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It seems as if Bitcoin and other digital currencies can’t seem to catch a break even after their week-long recovery to pre-crash prices. Shortly after it stabilizing at the $9,000 level, the market took a step back to land itself back in the red over the past 24 hours. Bitcoin is currently trading just above $8500, losing around 5% since yesterday.
Following the past week’s trend of declining more significantly as compared to Bitcoin, Ethereum is possibly looking to retest the $500 level. Last weekend, it dipped below that point for the first time in months, retracing its entire bull run since November 2017. At this time, Ethereum’s change over the past day is twice as much as that of Bitcoin, at close to 10%, with a price of $525.
There has been no recent news to suggest why Ethereum is tanking harder and faster than other cryptocurrencies, but it remains to be seen whether the trend continues over a longer term.
Other cryptocurrencies seem to have met with similar fates as the market leader as well, with most of the top 10 currencies bleeding in value. An exception to this, however, appears to be EOS, which has been in the green throughout the day’s downtrend, although not by much.
NEO, Stellar and Cardano seem to be the worst affected at this time, with their losses reaching well into double digit percentages.
Bitcoin Cash and Litecoin are trading at approximately $990 and $160 respectively, clearly taking smaller overall hits than the other players.
Importantly, it appears as if Bitcoin cannot seem break the $9,000 threshold for unknown reasons. The initial jump beyond it may have only been motivated by the recent positive news coming from the G20 summit.
Top Stories from the Crypto World
1. Edward Snowden exposes US surveillance operation on Bitcoin investors
Edward Snowden, the known whistleblower that founded WikiLeaks several years ago, has stated that Bitcoin’s public ledger might be a vulnerability that causes its eventual downfall.
A document leaked by him also suggests that the NSA and FBI have been tracking Bitcoin use by US citizens through a covert operation named OAKSTAR. Another subprogram, MONKEYROCKET, may also specifically follow their actions on the blockchain.
Surprisingly though, WikiLeaks was one of the initial proponents of the cryptocurrency revolution and even accepted it as a payment method for donations as early as 2010.
2. Chinese stock exchange to take action against companies illegitimately claiming affiliation with blockchain technology
China’s Shenzhen Exchange has announced that it will be clamping down on companies claiming to drive hype around their involvement with blockchain technology.
The decision appears to have arrived at primarily because of the actions of a company, named Zheijiang Enjoyor Electronics, that announced a possible blockchain pivot on WeChat.
Furthermore, this move is perhaps not very surprising as, in the past, several US-based companies have seen their stock prices soar simply by adding the word ‘blockchain’ to their names. A recent example is when the company “Long Island Iced Tea” to “Long Blockchain”, causing its stock to rise by around 289 percent overnight.
3. Coinbase bug allowed users to manipulate their Ethereum balances
Dutch researchers have revealed a glitch that allowed malicious actors to fraudulently credit their Coinbase accounts with unlimited Ethereum since as early as December 2017.
According to the trading platform, “The researchers noticed an issue with our ETH receiving code when receiving a contract. This allowed sending of ETH to Coinbase to be credited even if the underlying contract execution failed.”
Coinbase has rewarded the research firm, Vicompany, with $10,000 in accordance with its bug bounty program.