce block time from 75 seconds to 25, effectively tripling the rate of block production. Participants also voted to retain Zcash’s existing halving structure, which resembles Bitcoin’s issuance model.

Another notable metric is the amount of ZEC held in shielded pools, as recent updates on the matter indicated that 29% of the existing supply is currently shielded. Another 4 million tokens have moved into the newer Ironwood pool.

Kaspa: Adoption Being Tested

Kaspa’s recent developments have focused more heavily on expanding what developers can actually build on the network, such as the Tokata hard fork. It introduced UTXOs, covenants, transaction introspection, and native zero-knowledge verification, pushing the project beyond its original role as a high-throughput proof-of-work payments network.

Released in September, Silverscript 1.0 added higher-level tools for building covenant logic, including vaults, escrow, mechanisms, and time locks. The .k name service also launched during the same month, allowing Kaspa addresses to be replaced by readable names, with several thousand registrations recorded within the first few days.

In terms of price movements, KAS has soared by roughly 50% in the past month, bringing the psychological $0.50 level back into focus. The question now is whether the network usage can catch up with the technological development.