The price of the largest digital currency to swing wildly in Asia. Bitcoin dropped as much as 32 per cent to $3,915, its weakest since March 2019, before clawing back most of that loss by midday in Hong Kong, according to consolidated pricing compiled by Bloomberg. Its drop of as much as 50 per cent over the past two days is among the biggest ever. Bitcoin was down 7.8 per cent to $5,280 as of 12:25 p.m. in Hong Kong. The wider Bloomberg Galaxy Crypto Index tracking a basket of digital assets hit a historic low in data going back to August 2017, sliding as much as 49 per cent over the two sessions. Rival token Ether briefly flipped positive to reverse an earlier 30 per cent loss, while XRP pared declines.
‘This sell-off has caused cascading margin calls with the vast majority of investors shifting to exposure to cash,’ said Wayne Trench, chief executive of digital asset brokerage and exchange operator OSL. ‘In this situation, correlation converges to 1 and even impacts potential ‘safe havens’ like gold and Bitcoin to varying extents.’
Bitcoin is down about 50 per cent from its recent high in February. The crypto had been on the upswing this year to that point, as investors looked ahead to the so-called ‘halvening’ a schedule reduction in the Bitcoin mining rate designed to combat price inflation.
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