After the recent stagnation, bitcoin finally began moving and dumped to a six-week low beneath $20,000.
Most altcoins are deep in the red as well. Ethereum is down to $1,500, while SOL, ADA, and AVAX have declined by up to 8% in a day.
Last week was particularly harmful to the primary cryptocurrency, which dumped from $25,200 to $21,000 in a matter of days. Since that enhanced volatility, the asset calmed and spent most of the following days trading in a range between $21,000 and $22,000.
It tried its hand at taking down the latter on Thursday but was stopped in its tracks. As such, it was pushed back down to $21,500, as reported yesterday.
However, Jerome Powell addressed the nation and reiterated previous Fed statements about trying to bring back down inflation to 2%. Although this has been said numerous times in the past, it had an immediate effect on BTC’s price.
In a matter of hours, bitcoin slumped by over $1,000 and went below $20,500. The situation worsened earlier today when BTC dipped below $20,000 for the first time since the middle of July. Somewhat expectedly, this caused millions of dollars worth of liquidations.
As of now, it has bounced off and trades just over that coveted line, but its market cap has tumbled below $400 billion.
As it typically happens when BTC heads south hard, so do most of the altcoins.
Ethereum was among the best performers until recently, perhaps fueled by the hype about the upcoming Merge. As such, ETH had spiked above $1,700 two days ago. Earlier today, though, the second-largest crypto fell beneath $1,500, losing over $200 in this timeframe.
Cardano is down by 8.5% in a day, Solana by 7%, and Avalanche by 8%. Binance Coin, Ripple, Dogecoin, Polkadot, Shiba Inu, and Polygon are also deep in the red, although with a bit less harmful declines.
The lower- and mid-cap alternative coins are in a similar adverse state. Consequently, the overall crypto market cap has seen more than $80 billion evaporate in a day and is down below $1 trillion for the first time in almost a month.
