What Caused Crypto Markets to Dump $30 Billion and Hit a New 2018 Low
August 15 2018 - 6:40AM
ADVFN Crypto NewsWire
This year has not been a bright one for cryptocurrencies. The
fervor at the beginning of 2018 has dissipated into a shroud of
despair towards the end of it. As markets continue dump, new lows
are being made leaving us wondering when it will reach the
bottom.
Over the past 24 hours cryptocurrency markets have bled $30
billion dollars according to stats from Coinmarketcap.com. From a level of $219 billion this
time yesterday markets have crashed to a new low for the year of
$189 billion around eight hours ago. A small correction has pulled
them back to $192 billion but further losses look imminent.
It is the third lower low in August indicating that the down
trend is steepening. A whopping $110 billion has left the crypto
space in less than three weeks as markets plunged 37%. Bitcoin has
fallen sharply dropping 27% from its July high of $8,350 to its
current level at just over $6,000. This has caused the altcoins to shed even more as
they get dumped in a fury of FUD. Many of them including Cardano,
Iota, Tron, Neo, Binance Coin, VeChain, and 0x are getting smashed
over 20% on the day.
There has been some speculation as to what is behind this big
dump as the SEC’s delay of the CBOE ETF would not have caused such
a collapse but may have been the catalyst for it.
Senior market analyst at eToro, Matti
Greenspan, suggested the US dollar is having an influence when he
told the
WSJ;
“The crypto markets falling may well be a side effect of the dollar
strength right now. The buck is simply crushing everything in its
path.”
Other analysts have blamed Ethereum for the last two
day’s declines as ICO projects offload their ETH holdings to
liquidate assets in a bearish market. Ethereum has been crushed
overnight with an 18.5% slide to $260, its lowest level since
September last year. Since early February over $80 billion has been
dumped out of Ethereum’s market capitalization sending it back to
levels in mid-2017.
Ethereum is still the primary platform for many ICO and
blockchain projects but since raising funds in ETH they have been
anxious to cash out as the bearish market goes from bad to worse.
It appears that this has all happened at once accelerating the free
fall that many tokens are now experiencing.
The long term prospects for Ethereum and Bitcoin are still very
strong, but this year they are being put through the wringer.
By
Luke Thompson
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