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Bitcoin Price Plunges Toward $8,000 as Market Grows Heavy

Last Updated March 4, 2021 5:05 PM
Josiah Wilmoth
Last Updated March 4, 2021 5:05 PM

The Bitcoin price plunged toward $8,000 on Thursday as the cryptocurrency market began to grow heavy across the board. Just two top 100-cryptocurrencies — Kin and DigixDAO — managed to advance against the US dollar, while the other 98 endured another day in the red.

Bitcoin Price Dips Below $8,000

On Wednesday, the Bitcoin price fell below $8,000 for the first time since early February, and it has spent the intervening hours fighting to maintain that level the bearish pressure from above. At present, Bitcoin is valued at $8,175 on Bitfinex, which translates into a $139.6 billion market cap and a 42.2 percent share of the overall index.

bitcoin price
Bitcoin Price Chart

Altogether, the cryptocurrency market cap dropped by $26 billion, a single-day retreat of more than seven percent. At present, the index is valued at $330.2 billion — a decline of more than $500 billion from the all-time high it set in early January.

Cryptocurrency Market Grows Heavy Despite Bullish News

The decline correlated with reports that Google will ban cryptocurrency-related advertising, a move that brings its ad policies in line with that of rival Facebook, which began prohibiting these types of ads in January. The pullback also came as a US Congressional subcommittee met to discuss cryptocurrency regulations, particularly in regard to rules governing investor protection.

It’s notable that the correction has proceeded despite the fact that several major fintech firms — including Square and Robinhood — have begun allowing their customers to buy and sell cryptocurrencies through their apps, which are already widely-used among cryptocurrency enthusiasts and non-investors alike.

More recently, Circle launched a full-fledged cryptocurrency brokerage platform and has already rolled it out to 46 US states. This app leverages the firm’s institutional trading desk to provide investors with the ability to instantly purchase five cryptocurrencies, with more expected to be added to the platform in the near future.

However, Google search data indicates that public interest in cryptocurrency is at a relative low point, so the release of these apps is not having the sort of impact it might have had on the market three months ago, when cryptocurrency exchanges were so swamped with traffic that they stopped accepting new user registrations while they worked to scale up their operations.