The world’s biggest cryptocurrency, bitcoin, slumped as much as 13% to $16,317, a sharp correction from its three-year high of $19,521 hit a day earlier. It was last down 8%. Bitcoin’s price has rallied around 150% this year to just short of its all-time high of $19,666. Fuelling its rise has been the demand for volatile assets, interest in assets perceived as resistant to inflation, and expectations that cryptocurrencies will win mainstream acceptance.
Bitcoin’s price hovers around $17,000.
At the time of writing, bitcoin is changing hands at just above the $17,000 mark, a $2,000 low from yesterday. Bitcoin’s 12-year history has been peppered with vertiginous gains and equally sharp drops. The leading cryptocurrency remains a highly volatile asset, and its markets are far less transparent than traditional assets. Several BTC traders cited the unwinding of highly leveraged positions built up as bitcoin moved closer to its record, as well as tweets by the CEO of the crypto exchange giant Coinbase expressing concern at rumors of a possible regulatory crackdown. Brian Armstrong, CEO of California-based Coinbase, tweeted that he was worried by rumors the United States would clampdown on individual cryptocurrency wallets.
Bitcoin continues to remain a volatile asset.
The price of the leading cryptocurrency, bitcoin, had reached as low as $4,000 earlier in March this year when the global pandemic hit. Since then, it has witnessed a massive recovery, especially in the last six weeks or so. Bitcoin was on its way to break its all-time high this week with just shy of $19,666. It had achieved its all-time-high back in 2017. Smaller coins also fell, with the second-largest cryptocurrency, Ethereum dropping around 13%, and XRP, the third-leading coin, sliding more than 20%. Ethereum and Ripple’s XRP, which tend to move in tandem with bitcoin, hit multi-year highs earlier this week.
