Artur Widak | Nurphoto | Getty Images Bitcoin fell just below $ 21,000 in Asia on Tuesday before recovering slightly as it continued to plunge as investors sold riskier assets. The world’s largest cryptocurrency fell nearly 14% in the last 24 hours, while ethereum fell more than 12% over the same period, according to data from Coinbase. Bitcoin hovered around $ 21,800 on Tuesday in Asia. “Everything is on fire right now, whether it’s stocks, encryption assets or anything,” said Nirmal Ranga, head of trading and analytics at ZebPay. “What you see in the market is … fear, uncertainty and doubt. Technically, the markets seem to be oversold and there has to be a threshold for bitcoin in the near future,” he told CNBC Asia Street Signs. Encryption assets fell to the hammer on Monday as trading platforms such as Celsius and Binance halted withdrawals and some companies cut jobs. Celsius said withdrawals, exchanges and transfers between accounts would be halted due to “extreme market conditions” and that the move was intended to “stabilize liquidity and operations”. “We are taking this action today to put Celsius in a better position to honor, over time, his withdrawal obligations,” the company said in a note. Binance, the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange, meanwhile suspended bitcoin withdrawals for more than three hours “due to a stalled transaction that was pending”. The market capitalization for cryptocurrencies fell below $ 1 trillion on Monday for the first time since February 2021, according to data from CoinMarketCap. About $ 200 billion has disappeared from the market in recent days.
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The cryptocurrency sell-off comes as investors generally avoided risky assets amid fears of a possible global recession as major central banks around the world raise interest rates to curb inflation. Policymakers at the US Federal Reserve are now considering raising interest rates by 75 basis points later this week, according to CNBC’s Steve Liesman. This is greater than the 50 basis points increase that many traders expected. The Wall Street Journal first reported the story. Rising rates tend to make future gains on growth assets less attractive. Bitcoin has fallen almost 70% from an all-time high in November 2021.
