By
Tolu Ajiboye
April 23rd, 2024
The bloodbath in the cryptocurrency market saw almost all of the top ten cryptocurrencies losing 10-12% of its price in a single day. Overall market cap dropped by $28 billion.
Wednesday, November 14, the crypto market witnessed one of the biggest carnage moments of 2018. The cryptocurrency market cap plunged by nearly 15% making its new 2018 low of $180 billion, according to CoinMarketCap. This market correction is widespread across the entire crypto market. It is visible that almost all of the top-twenty cryptocurrency have lost 10-12% of their price in the last 24-hours.
After consolidating above the $6000 for the last few months, Bitcoin bulls finally lost the battle to the bears. In our weekly report, CoinSpeaker noted on Monday regarding the hovering bearish signs. Bitcoin (BTC) sharply slipped below the $6000 levels while attaining a new 2018 low of $5556. With this, the Bitcoin market cap has gone below $100 billion and is currently at $98 billion. However, Bitcoin still manages to have over 52% dominance in the cryptocurrency market.
Just a few hours before the BTC price drop took place on Wednesday, a well-known crypto traded and technical analyst said that BTC showed weakness.
“BTC looks pretty weak, this might be the first time I’m not buying $6,200 in quite a while. I’m just not trusting it to hold forever after getting battered for so long. If it does break, alternative cryptocurrencies will suffer hardest,” he said.
Reason Behind the Bitcoin Price Fall
Several popular analysts believe that the latest move in Bitcoin is purely technical. Mati Greenspan, senior market analyst at eToro says that “As far as I can tell this move is more technical in nature”. Blockforce Capital CEO Eric Ervin also shared similar perspective. In a word with Forbes, Ervin said that “the recent price plunge is a cause of purely technical moves.”
“The significance of the $6,000 support level shouldn’t be understated. As the bear market has trudged along these past few months, that level has held steady,” he noted. As a result, “many investors have come to see it as a stop-loss measure. This would explain the large amount of liquidations that have occurred.”
“Looking forward, today’s price drop may be a blessing for the asset as it could help push the market to a bottom, after which it can bounce back,” added Ervin.
Victor Dergunov, founder the Albright Investment Group, wrote the following in a blog post with The Independent.
“This is not the first time bitcoin has seen calm waters. We’ve seen similar periods of modest volatility, and humble price swings. Primarily, similar low volatility phenomenon have occurred in the very late stages of bitcoin bear markets [whereby prices fall as investors sell]. Everyone seemingly loses interest, volume dries up, news flow quiets down, and then, when you least expect it, the next bitcoin bull market begins [whereby prices rise as investors buy].”
FUD Caused By the Bitcoin Cash Hard Fork
Along with Bitcoin, there were several other altcoins which were badly ailing. The first Bitcoin derivative Bitcoin Cash (BCH) was the worst performer. BCH lost are its last week’s gains and slumped by over 20% in a single day. BCH is currently trading at $444 with a market cap of $7.7 billion.
Not to forget, Bitcoin Cash is undergoing a hard fork today. Several analysts believe that a lot of drama surrounding BCH’s hard fork is the reason behind the market fall. Joshua Frank, co-founder of cryptocurrency analytics platform TheTIE.io told Forbes that “There is a tremendous amount of FUD surrounding the Bitcoin Cash hard fork”.
“It seems like there is a lot of confusion in the market as to what is driving price and who will emerge as the winner in the BCHABC vs. BCHSV fight,” stated Frank. We have seen this FUD and confusion in Twitter conversations. This is reflected by the fact that Bitcoin Cash has had sentiment volatility three times higher than any other major cryptocurrency over the last 24 hours and BCH’s tweet volume is 217% higher than its 20 day moving average.”
XRP Topple Ethereum to Grab the Second Spot
For the second time this year, XRP has surpassed Ethereum to become the second-most-valued digital assets after Bitcoin. Yesterday’s market collapse saw Ethereum (ETH) loosing over 12% of its price to fall below $200. Currently, Ethereum is trading at a price of $180 with a market cap of $18.6 billion.
The XRP’s market cap leads that of Ethereum with a marginal value which is $18.7 billion. Although XRP too has lost nearly 9% of its price.
All in all, the cryptocurrency market cap fell by $28 billion in a single day. At the press time, the overall crypto market cap stands at $185 billion.