Bitcoin’s wild ride continues as the cryptocurrency took an abrupt fall in trading above $17,000 to hit a ‘low’ of $14,106.Bitcoin price has had its biggest fall in dollar valuation yet, losing over $3,000 from it’s high of $17,203.45 during the early hours of Friday (UTC) down to $14,106.32, global average markets’ data shows.
The 17% drop, while steep, falls short of the 20% decline in bitcoin prices on November 30 – a day after bitcoin price hit $10,000. 3
At press time, bitcoin is trading back above $15,500.
Bitcoin used to be all about libertarians and black-market trade.
The fringe communities that drove Bitcoin in its early years are playing a much less important role in the current rally.
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Many investors have said the most important factor driving the current enthusiasm is the entry of hedge funds and other institutional investors.
The path for large investors has been smoothed by the Chicago Mercantile Exchange and Chicago Board Options Exchange, which have been racing to roll out Bitcoin futures contracts. Most banks are already signed up with these exchanges and consequently can immediately begin trading the contracts. The options exchange has said it plans to start trading on Sunday.
It is still unclear how the arrival of Bitcoin futures will influence the demand for the digital tokens.
With a futures contract, banks can bet on the price of Bitcoin without holding the underlying Bitcoins. This is expected to bring many new players into the market who don’t want to deal with the complications of holding Bitcoins.
But the futures contract will also allow investors to short Bitcoin, or bet on the price’s going down, which has been hard to do until now. Some analysts think this could put downward pressure on the price. Other market participants have worried that Bitcoin futures could spread the risks of Bitcoin into the rest of the financial system.
People still use Bitcoin and other virtual currencies to make ransom payments and buy illegal goods online, including synthetic opioids. But that activity has been on the wane since the authorities shut down some of the largest online black markets this year.
What are the dangers of getting into this market?
Many of the largest exchanges, including in South Korea, are essentially unregulated. The lack of oversight means that no one is checking that the exchanges are properly securing their customers’ money or that large players are not able to manipulate the price. One of the largest exchanges in the world, Bitfinex, has been hacked numerous times and provides little transparency about where it is keeping its money.
Even regulated exchanges, like Coinbase in the United States, have not been battle tested like larger financial institutions, and their operations have gone down at key moments.
Once people buy Bitcoin or other virtual currencies, they are often targeted by hackers who have become experts at penetrating Bitcoin accounts.
Bitcoin “wallets” are vulnerable to new kinds of attacks that are not a problem for ordinary financial accounts.
Most important, in contrast to money in a bank account, when a Bitcoin is gone there is essentially no way to get it back and no insurance covering its loss.
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