At press time, bitcoin has taken something of a nosedive and is now trading for a measly $8,800.
Bitcoin Drops Again
While the price isn’t nearly as bad as it could have been, the currency has fallen below the $9,000 line, which is where it’s been for nearly two weeks. Things ultimately took a nasty turn for bitcoin and cryptocurrencies in general in late September when Bakkt – the institutional crypto trading platform owned by the Intercontinental Exchange (ICE) – debuted to rather lackluster reception.
While things did eventually pick up for the system, bitcoin suffered for it. Trading at $9,500 during that time, the currency fell to approximately $8,100 within minutes after the platform opened for business.
BTC later took another serious dive in late October when it was announced that Facebook head Mark Zuckerberg would testify before the American Congress regarding Libra, the company’s latest crypto project. Many members of Congress had concerns over Libra’s properties, claiming the currency would open the door to money laundering and other forms of white-collar crime.
Zuckerberg took the stand to say that Libra would work hard to ensure that customer data was always kept private and criminal behavior would be shut out. Unfortunately, the event proved to be a little too worrisome for the crypto space, and bitcoin fell to the $7,400 mark shortly after the announcement.
However, things began picking up about a week later when Chinese president Xi Jinping stated that he was a big fan of blockchain technology and felt that it could somehow revitalize the Chinese economy. He also said that he was looking to boost blockchain innovation within the nation’s borders.
This caused bitcoin to shoot back into the high $8,000 range, but from there, Bakkt began hitting new trading records, which ultimately caused the coin to shoot up even more. Things were good; trading was high, and it seemed like the price had recovered.
At the time of writing, however, things appear to be taking a step back. Again, the drop isn’t necessarily huge, but it is strange that the currency would drop so suddenly after keeping up a set momentum for quite a while.
What Could Be the Cause?
In addition, there doesn’t appear to be any clear reason as to why bitcoin fell. There is an argument between popular cryptocurrency trading platform Bitfinex and University of Texas finance professor John Griffin over alleged bitcoin price manipulation in 2017, but that doesn’t seem to be enough for the currency to shed approximately $400.
Clearly, volatility is still very much an issue for BTC. Furthermore, many other currencies seem to be mimicking the coin’s behavior with entities like Ethereum (ETH) having dropped into the low $180 range, and bitcoin cash (BCH) having shed nearly $30 from its price over the past few days.
