After a week of poor performance, Bitcoin has continued its descent, and has now crashed below its previous 2018 lows of $5,500, setting fresh lows at $5,100. Bitcoin’s unprecedented drop has led many major altcoins to fall 10% or more, and according to one analyst, more blood is likely to come in the near future.
At the time of writing, Bitcoin (BTC) is trading down 9% at its current price of $5,100, setting a new year-to-date low. BTC’s latest drop comes less than one week after it fell from the $6,300 region, where it had relative stability, down to lows of $5,400.
The latest market carnage has led the overall cryptocurrency market cap to fall to just over $167 billion, a level that hasn’t been seen since October of 2016.
While speaking to MarketWatch, Stephen Innes, the head of Asia Pacific trading at Oanda, said that the regulatory hurdles that Bitcoin will face in the coming months will likely push its price below $5,000, opening the gates for even greater losses.
“The digital token fell as much as 6.3% to $5,202, having plunged through a critical resistance level Wednesday after a period of relative tranquility. I remain incredibly bearish on BTC with the $1,000 level looking as likely as $10,000. But this is from a longstanding and unwavering view that regulators and the banking system will continue to push back against the rise of virtual markets, and will undoubtedly burst crypto’s balloon as the $5,000 cliff edge is approaching fast.”
It remains unclear as to whether or not Bitcoin’s bulls will be able to defend $5,000, which appears to be a critical psychological level.
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Altcoins Plunge, XRP Holds Steady
As usual, BTC’s price led the general markets, causing many altcoins to drop 10% or more over the past 24-hour trading period. The plunge has, so far, been led by Ethereum (ETH), Litecoin (LTC), and Monero (XMR), which are trading down 11.6%, 10.4%, 12%, and 15% respectively.
XRP, however, has been able to avoid much of the carnage so far, and is currently trading down 3% at its current price of just under $0.50. Coinciding with Bitcoin’s drop last night, XRP fell to lows of $0.47, but quickly recovered to highs of over $0.50 before settling at its current price.
In addition to avoiding today’s widespread losses, XRP has also recovered much of the value it lost from last week’s market drop, when it fell from approximately $0.52 to lows of $0.42, before climbing back towards its current levels.
Because of XRP’s stellar performance over the past week, it has solidified its position as the number two cryptocurrency by market capitalization, which is currently sitting $4 billion higher than that of ETH’s.
The next few days will prove to be critical for bulls who are looking to regain market dominance by pushing Bitcoin’s price back up, as if it breaks below $5,000 there will likely be significantly larger drops to come.
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