The cryptocurrency boom seems to lose steam. The one that has been one of the big issues in the market in recent months has been deflated as well as its price of quotation. After marking the bitcoin highs near $ 20,000 at the end of the year, the price of the famous digital currency has plummeted below $ 7,000. That is, in just over three months its price has sunk by 65%.
The other cryptocurrencies are no strangers to this strong fall that bitcoin has experienced. The market capitalization of all of them is close to 260,000 million dollars. The figure is far from its maximums marked at the beginning of the year, when it beat the level of 810,000 million dollars (657,000 million euros).
The Ethereum, the second largest cryptocurrency in terms of capitalization, marked peaks in mid-January. At that time, its price was close to $ 1,400 and currently stands at around $ 385. That is, in less than three months the price of the digital currency has plummeted more than 70%.
Investors have taken advantage of the cryptocurrency rally to make cash and get juicy capital gains. In addition, the news that has surrounded cryptocurrency has not been positive and have revealed the weakness of this type of financial assets. The continuous thefts or hacks that these platforms have suffered, together with an increase in regulation, have caused a major setback in the price of digital currency.
Recently, five markets of cryptocurrencies in Japan have planned to close their activities to the increase in security requirements of the Japanese regulator, following the multi-million dollar robbery suffered in January by one of the largest companies in the sector. The cyber-attack perpetrated against Coincheck at the end of January caused the theft of NEM virtual currency worth around 400 million euros (493 million dollars), and led Japan, a pioneer country in the regulation of the sector, to intensify the surveillance over operators.
The boom experienced by bitcoin has caused many organizations to take advantage of their own cryptocurrencies. Venezuela, for example, had launched the 'petro', its digital currency backed by its oil assets. The digital currency, which has moved more than 600 million euros according to Maduro, has caused the reaction of the United States. Its president, Donald Trump, has signed an executive order that prohibits "all transactions" with "any currency or virtual asset" that is issued by the Government of Venezuela, in reference to the petro, the cryptocurrency launched by Nicolás Maduro .
In our country, scams with this type of assets have skyrocketed in recent months. Therefore, representatives of the Bank of Spain, the National Securities Market Commission (CNMV) and the National Police have warned of the risks of using cryptocurrencies, as they are already receiving complaints for alleged scams and have recalled that they are not legally money.