By
Temitope Olatunji
April 19th, 2024
Bitcoin fell to a six-month low just above $6,500 on Wednesday, however, now it seems to have gained a little bit and stabilized above $7,000.
On Wednesday most cryptocurrencies were trading in red again including Bitcoin (BTC) that, in the last 24 hours couldn’t turn its trace. Bitcoin closed on Tuesday the day at the $7,198 price mark, at which point the world’s largest crypto coin found an intra-day high on Wednesday of $7,227, before moving down again towards its current trading price near $6,945 still falling by 3.51 at 11:53 am CET. Among the possible influencing factors we should mention the recent Upbit hacker attack.
BTC is still down around 15% from the weekly open of $8,200, while, in November, for now, investors have lost close to $2,000 per coin.
According to some analysts, the support at $6,500 was more than enough for the bulls, but Bitcoin is probably to stay around the $6K price region meaning it could even retest the 200-week moving average, currently around $5,400.
More positive about BTC’s outlook was PlanB, the Twitter analyst known for his Stock-to-Flow Bitcoin price charts. He suggested that Bitcoin could easily retake five figures before 2020.
Call me crazy, but it wouldn't surprise me if BTC closes 2019 at $10k+ .. opportunities like this (#bitcoin below S2F model value, 6 months before the halving) are rare. pic.twitter.com/ADwqixd9EF
— PlanB (@100trillionUSD) November 25, 2019
Ethereum (ETH), continues to follow BTC as it goes down. The number-one altcoin was falling by 3.51% moving up to its current trading price of around $142.8 per coin.
XRP, the third-largest coin by market capitalization, is following today’s trend and is falling as well. The coin currently sits at $0.21 to show a fall of 0.84% on the day. The news that Ripple completed its original commitment with a final $20 million investment in money transmission network MoneyGram obviously didn’t have a positive effect on its trading price.
The majority of top-20 coins are decreasing as well except the Tron (TRX) which is currently rising by 4.62% followed by Cardano (ADA) that is going up by 0.28% and UNUS SED LEO (LEO) that shows gains of 0.54%. Tether (USDT) is also up by 0.81%.
The overall cryptocurrency market cap currently sits around $191,252 billion, with Bitcoin making up 66% of the total.
Wall Street veteran Peter Brandt, who made a name for himself by predicting bitcoin’s devastating 2018 bear market, has called Bitcoin’s low for July 2020–two months after bitcoin’s closely-watched halving event.
He wrote:
I think you are correct — in terms of price anyway. My target of $5,500 is not far below today's low. But I think the surprise might be in the duration and nature of market. I am thinking about a low in July 2020. That will wear out bulls quicker than a price correction.
— Peter Brandt (@PeterLBrandt) November 23, 2019
And not just the May Bitcoin halving, which will see the number of Bitcoin rewarded to miners cut by half from 12.5 Bitcoin to 6.25 Bitcoin, but Bitcoin bulls are also hoping that next year could bring an increase in the number of Bitcoin retail investors and people using Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies for payments. And, they might not be wrong. Bakkt, a New York Stock Exchange-owner backed Bitcoin and cryptocurrency venture, announced last month it plans to launch a consumer app for cryptocurrency purchases in 2020.
Be it as it may, it is logical that investors and market traders are wondering what again has caused this new “crypto winter.” The answer may be in strict guidelines on blockchain that came from China. The People’s Bank (PBoC) announced it would be coming down hard on crypto trading earlier this month saying:
“The People’s Bank of China will continue to implement the requirements of the “Announcement” [2017 ban] and continuously monitor the virtual currency business activities within the jurisdiction. Once it is discovered, it will be disposed of immediately, and it will be prevented from happening early.”
It will be interesting to see how the situation is going to resolve but one thing is sure – this could be a great time for a Christmas shopping spree.