Cryptocurrencies Pull Back After Dropping to 2018 Low

The cryptocurrency market declined slightly during the day on Tuesday, after reaching its lowest level since November 2017. The decline was led by Bitcoin (BTC), which traded at $6,480 during the day, down 3.36%. Ether (ETH) dropped 2.75% to $209.86. Ripple (XRP) also decreased 2.49% to $0.44101.

The decline in the cryptocurrency market comes one day after a major decline that erased about $13 billion from the total cryptocurrency market capitalization in 24 hours. Bitcoin lost 5% of its value yesterday and is now trading at levels not seen since November 2017 .

Yesterday’s decline was led by Ripple (XRP), which lost 20% of its value and is currently trading at a six-month low . ETH followed with a decline of 9%, while Bitcoin lost only 2% during the day, showing relative strength compared to other cryptocurrencies in the market.

The decline of Ripple was caused by several factors, including negative comments from South Korean regulators about cryptocurrencies that are not backed by assets, as well as rumors that Ripple will use up part of its supply of XRP tokens to support the token’s price on exchanges. It is not

Cryptocurrencies are pulling back after dropping to the lowest level this year.

The overall cryptocurrency market capitalization dropped to $263 billion on Monday, down from $813 billion in mid-January, according to CoinMarketCap.com. The website tracks prices for more than 1,300 digital coins and tokens.

While bitcoin has been the top performer this year, some of the smaller coins have seen even better returns.

Bitcoin, the largest cryptocurrency by market cap, has seen its value fall about 64% since its December peak of nearly $20,000. Bitcoin was trading at around $7,140 as of 2:10 p.m. ET Monday, up 0.2% over the last 24 hours and roughly flat over the weekend.

The second-largest digital currency by market cap, ethereum has fallen about 69% since its early January peak of more than $1,400. Ethereum was trading at around $432 as of Monday afternoon, up 1% over the last 24 hours but down 3% over the weekend.**

Bitcoin and other digital currencies dropped to a fresh 2018 low on Wednesday.

The price of a single bitcoin BTCUSD, -2.47% fell to an intraday low of $5,856.88, its lowest level since Nov. 30, according to CoinDesk data. The No. 1 cryptocurrency is down 3.7% at $5,926 in recent trade.

Altcoins are also being battered with Ether ETHUSD, -2.13% off 3.1% at $165.39, Litecoin LTCUSD, -3.19% losing 2% at $46.89 and Ripple’s XRP coin XRPUSD, -2.95% down 5% at 49 cents a token compared with Tuesday levels on the Kraken crypto exchange.

All told the total value of all cryptocurrencies is at $195 billion after hitting a peak above $830 billion in early January, according to CoinMarketCap data.

The decline comes amid news that the U.S Justice Department has reportedly opened a criminal probe into whether traders are manipulating the price of bitcoin and other digital currencies using another virtual currency called tether (USDT).

Cryptocurrencies experienced a sharp fall on Tuesday, as most of the digital assets dropped by 5 percent or more, according to data from CoinMarketCap. The price of Bitcoin (BTC), the world’s largest cryptocurrency by market cap, declined by nearly $1,000 at one point today, hitting a low of $6,625.60. At that price, Bitcoin was down more than 10 percent for the session and about 35 percent for the week. After a brief recovery, Bitcoin is currently trading at $6,895.10 — down 5.9 percent in the past 24 hours and 34.7 percent for the week.

The other top 10 digital currencies are also posting losses in the range of 5-10 percent for the day with only Tether (USDT) and Dash (DASH) posting gains of 0.2 and 0.5 percent respectively. One of the biggest drops happened to Ethereum (ETH), which declined by nearly 15 percent to hit a low of $305 before recovering slightly to its current price around $315 — still down 14 percent in 24 hours.

At press time, the total market capitalization of all cryptocurrencies is approximately $268 billion — down from its high above $800 billion in January 2018.

Bitcoin dropped to its lowest level of the year on Friday and is currently lingering around the $6,700 mark.

The cryptocurrency fell to as low as $6,646, a new low for 2018, according to CoinDesk’s Bitcoin Price Index (BPI). At press time, bitcoin is trading at around $6,744. The last time the cryptocurrency traded at these levels was Nov. 27, 2017.

“The recent drop in price could be attributed to a combination of factors,” said Mati Greenspan, senior market analyst at eToro. “The first and most important is that we’ve entered into a new tax season in both the U.S. and Japan.”

“This is causing some investors to sell off their crypto holdings so that they can pay their capital gains taxes,” he added. “We already saw something similar happen back in December when the U.S. tax reform was announced.”

“What we’re seeing now is the Japanese are also starting to sell off their crypto holdings just like they did when they had to pay capital gains taxes on them last year,” he told CNBC via email.”

The cryptocurrency industry has continued to lose value over the past 24 hours and is currently down more than $20 billion from its total market capitalization on Sunday.

At press time, the combined market cap of all cryptocurrencies is roughly $400 billion, according to CoinMarketCap.

The industry peaked at a valuation of nearly $830 billion in early January, but since that time, it has dropped by more than 50 percent. However, this latest drop brings the industry’s total losses to more than 80 percent from its peak.

Bitcoin (BTC), the world’s largest cryptocurrency by market cap, is trading at roughly $6,360 as of this writing – its lowest price since November of last year. It is currently down 4 percent over the past 24 hours and 9 percent over the past week.

The value of cryptocurrency has dropped to its lowest point since November of last year. This is after a rise of 50% in the first quarter and a subsequent drop of 17%. This is a good time to get into crypto, but only if you are very careful.

The main problem with cryptocurrencies is that they are not backed by anything. They cannot be sold for cash, which makes them worthless until something else happens. For example, if there was a natural disaster that made all the money in the world disappear, then the value of crypto would rise dramatically. But this situation is unlikely to happen for many years.

What about buying crypto? The best way to do this is to buy a hardware wallet and keep it in your house. Hardware wallets are like little computers that hold your private keys and run software that makes it easy to manage your assets. You can use them to buy and sell crypto without having to worry about whether or not you will lose your coins.

If you do decide to invest in cryptocurrency, remember that it can take several months before you see any profit. Even then, you may never make enough money to pay off your initial investment. This is why most people who invest in crypto do so for the long term, rather than as a short-term