Cryptocurrency market cap under $1 trillion first time since January 2021; Bitcoin falls to $22,000

Cryptocurrency, Bitcoin News: The global crypto market cap has slipped below $1 trillion for the first time since January 2021. The total market cap is currently at $944.78 billion, a 3.57% decrease over the last day, according to CoinMarketCap data at 4 PM on June 14. 

The price of Bitcoin (BTC) has also plummeted considerably. The popular cryptocurrency’s price has fallen for nearly 12 straight weeks, from nearly $49,000 in March to around $21,000. In the last 7 days, Bitcoin’s price has moved southward by more than 24%. 

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At 4 PM, Bitcoin was priced at $22,507.14 after falling over 6% in the last 24 hours and the market cap stood at $429 billion. Bitcoin’s dominance is currently 45.29%, a decrease of 1.66% over the day, the data showed.

Bitcoin had reached an all-time high of over $68,000 in November 2021 and has fallen more than 60% since then.

Ethereum, second only to Bitcoin in market cap, was below $1,200 at 4 PM and its market cap stood at $144 billion, according to CoinMarketCap. Ethereum price has crashed more than 30% in the last 7 days.

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The meltdown in the crypto market has erased tens of billions of dollars. The prices of Bitcoin and other crypto-assets have declined by 20 to 40% in the past seven days. Investors have been selling riskier assets such as digital currencies amid fears that the Federal Reserve could aggressively hike the interest rates later this week after inflation in the US hit a fresh 40-year high of 8.6%.

Abhijit Shukla, CEO and Director, Tarality, said that the current situation of the crypto market is just like the mirror situation of the global market. 

“Owing to the current situation, investors are in fear that Federal Reserve can increase the interest rates at any time. The US President’s proposed Saudi visit can give some positive signs in terms of energy prices in the recent future,” he said.

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This is the second notable collapse in the cryptocurrency in less than two months. The stablecoin Terra imploded in early May, erasing tens of billions of dollars in a matter of hours. Stablecoins have been seen as relatively safe, because they’re supposed to be backed by hard assets, such as a currency or gold. 

Celsius halts withdrawals

Meanwhile, crypto lending platform Celsius Network has announced that it was pausing all withdrawals citing ‘extreme market conditions’. “Due to extreme market conditions, today we are announcing that Celsius is pausing all withdrawals, Swap, and transfers between accounts,” the firm wrote in a memo to clients.

The Celsius Network has 1.7 million customers and has $11.8 billion in assets. It’s unclear whether Celsius depositors will get all their funds back.

A cryptocurrency lender is not regulated like a bank, so there’s no deposit insurance and no legal framework for who gets their money back first, like in a bankruptcy. 

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