Chainlink (LINK) is on the rise in early trading on Wednesday, supported by an upbeat sentiment among investors towards cryptocurrencies in general and buoyed by several interesting fundamental developments. At the time of writing, LINK/USD is trading at around $23.30.

Like many leading blockchain networks, Chainlink has announced its own DeFi hackathon worth $300,000 to start next month. The registration is now open and will enable the development of more exciting projects powered by smart contracts on its ecosystem. The biggest hackathon on the network also includes additional sponsorships by leading names, including Google Cloud, Filecoin and even UNICEF – which gives the hackathon a charitable angle as well. The hackathon will spur adoption of Chainlink’s technology among project and support the value of the LINK token in the coming weeks.

Another interesting fundamental development is Chainlink’s partnership with Wrapped which will allow users to wrap their cryptocurrency holdings and use it on different blockchain networks. Wrapped will leverage the network’s Proof of Reserve (PoR) consensus mechanism to provide complete on-chain auditability of supported wrapped assets backed by a qualified custodian.

Chainlink’s token is also expected to receive a boost after its addition in fintech app Titan’s managed crypto portfolio. Titan’s users can now benefit from an exposure to the decentralized oracle network and other emerging cryptocurrencies which will further spur investor interest in the LINK token.

Investor interest in LINK remains strong and evident from Santiment’s recent analysis which shows increased buying activity in the crypto among whales even as smaller investors sold off their holding during last week’s dip. During the dip experienced in the previous week, addresses holding between 1 million and 10 million tokens bought as much as 62 million LINK tokens, equivalent to 3.4% of the total supply.

Key Levels to Watch

On the 4-hour chart of LINK/USD, most of the moving averages along with the MACD are exhibiting a strong bearish bias. Although, the momentum indicator suggests some buying interest among investors as well.

Chainlink’s price is sitting just under the pivot point at $24.29 but above the immediate support at $21.15. An increase in selling pressure can see the support being tested, but if buyers jump into the market now, we could see LINK overcome the pivot point and make its way higher until the first resistance at $27.76.