Bitcoin price collapsed by more than 60% in 2022: at the end of December, the cryptocurrency was around $16,500,000 compared to its historic high of almost $70,000 in November 2021.
Bitcoin in 2021 was supported by the inflow of capital to the markets and extremely low or zero interest rates, with Goldman Sachs experts at the time even comparing bitcoin to gold, writes Trading Economics.
Meanwhile, a jump in inflation in 2022 and tighter financial conditions triggered a collapse in the cryptocurrency market.
The sell-off intensified first as TerraUSD steiblocoin collapsed and then after the bankruptcy of cryptocurrency exchange FTX, the world’s second-largest.
Bitcoin is down 0.8 percent Friday at $16,471,000, according to CoinDesk.
The bitcoin price collapsed to a 2-year low in trading Tuesday amid the bankruptcy of FTX, one of the world’s largest crypto exchanges.
The bitcoin exchange rate was $15,735,000 as of 1:30 p.m. Tuesday, with the value of the most popular cryptocurrency dropping to $15,480,000 during trading, which is the lowest value since November 11, 2020, according to CoinDesk.
The cryptocurrency market has lost more than $1.4 trillion this year due to a number of problems, including unrealized projects and lack of liquidity due to the global economic downturn. These difficulties have left many cryptocurrency companies facing a string of bankruptcies.
One such company was the owner of the FTX exchange. The company initiated bankruptcy under Article 11 of the U.S. Bankruptcy Code in early October. Before that, another major cryptocurrency exchange – Binance, which was planning to buy the assets of FTX – abandoned the deal after due diligence. The company explained its decision by the identified errors in the management of customer funds, as well as reports about the investigations conducted by U.S. regulators in relation to this site.
In addition, Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao said his company will start selling FTX tokens owned by FTX. This led to the collapse of FTX, whose market valuation once reached $32 billion.
A day earlier, it was revealed that FTX owed the 50 largest lenders $3.1 billion, with a total of 1 million lenders lending to it.
Investors fear that the collapse of FTX could cause a chain reaction in the sector, which further puts pressure on the cryptocurrency market. On Monday, shares of Coinbase Global (SPB: COIN) Inc., another major cryptocurrency exchange operator, plummeted 8.9 percent in U.S. trading, with its market capitalization plunging below $10 billion, the lowest since Coinbase went public.
Bitcoin fell to a two-year low in trading Friday on news that cryptocurrency exchange FTX has initiated bankruptcy under Section 11 of the U.S. Bankruptcy Code.
The company’s CEO, Sam Bankman-Fried, has stepped down, according to a statement circulated by FTX via Twitter. John Ray III has been named the company’s new CEO.
Bitcoin is losing 3.8% in trading, at $16,803 as of 5:40 p.m. Ksk. Earlier in the session, it was down to a two-year low of $16,351.52, Coindesk notes.
Ether (Ethereum) fell 4.5% to $1255.8 and Binance Coin fell 6.2% to $285.11.
Earlier on Friday, the head of the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange Binance, Changpeng Zhao, said during a conference in Indonesia that the cryptocurrency sector is facing a crisis similar to the financial crisis of 2008, which could lead to the collapse of several companies in the sector in the coming weeks.
The rate of bitcoin fell by 4% during trading on Thursday after the publication of data on higher-than-expected inflation in the United States.
The price of bitcoin at 16:11 CST fell by 4.4% compared to the closing level of the previous trading and amounted to $18,312 thousand, which is the lowest level since June 18.
The rate of ether (Ether) fell by 6.6%, to $1.212 thousand.
Consumer prices (CPI index) in the US in September rose by 8.2% compared to the same month last year, showed data published on Thursday by the country’s Ministry of Labor. Thus, inflation slowed to a seven-month low from 8.3% in August, but was higher than the 8.1% expected by analysts polled by Bloomberg.
On a monthly basis, the CPI index increased by 0.4%, although analysts were expecting a rise of 0.2%.
Meanwhile, consumer price growth excluding the cost of food and energy (Core CPI) in September accelerated to 6.6% in annual terms from 6.3% in August.
“The whole world is looking at US inflation data to try and predict what the Fed is doing,” said Stefan Rast, founder of research firm Truflation.
Higher-than-expected inflation raises the possibility of another 75 basis point rate hike at the next Fed meeting on November 1-2.
The bitcoin exchange rate exceeds $20,000 during trading on Tuesday, having reached a maximum value in more than a week, but cannot break through the narrow trading range indicated after the cryptocurrency’s sharp fall this summer.
The price of bitcoin, as of 13:40 Kyiv time, rose by 5.69% compared to the closing level of previous trading and amounted to $20.223 thousand.
Bitcoin has been fluctuating between $18,000 and $25,000 since mid-June, following a crash in the crypto market that has depreciated nearly $2 trillion since its peak in November last year, CNBC writes.
The decline in the market was caused by an increase in interest rates by the central banks of the world, aimed at combating high inflation, and a wave of bankruptcies and debt problems that swept through companies in the cryptocurrency sector.
Crypto investors are keeping an eye on changes in monetary policy as cryptocurrencies have been closely linked to the US stock market this year. Rising interest rates put pressure on the S&P 500 and Nasdaq, which spilled over to other risky assets, including cryptocurrencies.
This time, the rise in the cryptocurrency market, which began on Monday, is at odds with the dynamics of the stock market. American stocks continued to fall on Monday, and the Dow Jones Industrial Average ended trading in the bearish trend zone (that is, it fell 20% or more from the last peak) for the first time since the start of the coronavirus pandemic.
However, futures for US indices showed an increase on Tuesday, indicating that stocks may start to win back on the mood of investors to buy on the fall.
The rate of Ether (Ether) rose by 4.79% to $1388.50. On September 15, a cryptocurrency software update dubbed The Merge was activated. The update switched the Ethereum blockchain to a new algorithm, which should drastically reduce the consumption of electricity during mining.
Bitcoin fell below $20,000 over the weekend and remains below that mark on Monday after US Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell made comments during the annual economic symposium at Jackson Hole on Friday.
The bitcoin exchange rate at 15:00 TC on Monday fell by 0.9% and amounted to $19,812 thousand.
The Fed will continue to raise the key rate until inflation is under control, and this is likely to “cause some pain for households and businesses,” Powell said.
Such “hawkish” statements also had a negative impact on the US stock market. The Dow Jones Industrial Average plunged the most since May on Friday.
The price of bitcoin did not fall below $20K for about a month and rose to $25,199K in mid-August. Since the beginning of the year, the value of the cryptocurrency has collapsed by 57% amid tightening monetary policy in the world, which could cause a recession.
The price of Ethereum, another popular crypto-currency, is down 2.35% on Monday to around $1,449k. Ethereum has dropped 60% since the start of the year.
