Crypto crash – latest: Bitcoin withdraws still blocked by Binance after huge market collapse

Bitcoin is down by about 16 per cent in the last day and is inching closer to the $21,000 mark.

The world’s leading cryptocurrency has sunk in value by nearly 27 per cent compared to its price last week amid the latest crypto market crash.

Other leading cryptocurrencies, including ethereum, and dogecoin have also dropped in value by around 15 per cent in the last 24 hours.

Solana and cardano are also down by over 5 to 8 per cent in the last day.

The overall crypto market is continuing its downward trend, and is currently close to a value of $900M, sinking by over 12 per cent in the last 24 hours.

El Salvador currently has 2,301 Bitcoin, worth about $50 million at the time of publishing.

This is about 50 percent of the $105.6 million that the country’s president Nayib Bukele invested.

The country has bought the dip several times in the past.

In October 2021, it bought 420 bitcoins, paying the highest price per bitcoin. Then on 9 May, Mr Bukele again “bought the dip” and bought 500 bitcoins for over $30,700 each.

But amid the latest crypto market crash, with bitcoin’s price inching closer to the $21,000 mark, it remains to be seen if the country would keep hodling its bitcoin assets to recoup some of the money lost.

Crypto market analysts are divided over whether we’re nearing the end of the bear market, or still firmly in the middle of it.

With more than 60 per cent losses for bitcoin since its November 2021 price peak, some believe it could still rival the 80 per cent+ losses seen during the market corrections of 2013 and 2017.

After dropping below $1 trillion today for the first time since 2020, we’ve asked analysts which way they think the crypto market is heading from here.

You can read all about it here:

We will be continuing our updates tomorrow – stay tuned!

Bitcoin’s volitlity at this time is unlikely to sweeten it to the Financial Conduct Authority in the UK, which is looking to regulate crypto more.

Nikhil Rathi, head of the organisation, said that crypto is “a vector for serious organized crime and money laundering” and told a Treasury Committee that “anyone who invests in them must be ready to lose all their money.”

In the past two years, Bloomberg notes, the FCA has all-but-banned Binance in the UK and set high standards for doing busines sin the country so that most digital currency companies can’t operate.

“In the US we have an alphabet soup of regulators,” Eugene Soltes, a Harvard Business School professor who studies regulation, says. “We’re trying to figure out still who is the regulator, not how we should regulate them. The FCA already has one up.”

“We could be facing even more severe losses moving forward. Economic growth is clearly slowing, and reports already suggest the U.S. could see a recession in the next year,” said Manuel Ortiz-Olave, co-founder at equity tokens firm Brickken, in an email to CoinDesk.

“Higher inflation will continue forcing higher interest rates, and higher interest rates are also negative for economic growth.”

He continued: “Some of the most important companies in the world like Apple, Microsoft or Nike have already reported slowdowns in sales, and Tesla has indicated that layoffs will come soon. These are clearly negative headlines, which combined with higher food and fuel prices, make people be careful about their savings.”

Susannah Streeter, investment and markets analyst at Hargreaves Lansdown, told This Is Money: “As inflation proves to be an even trickier opponent to beat than expected, bitcoin and ether are continuing to get a severe bruising in the ring.

“They are prime victims of the flight away from risky assets as investors fret about spiraling consumer prices around the world.

“The worry is that inflation is becoming too hot to handle by central banks who will be forced to douse economies with jets of freezing water, in the form of much steeper interest rate rises, to get it under control.

“With the era of cheap money coming rapidly to an end, traders are becoming much more risk averse and turning their backs on crypto assets.”

Binance said that it would allow users to withdraw their bitcoin – admidst the market crash – three hours ago after a “stuck transaction causing a backlog”.

However, that has not happened. “This is only impacting the Bitcoin network. You can still withdraw Bitcoin on other networks like BEP-20”, Binance chief executive Changpeng Zhao tweeted.

“Likely this is going to take a bit longer to fix than my initial estimate. More updates soon. Thanks for your patience and understanding.”

“Bitcoin prices suffered after US CPI rose to a four-decade high. With fundamentals currently driving price action, the economic calendar remains key for digital assets. Throughout the week, the release of high-impact economic data has exacerbated fears of rising inflation, weighing on stocks and cryptos alike. With Bitcoin prices currently trading within a well-defined range, the key psychological level of $30,000 continues to provide a firm level of support and resistance for price action, holding both bulls and bears at bay”, Tammy Da Costa, analyst at DailyFX, a portal for financial market news.

“As the war in Ukraine rages on, rising food and energy costs continue to support higher prices, placing additional pressure on policymakers to implement more aggressive monetary tightening measures in an effort to drive inflation lower. With investors pricing in a negative growth outlook and a higher probability for the Federal Reserve to increase rates more aggressively than initially anticipated, Bitcoin bears were able to gain traction before finding support at around the $29,000 mark”, says Ms Da Costa.

“At the time of writing, Bitcoin has fallen by 37 per cent (YTD) as the speculative asset remains vulnerable to the geopolitical backdrop. Although fundamentals remain the prominent driver for price action, major technical levels may act as an additional catalyst for both the immediate and longer-term move.”

“It’s still an uncomfortable moment, and there’s some contagion risk around crypto more broadly,” said Joseph Edwards, head of financial strategy at fund management firm Solrise Finance, as per Reuters.