Investing.com — The cryptocurrency market has had a rough week, culminating in a severe drop early on Monday. Major assets such as , , and fell further, triggering many more liquidations.
Bitcoin price fell below $50,000 for the first time since February, hitting a low of $49,351 before recovering to around $51,000. As a result, the original coin’s dominance rose to 58% as both altcoin and equity markets collapsed, wiping out over 17% of the total cryptocurrency market cap.
The total market capitalization, which stood at around $2.16 trillion last month, has fallen to around $1.76 trillion at the time of writing.
Some cryptocurrency experts predict that recent drops in Bitcoin's price could be the start of a more dramatic downfall, citing an impending economic storm and a decoupling of the cryptocurrency from the broader stock market.
Tristan Dickinson, CMO of exSat Network, told Investing.com that Bitcoin is not immune to global macroeconomic events.
“The capitulation of the Japanese markets (which fell by 12%) has combined with the poor performance of the Dow Jones, the S&P 500 and the Nasdaq and extends a broader feeling of global fears of recession.”
Tristan believes that “pullbacks are inevitable” and if Bitcoin manages to hold above 50,000, this could mark the beginning of a bull market. “But caution is warranted, August and September are historically bad months, so expect sideways action and further testing of Bitcoin support levels,” he added.
Ethereum also plummeted, losing nearly 25% of its value in just two hours, its worst single-day hit since May 2021. At the time of writing, ETH was trading around $2,190, recovering from a low of $2,170 earlier in the day and seeing declines of more than 10%.
The sell-off only worsened amid rumors that a major cryptocurrency market maker liquidated assets following massive transfers of Ether to centralized exchanges.
Panic selling in Bitcoin and the broader cryptocurrency market was fueled by a broader rout in financial markets due to fears of a global recession and rising tensions in the Middle East. Japan’s index fell 12.4%, the index fell 2.8% and micro index futures lost 2.9%.
Solana and Dogecoin were the biggest losers among the top 10 cryptocurrencies by market cap. Solana fell nearly 28% over the past week to $133, while Dogecoin fell around 23% to just under $0.10.
The latest wave of market declines was exacerbated by a disappointing US jobs report released on Friday. The report sparked fears of a recession, weighing on the stock market ahead of the weekend.
